Artistic Careers in 2020 — A Series |Khang Le
The first steps in a career are never easy, and even for those who are more established, the path to growth isn’t always straightforward. Software engineers, branding professionals, actors — we all have growing pains. In this series, we will explore the lives of creatives at different stages of their careers, how they have been developing their skills for the past few months, and what they see for their future. This series includes designers, entrepreneurs, models, and musicians.
This is part one.
Upstate New York
How do you become an influential force in casinos and the bridal industry by the age of 21? Easy. Get rejected by your dream school. Twice.
2014 had Billboard topped by Pharrell, Lorde, Katy Perry. Dexter had become a fashion inspiration for L.L.Bean, and 17 year old Khang Le was finishing up high school in Frederick, Maryland.
Khang Le was president of Tuscarora High School’s fashion club. He had a portfolio. He was teaching his classmates how to sketch and design. Everyone and anyone you could possibly ask believed he would get into a top design school and become successful. By the time senior year came around, classmates he had tutored started posting dream school acceptance letters.
Everyone looked at my portfolio and said I should be a designer. I went to art class every day, and I was confident that I should be in fashion. When I applied to FIT, I got a rejection for the first time in my life.
That was my first big disappointment.
It was heartbreaking.
With no backup, he took all his savings and moved to Vietnam. For 10 hours a day, every single day, Khang practiced drawing, patternmaking, and sewing. This was his life for 5 months.
2015 came around, and Khang Le returned to America, this time settling down in New York, where he attended Herkimer Community College with the intent to get an associates degree in fashion merchandising. This was it. His creative drive couldn’t wait anymore, and with the help of fashion professor Amy Roepnack and the experience he had gained, Khang Le produced a collection — the first collection he had ever made in his life — that got multiple features in New York Fashion Week.
The publicity from this event introduced him to more events in the industry, including charity events for breast cancer awareness and Syracuse Fashion Week — accompanied by Alexis Reed (VP of the Fashion Club)and Amy Roepnack. This last event served as a catapult. From then on, he worked with models daily and interned with professionals around the world, confident that with this additional experience, he would get the approval from his dream school. He applied to FIT again, only to receive a rejection letter with no specified reason.
He gave up.
FIT wasn’t going to take him. That much was clear. From 2015 to 2017, he produced at least two collections a year until he eventually received a letter from FIT inviting him to be a VIP attendee to the honors student collection fashion show.
When I got there they would ask, “What’s your name?” and then I’d tell them, “I’m ‘Khangle.’”
“Oh you have your pieces in the show!”
When I saw the name there — my name — that was the best feeling ever.
The students he had tutored in high school were now juniors in FIT, and they needed internships to graduate. They became his assistants and worked with the Khangle brand.
They asked me how I started. To be honest, without a rejection letter from FIT, I wouldn’t be here now.
Project Runway interviewed me, and I realized that when I told my story. Of course, I’m not encouraging people to drop out of college. Actually, I still went to college, just not where I wanted. Whether you go to a big school or a famous school or not doesn’t mean you will get anywhere in fashion. Fashion starts from the bottom of your heart, your energy, who are you on the inside.
Interviewer: You got FIT’s attention. What happened after that?
From 2017 to 2019, I hit the jackpot. I traveled full time around America doing fashion without really selling anything. Most designers make a collection and sell, but I don’t. I don’t want to go to a fashion show and show people a product and then try to sell it to them. I want to give them a performance. They get to watch something they don’t get to see every day. Most of the producers I’ve worked with love me so much because I try to give the audience something worth their time and their money. I got involved with lighting, music, DJ, and dancers instead of focusing on making t-shirts or jeans and trying to sell them. I give the audience goosebumps, and producers like me in their show because of this. Let’s say a show has 10 designers. 7 out of 10 have products they want to sell to make a profit. The other 3 are avant-garde. This makes the audience glad to look at something weird, you know. Art. Every fashion show, the producers need to balance that. People ask me, “Where can you buy it?” and I say “Nowhere, I don’t sell anything.”
Khang Le’s independent projects are defined by this principle. In many ways, he is more of a choreographer and a teacher than a designer. This is very prominent when he speaks about his experience and values.
I respect and I work with models so much more than I work with designer processes. The model is the soul of the collection. A lot of designers put no focus on the model’s feelings, but when I work with my models, I train them. I give them photoshoots for free. I train them a lot. I tell them, “You walk out there to be seen, it’s your moment on stage.”
That makes them confident, you know? So it makes them better. Models started coming to me for help to pass model castings, and I started traveling for my workshops.
Interviewer: That covers the pre-2020 era. What’s going on now? Where do you see your career going after 2020?
Yeah, 2019 was a big year as a runway director. One of my projects was Ronald McDonald House Charity. We brought back over $160,000 for the charity after that show. We had more than 10 designers, about 145 models. I worked on the “Stitched Fashion” event with executive director Mike Schinnerer in Albany, NY. I became the creative director for the Golden World International Beauty Pageant…
Now, I have an investor who is investing in my future, Rebecca K. At first I hesitated. I wanted to keep my projects exclusive. It’s more like… When people see what I make, they think about Katy Perry, they think about Lady Gaga. Something futuristic, something weird. I didn’t want to lose the identity of what I made. So I decided to make something that could be completely separate from what I was already doing, and I did bridalwear, suits. I make suits for rappers, for dancers, and I have a physical design studio in upstate New York now. The showroom name is “Whisky Jacks Glass Slipper.” I am really thankful to Rebecca for this. I have big plans for 2021. These plans are the biggest steps in my life so far. This is the year that magazines have actually looked at me. Actually, some of my plans haven’t been released to the public yet, so they are confidential, but you’ll see me.
Interviewer: What advice do you need from people?
I want to connect with people who are involved in magazines — the stylists and producers. I want to know how magazines work with designers. Is crediting fair? For models, makeup artists, designers, photographers — how do you correctly credit people? I always want to find someone professional who can talk to me about this. Like Anna Wintour or Marc Jacobs. (laughs)
Interviewer: Finally, what advice do you have for people?
This is advice to models that I got from Alexander Wang. I’ll remember it forever. For anyone who wants to become a model: part time, full time, for fun, or if you want to be famous; the question you need to ask yourself is “do you want to be a model? or do you want to be famous?” That’s the question. Same for designers and stylists. The same question. Some people love the feeling they get on the runway, wearing the makeup, but others want to have something to post on social media or to get more popular. Neither one is right and neither one is wrong, but you need to know your reason, because it changes how you approach things.
