And by “Jack of all Trades” we mean.…he does every­thing. After estab­lish­ing him­self in the mod­el­ing indus­try, he uti­lized his tal­ents, expe­ri­ence and love of art to develop his own world of fash­ion, unique inde­pen­dence, and an over­all brand to make him­self not only one of the most ver­sa­tile indi­vid­u­als in fash­ion, but one of integrity and passion.

In the midst of his busy sched­ule, Bran­don gave Emer­ald Chic’s fash­ion cor­re­spon­dent, Patrick, a few moments of his time for some insight into his career, his expan­sion, and even a few point­ers for you men out there look­ing for some fash­ion advice.

PH: What can you say is an “unfor­get­table mod­el­ing moment”?

BT: That’s a hard one for me to answer and nar­row it down, I thank God daily for what he’s given to me in this busi­ness. Most of my guy friends would say its prob­a­bly a job I’ve had play­ing Heidi Klum’s lover for Vogue over a few days work, a sexy rolling around shoot with Alessan­dra Ambro­sio on the beach, sleep­ing in Elle Macpherson’s house or hav­ing Gisele Bund­chen top­less on me for a shoot for a jeans com­pany cam­paign but that (as crazy as it sounds) became nor­mal. I would prob­a­bly say it was stay­ing in a 17 bed­room Igloo in the top of the Alps in Switzer­land for work for two weeks and get­ting paid to be in the most beau­ti­ful place I’d ever seen while snow­board­ing, snow­mo­bil­ing, and eat­ing fon­due daily!

PH: So, what’s new with you? You are quite the DJ-in-Demand. How is the dj career going?

BT: The career is amaz­ing! It’s mov­ing a lit­tle faster than I wish but how do you com­plain about that? The prob­lem with being a jack of all trades is God only made 24 hrs in a day. Recently, I’ve been spin­ning fun stuff like Sun­glass Hut Store Open­ing with the Strokes, a celebs birth­day party with The Fugees, and a one on one gig with R Kelly with me mix­ing and him per­form­ing for the club (he’s still got it).

PH: Like a num­ber of mod­els, you have branched out into another busi­ness. For me, it has been jour­nal­ism and event pro­duc­tion. And I hear rumors of you dab­bling in inte­rior design. Fill us in on this. What is the name and what are the origins?

BT: Well I grew up with a dad that taught me how to make every­thing with my own two hands. I watched him sin­gle hand­edly build our house and teach me all of this along the way. I love being a handy­man and actu­ally think­ing out­side the box for dif­fer­ent ideas. Such as my old walk­ing stick as my cur­tain rod and recy­cling old pieces and turn­ing them into my creation.

PH: What is the focus? Are you like Cindy Craw­ford Home and Kathy Ireland’s line, focused on devel­op­ing prod­ucts for the home, or are you more focused on design­ing inte­ri­ors by shop­ping for items that fit into a client’s par­tic­u­lar style philosophy.

BT: I am actu­ally try­ing to do a triple play. I want to make my own art, sell them their apart­ments or con­dos (yes I also do real estate too), and design their apart­ment with my art inside.

PH: What are your upcom­ing design projects? Any clients of note that you can mention?

BT: Well I’ve actu­ally now been asked about putting my art in a gallery here now and I’m prep­ping for a hair salon I’m design­ing in SoHo, which should be very inter­est­ing as I have full lee­way to do as I wish.

PH: CONGRATS on both counts. What were the design cues/​inspirations for your space?

BT: I have always been in love with design­ing to look like you stepped foot into another coun­try or time era. My place is now really Moroc­can style with col­ors and fur­ni­ture that I’ve made.

PH: What else is going on in Bran­don Trentham’s life? I hear a char­i­ta­ble orga­ni­za­tion is on the hori­zon, fill us in.

BT: My Favorite Sub­ject to talk about!!!!!! I have been work­ing with so many dif­fer­ent char­i­ties and groups for many years now but never had a sole pur­pose or project. The “Hope House Hon­duras” is just that, a Chris­t­ian run orphan­age that gives them hope and light at the end of the tun­nel. I am work­ing full time with it now as well and just built the web­site for it myself. Peo­ple can find out on the site how to become a part of it and see the bless­ings that I have got­ten to. www​.Hope​house​hon​duras​.org

PH: Finally, no one can deny that you are one of the most styl­ish mod­els around. While the rest of us fall back to the “Reli­able Model Uni­form” of white v-​​neck t-​​shirt, jeans, boots, and a really good watch, you are always turned out in some­thing uber-​​tasteful and edgy. Be it see­ing you on the red car­pet, bump­ing into you at a restau­rant, or even train­ing with you at the gym (yes, we are train­ing partners…lifting upper body today), you always get it right. What is your per­sonal style philosophy?

BT: It’s not about being on the brink of the new trend, it’s about being dif­fer­ent from every­one else. By the time peo­ple start wear­ing the same thing as me I wanna be over it. I like to buy a nice piece and change it to my lik­ing, whether its patches and new but­tons or cut­ting off a col­lar or half the sleeves. I once cut a whole in the top back of my jeans to have a place for my ban­dana to go through and tie. Dif­fer­ent is good. Your style should match your per­son­al­ity and never con­form. That’s BORING!

PH: What is your present fash­ion obses­sion? That one piece you have/​want to get? Mine is a Pey­man Umay bespoke suit, I wore one on the red car­pet and have cov­eted one ever since?

BT: HHHMMM well in the win­ter it was my heated under­wear (lol), but now my new bowtie obses­sion for the sum­mer. The web­site is called www​.ties​for​char​ity​.com and just as it sounds when you pur­chase them money gives back! What bet­ter way!

PH: What tips would you give guys out there for “get­ting it right”?

BT: Well that’s a broad ques­tion but if it’s about fash­ion, only wear what your com­fort­able in, if your not peo­ple can tell. If it’s about women, be your­self and never use a line, a sim­ple hello goes along way. If it’s about life, I’ll have to get back to you I’m still read­ing the book now.

Inter­view cour­tesy of Patrick Hazelwood:

Richard Gerst is an up-​​and-​​comer that is mak­ing SERIOUS waves both in the States as well as in Europe. He seam­lessly moves from high-​​fashion to com­mer­cial work and is get­ting cov­ers left and right now. He is the dar­ling of the model agen­cies being begged to shoot all their “new” and “big” faces alike. For a rel­a­tive new­bie, he is already encroach­ing on the ter­ri­tory of such names as Bruce Weber, Hud­son Wright, Rick Day, Stephen Klein, and some such. EC had the oppor­tu­nity to talk with the ever so busy Mr. Gerst and get a lit­tle insight into his world of fash­ion photography.

Q: When and where did you get your start in pho­tog­ra­phy? Give us a peek into the back­ground of Mr. Gerst.

A: When I was in my 20’s I remixed and com­posed dance music. After mov­ing to NYC in 1995 I did some inde­pen­dent label remixes that were pressed to vinyl, but I real­ized imme­di­ately that I really couldn’t enjoy other peo­ple lis­ten­ing, because even though I love to go out, I tend to be asleep by 10 pm.

So in 2005 I began think­ing more visually…

I bought my first dig­i­tal Canon in ’05 and shot maybe 10 test shoots from some agency guys from 2006–2009 just for fun.

They were all pretty aver­age except ONE. The dif­fer­ence being — the model and I .The agency was like “Wow! VERY nice images!”

Around Feb of 2008 I saw an edi­to­r­ial spread in Pref mag­a­zine out of Paris with images by Rick Day, and it was like being struck by lightning.

I con­tacted Steve Benisty, Rick’s rep, and insisted on meet­ing Mr. Day,

One of the most impor­tant things Rick told me, and I will never for­get it:

“Richard: Stop shoot­ing what you think oth­ers want. Shoot what Richard wants. It will come through in the images.”

Q: No mat­ter what the indus­try, there is always that inspi­ra­tion or role model. For me, it was a com­bi­na­tion of Mar­cus Schenken­berg (who has since become a friend) and Tyson Beck­ford. Markus, because he was the 1^st male model I knew by name and to earn over 1 mil­lion dol­lars as a model when I was FIRST get­ting approached to be in this busi­ness which I knew noth­ing about, and Tyson because he weak­ened the color bar­rier and paved the way for black guys like me to go to places like Italy, Aus­tralia, Paris, etc and be taken seri­ously as a model. Who was you’re the first pho­tog­ra­pher whose work really “spoke” to you?  What was the first photo that cap­tured your atten­tion? In mod­el­ing for me, there was the iconic shot of Tyson and Naomi Camp­bell for Polo Ralph Lauren.

A: This is a tough question.

Obvi­ously Day– and I specif­i­cally emu­lated him in this first year of shoot­ing edi­to­r­ial work.

Weber, Testino, and Ritts as well.

Q: Your pic­tures are always so beau­ti­fully exe­cuted and you are so easy to work with. These pho­tos taken for this EMERALD CHIC fea­ture, are some of my favorite shots and you seemed to have a clear idea of how you wanted to present me.  When I arrived at your stu­dio, you had already prepped sets, had props, and were ready to shoot the 1^st look within min­utes of my arrival with­out  hav­ing met me.  The expe­ri­ence was great

A: The set up for a shoot com­pletely depends on the lead-​​in. If an agency calls and needs a nice head­shot plus a lit­tle of my magic then I have an expec­ta­tion of start­ing with strobes and a spe­cific set­ting and look.  Then I dis­cuss other options with the tal­ent often based  on pre­vi­ous work and the per­son I think I see through their images or book. Some­times I ask about their hob­bies or goals or work or char­i­ties. I like con­fi­dent mas­culin­ity and sex­ual energy, so to send me a guy and not expect that I will try to obtain a  shot that is visu­ally excit­ing on a sen­sual level is quite frankly … stupid.

And I don’t really care how they have been pre­vi­ously portrayed.

Q: What “story” did you have in mind for the beau­ti­ful shots that accom­pany this article?

A: Hav­ing known about you, your work and your fash­ion con­nec­tions, shoot­ing you was interesting.

You were only the 4^th black model I have ever shot, one of the oth­ers being Nazri Segaro of Project Run­way (who’s por­trait hangs in my pri­vate col­lec­tion, with the other print in a famous actress’ apt in Manhattan …).

… I want the viewer to feel like they see a glimpse of that person’s soul.

When I met you I got a sense of your enthu­si­asm, your will­ing­ness to work hard, a cer­tain sex­i­ness …I sensed a slight antic­i­pa­tion… that you really wanted a suc­cess­ful shoot.

There­fore, I wanted to show a cou­ple of shots that might sug­gest some­thing softer about you, some­thing a bit more vul­ner­a­ble and approach­able, some­thing real, and a glimpse of an inti­mate moment that only your clos­est friends might experience…the sim­ple basis for your story.

Q: I was hon­ored to have been added to your ros­ter of mod­els. Please tell our EMERALD CHIC audi­ence how you go about select­ing subjects?

A: The inter­net and dig­i­tal pub­lish­ing have com­pletely rewrit­ten the book on how emerg­ing pho­tog­ra­phers find tal­ent.  The truth is, I sim­ply can­not accom­mo­date all of the requests I receive.  As I move into more celebri­ties and PR firms, via LA and NYC, I con­tact any­one I am inter­ested in.  I think what I am most inter­ested in is not only a strong phys­i­cal pres­ence and good face, but some­thing play­ful.  I am drawn to light … both the phys­i­cal medium and from within.

Q: Along the same line, I have been mod­el­ing for years and have noted that, much like our female coun­ter­parts, male mod­els too have been shrink­ing in size. One need just look at the cur­rent Prada and Burberry cam­paigns to see this. There were times in Paris, where I was “too big”. The design­ers were speak­ing in French, and had no idea I was flu­ent in it. It is refresh­ing to see a pho­tog­ra­pher that shoots fit men with a fash­ion­able edge. What is your take on this? Do you get a lot of pres­sure to select skin­nier models?

No. For cam­paigns, I don’t choose.  For edi­to­r­ial work, it depends on the book and I tar­get accord­ingly. I am also a nat­u­ral­ist, and I appre­ci­ate lean and not overly muscular.

Q: EMERALD CHIC read­ers saw your recent cover for DNA magazine…spectacular! What is on the hori­zon for Mr. Gerst? What upcom­ing projects can we look for­ward to? There are rumors of sev­eral edi­to­ri­als and a book??? Do tell.

A: Thanks for that!

My first book “Defen­sio” being pub­lished by Out­next Media for the iPad is await­ing approval from Apple, Inc. as we speak. Prob­a­bly by the hol­i­days it will be out. A very lim­ited edi­tion hard­bound ver­sion, signed and num­bered, will ship about  mid Jan 2011. Prob­a­bly only 20–30 copies for at about $300 apiece (more than half already spo­ken for). I

” I am always work­ing on new edi­to­r­ial work, includ­ing shoot­ing for 2 print Euro­pean mag­a­zines, a USA mag­a­zine, and a pos­si­ble story in an Inter­na­tional Fash­ion mag­a­zine with a female actress that I am very excited about.

Q: As EMERALD CHIC is a fash­ion spot, what trends do you see in the fore­front when it comes to fash­ion pho­tog­ra­phy (and fash­ion in general)?

A: For men, I see a move back to more sen­su­al­ity and body work with lean, nat­ural mus­cu­lar­ity. I think straight Amer­i­can men are finally get­ting com­fort­able see­ing a guy that is in awe­some shape with­out much cloth­ing on.… While gay men or women may find the image sen­sual, straight men are more on the level of “Wow, that guy works hard.” I have also noticed that younger men have stopped defin­ing them­selves by their sex­u­al­ity and I find that inter­est­ing, and a state­ment about dif­fer­ences in gen­er­a­tions (mine vs. theirs).

www​.richardgerst​.com

(+1) 561.NYC.FOTO

Just this morn­ing, Alexan­der McQueen, one of fashion’s most ecclec­tic and iconic design­ers, was found dead in his apart­ment in Lon­don. He was only 40 years old.

His design, unpar­alled. His pas­sion, remark­able. His life’s work, legendary.

We are sad to hear the news, but his fash­ions will be remem­bered for years to come. RIP

Don’t fear my friends, you will soon be able to see the lat­est in fash­ion trends, news, design­ers, bou­tiques and more from the Emer­ald Coast and across the globe!

We have cor­re­spon­dents in NYC, Miami, and Europe who are cov­er­ing the lat­est in every­thing chic! Stay tuned for our offi­cial launch in Feb­ru­ary after the Mercedez-​​Benz Fash­ion Week in New York. You won’t want to miss out on all the newest fash­ions and chic pics! Going to be uber fabulous!

Although this ad pub­lished some time ago, I couldn’t help but rekin­dle the love I have for the ever so care­fully designed ads of Marc Jacobs. There just some­thing about the ran­dom­ness potrayed in every ad that seems to make me stop, put down my cof­fee and think “what the heck am I look­ing at?” But calm takes it course when I imme­di­ately rec­og­nize the style, imag­ing and pho­tog­ra­phy of one of life’s most fas­ci­nat­ing designers. All is well because it’s Marc Jacobs at his best. Por­tray­ing not only the images of life, but the most unfil­tered hap­pen­ings that seem to take place, or have taken place at some point in our unpre­dictable lives.

Not sure if it’s the fact that when one ad posts a lady hang­ing over the side rail­ing of a con­struc­tion site with noth­ing but painted graf­fiti in the back­ground that just seems to revive the mar­ti­nis I had the night before.…or per­haps that kick-​​back to days past with bright red painted lip­stick and fero­cious eye­brows. But some­how, only Marc Jacobs can do ads just this way…and it works tremendously!

Oh how I love it!