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Willy Chavarria Is a Unisex Designer Making Undergarments His Way

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Willy Chavarria Is a Unisex Designer Making Undergarments His Way

One of the first things designers aim for when they achieve a bit of commercial success is to get into underwear. As long as there are M.B.A.s, the Calvin Klein business model will be a subject of study, and it is the rare designer who does not, at some point, figure out that while dressing stars and making glamorous runway clothes are great for one’s image, the margins are in skivvies.

Consider Willy Chavarria. Almost a decade after starting his namesake label in 2015, Mr. Chavarria, a former senior vice president of design at Calvin Klein, became a freshly anointed fashion star in his mid-50s by winning back-to-back men’s wear Designer of the Year awards from the Council of Fashion Designers of America in 2023 and 2024.

Late last year, he introduced the first line of men’s undergarments for his brand. (Although he is considered a men’s wear designer, Mr. Chavarria, a red-carpet go-to for rule-bending celebrities like Colman Domingo, Billie Eilish and Kendrick Lamar, terms his clothes unisex.) Being an inveterate provocateur, he called the line Big Willy.

Not content with that, Mr. Chavarria, 57, tested consumer tolerance this month by releasing a new capsule collection that includes tank tops, boxer briefs and jockstraps (along with sweatshirts, shorts and socks) that were manipulated to look sweat-stained, torn and otherwise distressed.

The collection is meant to both engage and provoke, said Mr. Chavarria, who produced it in collaboration with Latino Fan Club, a pornography studio with a specialized target market and what may be politely called a D.I.Y. aesthetic. Founded in 1985 by Dana Bryan, a photographer who went by the pseudonym Brian Brennan, the studio, now defunct, offered a visual alternative to the glossy, sanitized iconography then dominating gay pornography.

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With amateur styling and models almost certainly cast from the streets of New York, Latino Fan Club existed to celebrate raw sexuality at a time when AIDS had largely sent Eros underground. To whatever extent possible via an exploitative medium, it exalted gay Latinx sexuality, said Vince Aletti, a former photography critic for The New Yorker and The Village Voice, who has written about Latino Fan Club.

“It was a relief from all the white boy porn we’d been seeing for years,” Mr. Aletti said.

Mr. Chavarria, who called Latino Fan Club “iconic,” described the studio’s disruptive approach to pornography as mirroring the way he thought about his fashion label.

“In our line of work, there’s got to be more meaning behind the pretty pictures,” said the designer, who is making his debut at men’s fashion week in Paris on Friday. “Everything we do has to have some sort of force behind it, to break through the oppressive aspects of the world. Otherwise, why do it?”

For Jess Cuevas, an art director in Los Angeles who serves as Mr. Chavarria’s muse and right-hand man, flouting the norms of the luxury goods trade is part of the label’s aesthetic mission.

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“I love the idea that luxury can also be so gritty and gross,” Mr. Cuevas said. And, indeed, the installations Mr. Cuevas designed for the Dover Street Market stores where the collection is sold meticulously replicate the raunchy atmospherics of the XXX bookstores that inspired them.

“To me, so much luxury is vulgar,” said Mr. Cuevas, who was a creative force behind Madonna’s last tour. “What I love is taking luxury and deliberately bringing it to this vulgar place.”

In that sense, Mr. Chavarria’s latest foray into undergarments deviates from the Calvin Klein formula, even as that brand has also toyed with the visual conventions of pornography sites like OnlyFans in its recent underwear ads starring the actor Jeremy Allen White. That is not to suggest Mr. Chavarria’s collaboration with Latino Fan Club lacks commercial appeal, said James Gilchrist, the vice president of Dover Street Market USA and its parent company, Comme des Garçons USA.

“From a wider business perspective, it’s getting harder and harder for creatives like Willy,” he said. “Sure, at the luxury end of the market, there is definitely a lack of creativity, but a big part of what we do is give designers creative freedom.”

If that includes selling expensive underwear that looks as if it has already been worn hard and tossed in the laundry hamper, so much the better.

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“We love edgy things,” Mr. Gilchrist said. “It’s who we are.”

Lifestyle

Sunday Puzzle: State postal abbreviations

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Sunday Puzzle: State postal abbreviations

On-air challenge

Every answer is a familiar two-word phrase or name in which the first two letters of each word are the same state postal abbreviation. (Ex. Colorado — everyday ailment there’s no cure for — COmmon COld)

1. Florida — sudden rush of water down a streambed
2. Wisconsin — aid in seeing the road when it rains
3. Louisiana — deep-blue gem with a Latin name
4. California — Christmas tree decoration you can eat
5. Pennsylvania — tricky thing to learn to do with a car
6. Indiana — something a stockbroker is not allowed to share
7. Alabama — star of “M*A*S*H”
8. Massachusetts — female disciple who anointed the feet of Jesus
9. Maine — tribal doctors
10. Delaware — event in which vehicles go around a track crashing into each other
11. Georgia — part of the dashboard that measures from full to empty
12. Washington — city in Washington

Last week’s challenge

Last week’s challenge came from Andrew Chaikin, of San Francisco. Name a popular automobile import — make + model. Add the letter V and anagram the result. You’ll name a popular ethnic food. What names are these?

Challenge answer

Kia Soul + V = Souvlaki

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Winner

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This week’s challenge

Here’s a funny challenge from Mark Scott, of Seattle. Think of a famous actress — first and last names. Interchange the first and last letters of those names. That is, move the first letter of the first name to the start of the last name, and the first letter of the last name to the start of the first name. Say the result out loud, and you’ll get some advice on fermenting milk. What is it?

If you know the answer to the challenge, submit it below by Thursday, November 13 at 3 p.m. ET. Listeners whose answers are selected win a chance to play the on-air puzzle.

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Harlem Rapper Max B Released from Prison After 16 Years

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Harlem Rapper Max B Released from Prison After 16 Years

Rapper Max B
I’m Free!!!
Released from Prison After 16 Years

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‘Wait Wait’ for November 8, 2025: Live in Orange County with Roy Choi

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‘Wait Wait’ for November 8, 2025: Live in Orange County with Roy Choi

Chef Roy Choi speaks on stage in Beverly Hills, California

Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images


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Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images

This week’s show was recorded in Orange County with host Peter Sagal, guest judge and scorekeeper Alzo Slade, Not My Job guest Roy Choi and panelists Karen Chee, Negin Farsad, and Tom Papa. Click the audio link above to hear the whole show.

Who’s Alzo This Time

New York’s Feeling Blue; Junk Food Goes Posh; A Housekeeper with a Catch

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Panel Questions

Guess The Louvre’s Passworduess the Louvre’s Password

Bluff The Listener

Our panelists tell three stories about jobs of the future, only one of which is true.

Not My Job: Chef, author, and food truck revolutionary Roy Choi answers our questions about other types of trucks

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Chef Roy Choi, famous for revolutionizing food trucks, plays our game called, “Food Trucks? Meet these new trucks!” Three questions about different kinds of trucks.

Panel Questions

The GOAT and The Pup; Sweet Pettiness Rewarded

Limericks

Alzo Slade reads three news-related limericks: An Extra Dill Sandwich; Cookies to Be Thankful For; Get Your Lids Straight!

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Lightning Fill In The Blank

All the news we couldn’t fit anywhere else

Predictions

Our panelists predict, now that they’ve started selling junk food, what will be the next big change at Whole Foods.

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