The Great Divide talk to Silas Adler of Soulland

Online purveyors of Menswear, The Great Divide have recently done an interview with the man behind Danish label Soulland. And to accompany the piece, the guys have shot some of the latest collection against the backdrop of some of London’s most architecturally revered social housing.

TGD:  There’s a lot of architecture in your sweats and shirting for the coming season. The house print/embroidery is definitely my favourite thing in the collection. What was the inspiration behind these pieces? The sleeve print to me seems to reference old skate and metal shirts.

Silas: It’s funny because it’s two very strong inspirations merge into one sweatshirt.

The Inspiration for the houses comes from Paris and the fashion house as a structure – The Maison. It all started in Paris with Lanvin, Chanel, LV etc. I started to think of the institutions as the rulers and the ones who control fashion, sort of like the Illuminati or some thing like that. So I drew all these houses and made small sentences to go with each house. Then to make a complete contrast I made the piece as a classic skate sweatshirt.

TGD:  The prevailing theme behind your SS13 collection is the French bourgeoisie. I read somewhere that your intention was to poke a little fun at bourgeois tendencies. Now I don’t believe that we’re all completely free of bourgeois inclinations – in our office for example there’s a few coffee snobs. What’s your guilty bourgeois tendency that you couldn’t live without?

Silas: I mean just the fact that I work in fashion. I don’t know, I guess I’m a bit of a coffee snob actually now that you mentioned it. I drink my coffee black with no sugar or milk, so why bother drinking coffee that taste like shit. This one goes out to all the coffee snobs at TGD – I’m with you!

TGD:  There always seems to be an element of humour in Soulland collections, do you think that it’s important that fashion incorporates an element of humour.

Silas: There is always humour and irony in the Soulland collections. I think it´s super important that fashion can be fun.

TGD:  Do you still keep up with skateboarding? I’m of the opinion that once you’re a skateboarder, you’re always a skateboarder even if you can’t physically skateboard anymore – take Cardiel for example. There’s a lot of really cool Scandinavian skateboarding right now with Dank Magazine and companies like Bellows and of course Polar.

Silas: I agree! Once you go deep into skateboarding you will never find your way out.

And you shouldn’t! I will not compare myself to Cardiel because he is one of the most hardcore people ever. People always mention Danny Way and I get the fact that he is a robot and bla bla bla. But Cardiel is the a truth.

I think there are two kinds of pros. The ones that skaters like; Cardiel, Busenitz, Chewy Cannon, Lucas Puig etc. Then there are the pros that the public likes; Prod, Nyjah Huston, Mikey Taylor etc… Street League – ESPN etc. And to make my point; a lot of the new things from the Scandinavian scene is based on the by Skateboarders for Skateboarders mentality. Im down! Polar is going off and putting Malmø and Copenhagen on the map. Respect! By the way, I still skate –  just not enough!

TGD:  Any plans to venture outside of menswear?

Silas: I mean we do shoes and accessories now. The shoe collection is starting to go really good so that will continue to be a focus. But not womenswear for now…

Thanks to the guys at The Great Divide for sharing the interview. Soulland’s clothing is available from them now, so if you like what you see above go here, and to see more of the Spring/Summer 2013 collection go to the website here: Soulland.