Fashionista contributor Long Nguyen is the co-founder/style director of Flaunt.

Just a few minutes past midnight last night Alice Cooper took the stage and performed his perennial hit “School’s Out,” released in 1972. This was just moments after ZZ Top sang “Foxy Lady.” Darling Stilettos did the CBGB Ramones classics “Blitzkrieg Pop,” and Donovan Leitch–with Camp Freddy and Perry Farrell–closed the show with the Jane Addiction classic “The Mountain Song.” And that’s only a partial line up of the rockers that came out to perform in celebration of the launch of Original Moonshine and the tenth anniversary of John Varvatos’ menswear collection at the former CBGB space on Bowery, now Varvatos’ store selling his main, USA and Converse collections. Rock & Roll, whiskey and fashion.

Designer fashion requires a narrative–a way of telling a story or relating a lifestyle that the clothes are mere accoutrements. For Mr. Varvatos, it’s his early affection for rock music that has provided the blood that has flowed through his work since launching his first collection for fall 2000. In his office it’s hard to locate a book on fashion, but the piles on his long coffee table include The Illustrated Biography of Bob Dylan, Rock Record 7, CBGB: Decade of Graffiti History and Punk, Made in the U.K – The Music Attitude 1977-1983, Who Shot Rock & Roll, and Ryan Adams and the Cardinals: A View of Other Windows. And off course a tome on The Doors, just to name a few. In reconnecting with his adolescent obsession with rock music Mr. Varvatos gives the brand a soul, or what we call “fashion.”

“I grew up listening to rock music,” John told me as I visited him one afternoon to talk about, well, his fashion work. On the walls are two large framed triple gold records that Alice Cooper and Led Zeppelin given to him as gratitude for his collaboration. Right next to his desk is more rock memorabilia–a large blue electric guitar from Velvet Revolver. Looking at the books in front of me at his office , and the memorabilia that surrounded me, I realized that through fashion, Mr. Varvatos has finally been able to find the way to express his love and genuine devotion to rock music.

“I bought my first leather biker [jacket] in 11th grade,” he said recalling the days of his youth driving to rock concerts, dressing up just like those rock musicians he went to see. Now, he casts both young talents and venerable rock musicians in his advertising campaigns–Franz Ferdinand, Alice Cooper, Perry Farrell, Cheap Trick, Velvet Revolver, Ryan Adams and even ZZ Top. And he nurtures new bands with the monthly concert series at the Bowery store, the former CBGB performance space.

Born and raised in the suburb of Detroit, Michigan, a city with a long history of music legends, John Varvatos worked at different odds and ends jobs in fashion as sales clerks to support himself through Eastern Michigan University and the University of Michigan, earning a degree in education. With a friend, he co-owned a store in Grand Rapids selling Polo Ralph Lauren. Having great success with Polo, he eventually joined Ralph Lauren in 1983 first as a Midwest sales representative, then was transferred to New York where he worked in merchandising. Eventually, he moved to the design department. In 1990, he went to Calvin Klein as head of menswear, working on the main collection and launching the CK brand. He returned to Ralph Lauren in 1995 as head of menswear design for Polo and launched the separate Polo Jeans Company.

With the financial backing of the Nautica Company, which he joined in 1998 to head up special projects and the Nautica Jeans launch, he started his own brand in late 1999 and showed the first collection on the runway during New York Fashion Week in 2000. Bergdorf Goodman, Saks Fifth Avenue and Barneys bought the collection. Later that year, the company opened its flagship store in SoHo, the first of nine stores operating today. Today, Mr, Varvatos owned 20% of the company after VF Corporation purchased Nautica in 2003.

A first collection is rarely a definite statement of the designer’s ethos, but Mr. Varvatos’s debut collection runway show was a sure indication of his own particular approach to fashion, or more precisely to shaping American fashion. That fall collection–a loosely fitted charcoal single-breasted suit, a cotton belted parka, a belted wool poncho, double-breasted coats and fine knitwear all worn with flat front pants with flare legs–combined high quality fabrics like cashmere, flannel wool, wool twill, wool melton, and vintage wool herringbone. The pristine manufacturing gave the designer a foundation for a business.

In lieu of making some trendy fashion statements that most designers clamored around, the collection presented choices, concrete choices with the base on a loose silhouette that a customer can pick and choose to mix with their existing wardrobe. That’s a harder road to take in fashion, where the commercial is often shunned, basically an afterthought to spectacular runway shows. Yet Mr. Varvatos persisted with his vision, and over the course of several seasons gained a voice because his singular approach to menswear. At a time when a tight fit and black clothes ruled the runway, he proposed wide legged, loose suits in white, ice blue and light grey in a collection for spring 2003, and a large lapel on a slouchy suits for fall 2005. More importantly, these collections were a base for a building solid business: Today, the label generates over $125 million in yearly sales.

In September 2001, Mr. Varvatos initiated a partnership with Converse, a shoe company that had never worked with designers, to design limited edition Chuck Taylor All-Stars and Jack Purcell sneakers. It became the most successful collaboration for Converse and continued with the best selling lace-less Chuck Taylor in January 2004 and the launch of a full range collection of apparel for Converse in March 2006. To complete his range of products, he added the USA Collection of vintage denim and woven in 2006. Along the way, he picked up three CFDA menswear designers of the year awards and cemented his fashion credentials.

But of all the success, he is most proud of his Bowery store project.