This New Label From a Marc Jacobs Alum Is Inspired by 'Kill Bill' and 'Buffy'

When Nico Mejia transferred from Los Angeles' Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising (FIDM) to Parsons while pursuing an undergraduate degree in fashion design, he remembers a teacher ripping his first project in his first semester to shreds. "I was so defeated," he says. "She was like, 'This tells me nothing about you. I don't know what this is. This could be Calvin Klein.'" Almost 10 years after graduating from the New York City school, he's launching the ultimate expression of his vision: his own womenswear label.

Kamantigue (pronounced kah-man-tiggy, his Filipino grandparents' last name) is a far cry from that first failing project at Parsons — which, looking back, was a necessary obstacle on his path to design. After all, it inspired him to say "fuck it" and do what he wanted to achieve with his second assignment, which helped him win a CFDA/Teen Vogue Scholarship that contributed to funding his education.

Mejia's fashion journey, though, began in high school. He pinpoints Lady Gaga's early but instantly iconic ensembles, from her infamous meat dress to her Alexander McQueen armadillo heels, as formative images. "As I got older and as a gay kid, I fell in love with pop culture. I saw MTV and VH1 and was just obsessed with entertainment. It opened my eyes to a world outside of the suburbs of DC," he says. "Project Runway" was also central in his early design interest, inspiring him to take sewing classes as a teen. He knew he wanted to have a brand one day: "I just loved the way that you could tell a story through fashion."

Fast-forward to today, and the world Meija's building with Kamantigue revolves around an illusory heroine inspired by his own fictional favorites, like Uma Thurman in "Kill Bill," Milla Jovovich in "The Fifth Element" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer". (Sarah Michelle Gellar, expect a call!) "There's this idea of a flawed woman or flawed girl who's also strong and kicking ass," he says.

There's also a strong music influence. "If you put on a Radiohead album, it'd just feel synonymous to the clothes," he says. "Radiohead is my favorite band of all time. I'm a Pisces — I'm always anxious, always in a dream world. I really hold onto their moodiness. I try and distill these sounds into how I would see them visually." (Further connecting his designs to music, Mejia made a playlist matching each item to a song, with deep cuts from PJ Harvey, Sade, Fiona Apple and more.)

Kamantigue's first drop is more of a capsule that "starts a dialogue." He set out to make "one of everything that you need," from trousers to a skirt — 11 pieces total, in a tight color palette and striking asymmetric silhouettes. Mejia says he doesn't want to categorize the look as "spacey" or "futuristic," though they're certainly in that realm. (Despite his own resistance to these monikers, there are similarities to André Courrèges' space-age-style designs.) There are "Android jeans" made with Japanese denim, mock-neck tops in double-face satin, colorblocked blouses, contrasting skirts and Italian stretch-wool cutout dresses.

"I envisioned Kamantigue for, most likely, a young, professional millennial who's looking for something that's not too trendy, but also not too minimal," Meija says. "I hope to bridge that gap in fashion right now — it feels like there are two ends of being super young, cool and very brat, or being really minimal, like The Row. I hope to go in between."

Collection 001 will launch on the brand's website at the end of August with pieces ranging from $350 to $1,095 available for pre-order.

Meija wouldn't have had the knowledge and network to launch a brand without the experiences he had before this. He's built up quite the résumé since graduating: An internship turned into a "formative" full-time position at Marc Jacobs, where he designed leather accessories, could be a fly on the wall to the founder and learned "how to work with big personalities" for four years. He then had stints Derek Lam 10 Crosby, Area and Prabal Gurung. At the latter, he really sharpened his craft, getting to work alongside the CFDA Award-winning designer in a senior role, leading and executing the label's Fall 2023 season.

"Prabal offered me the opportunity to start the collection from the ground up, concept-wise, sketch-wise, fabric-wise," Mejia says. "Every other role before had been setting me up for it, learning how every single thing was done or handled, but I was always making somebody else's vision come to life. Prabal let me propose my vision to him for the company."

Having this behind-the-scenes experience set him up for when he eventually decided to go out on his own. "I wouldn't have known how to order a fabric without building those relationships," he says. "These are mills that I've worked with that have taken a chance with and taken me seriously as an independent designer to order their fabrics."

Sure, Mejia is a little anxious as he rolls out a project that's entirely his own. Nerves are normal around starting something new, especially when it's a self funded business — though he can lean on a support system of family, friends and his partner. More than anything, he's experiencing a euphoric sense of freedom.

"Being able to have something that's fully my concept and a design that I want to make without having to get it approved by anybody or making sure it fits with somebody else's brand or somebody else's vision… I've been equating it to coming out a little bit," he says. "I've had this whole concept in mind for a while. Just doing something for myself felt right to do it now."

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