This is the new name of the game for labels like Chavarria’s, to find a corporate partner eager for some “community” brownie points to foot the bill. He worked with Tinder for his first show in Paris and his ties with Adidas have become closer. He’s had a fruitful partnership with the sportswear behemoth since 2024 (if not with the misstep of mimicking a pair of huaraches, the traditional leather sandals made by Indigenous artisans in Mexico, for which the designer apologized), and is also now acting as a consultant, working on its inline collections in addition to his cobranded collaboration.
He’s also teamed up with Grindr for this show. “I’m really happy to partner with them because, first of all, I’m here to support anything gay,” he says with a laugh. “Grindr is used for sex, for a hookup, but they have this interesting perspective on how they celebrate a very elevated perspective of gay culture.”
The work with these corporate sponsors has become a business of itself for Chavarria. He launched Creative Services, through which he offers visual consultancy services to brands and partners. “It’s been like a side hustle for me,” he says. Plainly, Creative Services allows Chavarria to produce and conceptualize campaigns and other projects, the income of which goes back into his brand. Corporations come to him for a partnership and Chavarria turns them into clients, too, doubling his income stream.
“These companies, they’re desperate for cultural validity,” Chavarria says. “I’m not stupid, I know what I’m giving them. I am offering a pathway to a demographic that brings them business,” he says, “a way to connect with people that corporations can’t always figure out how to reach.”
Photographer Ellen Fedors.
He is now in expansion mode, partnering with talent and making luxury clothing, but he’s not leaving behind his core audience. Chavarria has also decided to launch a diffusion line called Big Willy as of this show. It will be an inexpensive version offering the clothes he was first known for before he leaned into luxury wear and tailoring: Clever slogan and printed tees, generously cut hoodies and trackwear, and even underwear. “I want to provide a world that people can immerse themselves in,” he says, “knowing that not all can afford my $800 jeans, but they could afford the $150 Big Willy pieces.”
As Chavarria works on spreading his gospel on a global scale—and stage—he’s also thinking of ways to expand that vision past the Latino identity. “It’s not always going to be Latino centric, but at this exact moment right now, I think it’s necessary for the world to see Latinos in all our glory,” the designer says. “In the most beautiful clothes, singing the most beautiful music. This needs to be on the highest pedestal I can possibly manage, and I will do whatever I can do for the world to see that.”
