Interview with the Founders of Brock Collection

For him: cowboy boots, vintage denim and T-shirts. For her: easy cotton dresses and sweaters. Brock Collection is an amalgamation of styles derived from the little-bit-country upbringings of founders Kris Brock and Laura Vassar. A complementary juxtaposition of jeans and evening gowns, knits and romantic tops, the line is beloved on the runway, red carpet and in real life.

The business partners first met in 2010 while studying at Parsons School of Design in New York City. "We started working together on our school projects," says Vassar from sunny Southern California, where the two are now based. "We realized Kris was really great at this aspect [of design], and I was really great at another aspect. All we would do was work," she says—and that hard work paid off.

With the brand now available at Nordstrom, we spoke to the duo about how the whole thing started nearly six years ago and the way each season reflects the easy, breezy California-meets-upscale-New York vibes they've become known for.

How did you start Brock Collection?

Laura Vassar:
It came together one season when we went to Paris—we were at dinner with friends, and they were like, "Next season, you two need to come back to Paris with a collection." So, we went home to New York and started working on a collection, and we did it. We brought it back to Paris [that next] February and presented to all the stores and editors; it was two racks of clothes that we were just really happy to show.

Where did the inspiration for the first collection come from?

LV:
Kris, do you remember that roll of fabric? The face of the fabric was this grey floral—Kris liked the grey side, but I liked the [opposite] red side. We kept flipping it back and forth, and we started the collection like that. We started making coats and dresses and skirts out of it, and we just fell in love with that. It all began with pieces that could be staples in her wardrobe but that weren't just your average print.

Kris Brock:
Yeah, and I think that's also what we focused on for those first few collections—it was focused around basics. We were making clothes that we felt like she could live in.

LV:
In special prints and special fabrics that you may not be able to find elsewhere.

KB:
Yeah, and I think we quickly kind of found out how much we liked the fabric development part of it because, since the beginning, we kind of always gravitated toward very graphic, special, really expensive fabrics, which also, at the time, dictated our price point.

How do you put a collection together today?

KB:
I think it's still about making pieces that she can live in and feel really passionate about wearing. We always go back to what she's going to want to wear from a staple standpoint.

LV:
That's exactly right. We kind of go back to her wardrobe and how she needs to fill it. You know, she needs a pair of raw denim she can wear daily, she needs sweaters that she can throw on that are realistic to her lifestyle. And then we also always have cocktail options for events and things, and then there's the occasional day dress that she could wear for a luncheon.

What about the gowns?

LV:
Evening gowns are something that we do well with because, for us, an evening gown needs to be pushed—it needs to be special. It needs to be something that feels couture but she could buy off the rack. So, if you think about the collection as a whole, our goal is always to make sure that she has everything in the Brock world that she can go to for any element of her lifestyle.

KB:
Over the years, we've kind of defined our process a little more. It's interesting because I think we work in different ways than most designers, where we kind of only sketch dresses and launch prototype collections only on dresses and then build a collection from it, which I'm starting to see when we take a step back and look at a collection—we haven't talked about the brand's beginning in a long time.

LV:
Yeah, it is loads of dresses, but then dresses evolve into tops and skirts, and then they become a whole offering.

Describe your style in three words.

LV:
Oh, gosh. I would say livable, definitely romantic … and I don't know what the third would be.

KB:
I think I would just go back to what we always say as a brand. We're all-American romance because I wear a lot of cowboy boots and braided leather belts and T-shirts and jeans, but then I wear a lot of trousers with T-shirts, as well, and blazers with T-shirts.

Would you say the collection is reminiscent of your own personal styles?

LV:
I think so. For me, it's always thinking of my childhood and a combination of this "American, being on a ranch, really rural and outdoorsy" [vibe] with this need for cozy knitwear and jeans and then also the dreamy element of floral gowns. I definitely think that when you develop a collection, you always think, "Will I wear this? Am I going to live in this?" That's really important to always answer yes to.

KB:
I feel like both of our personal styles really kind of live through the collection. Like Laura was saying, kind of "on-a-ranch country life." Laura grew up in Northern California, and I grew up in Texas, so we both have a semi-equestrian feel to our background, which I think plays through on the romance side.

Has the collection changed coming from New York to the West Coast?

LV:
Interestingly enough, not so much—just because we've always kind of had the California lifestyle in our sensibilities with the collection. Even in the beginning [in New York], we were always thinking of things she could wear in California. I think our goal has kind of always been to make sure that we put both of those sensibilities in the collection.

What items do you each have the most of in your closet? 

KB:
Mine is probably denim. I have so much—I love vintage denim, like old Wranglers, old Levi's—and then T-shirts.

LV:
I have tons of dresses and cotton dresses that are easy to wear every day, as well as sweaters and jeans, but I'm pretty much obsessed with dresses.

If you could swap wardrobes with anyone, who would it be?

KB:
If I could swap wardrobes with anyone, it would be Tom Ford, for sure. For both day and night.

LV:
Mine would be Lauren Santo Domingo.

KB:
That's a good answer.

LV:
Yeah, Lauren Santo Domingo, 100 percent.