A Chat with Famed Fashion Designer Marco Marco

Dressing Katy Perry, Britney Spears, Nicki Minaj, Iggy Azalea and Selena Gomez is all in a day’s work for fashion designer Marco Morante. The eccentric Los Angeles based designer is the man behind the glamorous costumes of A-list pop stars. Flicking through his list of clients is like scrolling through a best-dressed list from the Grammy’s.
For Marco, rubbing shoulders with the rich and famous wasn’t exactly what he envisioned for his career.
“I don’t know if my goal was to design for celebrities, but I wanted to make over the top stuff, and I wanted it to be seen. This seemed like a viable path to that,” says Marco.
Morante’s designs are currently being seen on Australian rapper Iggy Azalea music video for her song ‘Fancy’ that is quickly shaping up to be one of the biggest songs of the year.
“I love Iggy, her stylist Alejandra, and her whole team. I was a fan of Iggy since “Pu$$y”, so it’s an honour to get to be a part of their moment,” says Marco.
“Iggy always looks perfect in everything. I’m never nervous going into a new gig with her because she only knows how to kill it.”
Since finding fame as the go-to designer for nearly every musician in the Top 40, Marco is taking his brand, Marco Marco, and his eccentric style to a new arena: men’s underwear.
“I was fully focused on custom women’s for so long and wanted to do something for guys. I always made underwear for my friends and it seemed like a natural transition,” says Marco.
Along the way Marco found some extra incentives as well, “I guess I felt like I needed more men in their underwear in my life.”
And he has certainly found just that. The line, which includes boxers, briefs and leggings, comes with a hint of Morante’s trademark eccentricity.
Josh Duhamel recently revealed he owns a pair of Marco Marco “see-through-in-the-ass” underwear—briefs with a mesh behind.
While his designs may be quite fashion-forward for the average man’s standards, Marco believes that underwear is something that everyone can be confident in.
“The great thing about underwear is that you get to wear whatever you want,” Marco says. “And no one has to know until you want them to.”
“Nothing builds more confidence than knowing something know one else does. I’m pretty sure that is what Victoria’s Secret really is.”
Despite having designed underwear for friends as a side project for years, creating a whole collection didn’t come easily for the seasoned designer.
“The original collection took my team and I several weeks to get together but I hated it. It wasn’t inspired and wasn’t any fun.”
In the end, inspiration came in an unlikely form: from stars of RuPaul’s Drag Race who strutted the catwalk in Mornate’s designs.
“Honestly, all I really wanted was for Vicky Vox to open my show, and I couldn’t shake that want. Eventually I said screw it. I called Vicki along with a bunch of our friends to walk,” says Marco.
“We threw the whole collection away 5 days before the show and redesigned it entirely around them.”
Whether he is dressing stars for awards season, or having his underwear strutted on the catwalk’s of RuPaul’s Drag Race, Morante lives and breathes fashion.
So who is fashionable enough to inspire the man on the forefront of fashion?
“My friends are my fashion icons,” says Marco. “They are all happy lunatics and I love to watch them live.”