What’s the most fulfilling part of your job?
It goes back to the people. I just feel thankful, and grateful, and amazed by the people that are attracted to my shop and whom I get to work with. If you do a good job, it’s more than just you, the whole team gets to benefit.

Who is your dream customer, living, dead, or imaginary?
Imaginary? So it can be like Tilda Swinton with Ghandi’s brain? I guess it would have been really nice to have Ian Miller from Joy Division to come in and buy a coat. I always appreciated his style growing up. The other ones have actually happened, people like Patti Smith and Lou Reed.

I was going to say, Patti Smith would blend in with your store perfectly.
But they’ve all come in. I didn’t even know I was talking to Lou Reed. He hung out in the store for like two hours, and all of a sudden I realized. And we were like playing the Velvet Underground in the shop at that moment.

What do you see in store for Assembly in the future?
Launching the women’s collection has been in the works for a long time, so establishing that is a short term goal. Getting a nice foothold into retailers across the board and doing a second location in LA are on the longer scale. And then some vacation time for me.

I think vacation time is on everyone’s list for the future.
It’s kind of the forever dream that keeps all self-employed people going.

Assembly New York is located at 170 Ludlow Street in New York and online at www.assemblynewyork.com