How Carly Mark Turned Puppets and Puppets Into Downtown NY Gold
A pair of white porcelain saucers cheekily attached to the top of a toile de Jouy corset. A patent leather Mary Jane with a wedge of Swiss cheese for a heel. A simple black handbag embellished by a perfect chocolate chip cookie. These tongue-in-cheek designs are a few calling cards of Puppets and Puppets, a three-year-old womenswear line by Carly Mark. A fine artist-turned-fashion designer, Mark has made waves in the New York fashion scene with her highly whimsical and covetable creations, which this year earned her a nomination for the CFDA Emerging Designer of the Year.
“I’m very nervous,” Mark tells me over the phone from her West Village home. “I don't want to get my hopes up about anything, but I'm excited.” It’s been a labor of love for Mark, who launched her first collection in Fall 2019 and quickly developed a reputation for clever, often satirical work that pokes fun at fashion conventions while delivering undeniably cool clothing beloved by downtown creatives. Here, Mark shares her path to Puppets and Puppets, dissects the brand’s cult appeal, and discusses the challenges of growing a young brand while maintaining its unfettered spirit.
I wanted to start by talking a little bit about yourself, coming to New York, studying fine arts, then eventually starting your brand.
I'm originally from the suburbs of Detroit. I'm from a fairly conservative, private school – attending, golf team type of community – and was always like this. I never really fit in, and I always felt other my entire life, which is I guess how little creative kids come out. I always leaned toward art and spent most of my time in art classes.
I had a mom who really loved art. My mom went back to school when I was in high school to get her graduate degree in art history. She is now head of the docent program at the Detroit Institute of Art. We would talk about art within an institutional context, and it felt really transcendental and important. I knew I needed to just get out of my community, so I thought fine arts must be the answer. It was a creative outlet and to me, it was incredibly emotional, incredibly visceral.
I moved to New York to go to SVA (School of Visual Arts), and I ended up working in multiple galleries. I used to work at Gavin Brown's enterprise when it was open. I had a studio practice. I was making my way toward being a studio artist for a living. It was gradual, but I hit a wall. It just dawned on me one day that what I thought art was, or what I thought the art world was, it actually wasn't. It's a business like anything else. And an artist is just making a product like anyone else. And that's totally fine. But because I had gone into it romanticizing what art was, I felt let down and I became uninterested. I was turning 30 and I was like, “I got to figure this out because I don't like what I'm doing, and I don't really relate to the art world.” It just didn't feel like the right lane for me.
Tell me about the start of Puppets and Puppets.
I was making clothes for sculptures and video pieces I had done. When I hit this crossroads, basically at 30, there were a few directions I was thinking of going. Either I'm going to go into film and become a director, or I'm going to become the next Jim Henson and open a creature shop and just make creatures – which I still might do at some point in my life. [Running a brand] is an incredibly difficult game, and I don't necessarily recommend it to anyone who wants calmness in their life, but I do not care for calmness. So here I am working on my eighth season. This brand has just become mine and who I am, and luckily, other people relate to it because I'm miraculously and proudly up for this CFDA Emerging Designer Award.
Coming from that fine arts background, obviously the pace of art and fashion are completely different. Were you turning out work quite frequently in your practice?
By the end of it, I was because everything had started to pick up. I was having solo shows, I was showing at fairs and selling work. But fashion is a much more intense and structured pace, and I like it much more because I thrive on repetition and structure. The lack of structure in fine art made me feel crazy.
Would you say acclimating to that process and schedule was quite easy for you? Or it felt more natural to do?
I actually felt liberated with some parameters. I know for sure I'm going to have a show every September and February, and I just work toward that. I'm happy to work six days a week. Give me one day off, I'm good. I love working. The fact that there are basically almost no days off in this calendar, it actually works for me.
Can you talk about applying your fine arts practice to your fashion work?
The fun thing about fine art – and I don't look at fashion that differently – is you just guess. You just do it. I always say we're floating on a rock in outer space. You can't really do anything wrong. The only thing that's wrong is not doing something. So I've always just figured out my way to do it.
Could you walk me through your design process going into a new collection?
When I look back at the trajectory of my collections, it’s always a film that inspires me. I'll choose a film, and then I'll build mood boards from there. I always let everyone know that I'm a Gemini. My brain is basically jungle juice, so I'm going to just spit out ideas. And it's everyone's job around me to help me organize and sift through them. I'm really interested in focusing my brain, which can be a challenge.
What is the through-line that you built in Spring/Summer 2023?
The main thing that I was thinking about was Eyes Wide Shut. Of course it's highly interpretive and through my lens. There was a look that wasn't a one for one, but it was a white tank and panty set from the scene where Nicole Kidman is talking to her husband and revealing her truth. Eroticism was definitely something I was thinking about because the film is so much about [that], and I think you can see that throughout the collection.
It’s interesting how New York fashion took on this more DIY, artistic spirit. [There are] so many of these young brands that are super creative, but it's ultimately difficult to evolve into a successful business. How do you grow your brand while still staying true to the spirit of it?
I think about this a lot because it's a shame. A lot of these brands that I'm talking about that inspired me to get going, there are remnants around. But Raffi [Hanley of Lou Dallas] doesn't show anymore. Shayne [Oliver of Hood by Air] doesn’t show anymore. It's really hard to be scrappy and also grow a business. I mentioned that my mom is the head of the docent program at the Detroit Institute of Art. But also, I think it's important to note that my grandmother, when I was growing up, was the largest shareholder of Weight Watchers International. So she was this incredible business person. She wore power suits every single day. She had shoulder pads put in every jacket she's ever owned. And I grew up around that too.
In order [to] keep the lights on, you've got to make money and you've got to grow. I always knew that I needed to figure out a way to stick around. By chance, I happened to be connected about a year ago to Joey Laurenti, who was CEO of Sies Marjan. We were introduced by friends and we clicked. From that day on, we've been working together, and he's helped me build this business in the last year.
I'm so grateful for him and the work we've done together. It was really just kismet. I just crossed paths with someone who I love and who understands me, and I feel really lucky. This is something I think about all the time: how to hold onto the parts of my brand that make it personal and special and that people relate to while actually growing a business. You have to be really in sync with yourself, and also realistic. And don’t stop working. Never.
Could you tell me about the origin of your cookie bag, which is such an iconic piece and one that people really associate with your brand?
I love the cookie bag. My best friend Chloe Wise is an amazing painter and sculptor. She has worked with this resin artist for years named Margalit Cutler. I knew what Margalit was capable of, and I've seen the work she does for Chloe. I remember it was my third season and the theme was Moebius, this French illustrator who I found through a documentary about Alejandro Jodorowsky and the work that they were doing on the Dune that was never made. So, I was creating Moebius characters to walk the runway. It was basically a costume season, but there was this one character who had a belt on with a buckle. I was looking at the references and I thought, I don't need to be so on the nose, what can I use as a belt buckle? Maybe it should be a chocolate chip cookie. Oh, I actually know a person that can make a chocolate chip cookie belt buckle, because I had met Margalit.
Margalit made me a chocolate chip cookie belt buckle, she brought it in, and I was so mystified by it. I can't stop staring at it. I'm kind of obsessed with this thing. I used it twice in season three, and after that season I was like, we've got to put that on a bag. I started developing it right before the pandemic, and then Covid happened and I just kept working on it. I skipped a season because I didn't feel it was appropriate to show fashion when the world was falling apart. I did a lookbook the next season and had the cookie bag in there, and it got picked up by SSENSE.
I love the bag for multiple reasons. One, because it's aesthetically so pleasing. Also, I loved taking this thing which is so enticing, so seductive, but it’s actually fake. To me, it became almost like this totem. Then placing it on a black handbag on the spot where a brand logo usually would go. As much as it is a delicious object, I am also making a joke, a comment on this object. This is the art school kid in me who sat in critiques all day long. It's very meta, and I love that.
Were you surprised that people fell for it the way they did?
I knew that it would take off, but it does actually take time. Our tapped-in, creative community knows it and gets it now. But after taking my collection to Paris for the first time last season, I realized that it takes people a second. That surprised me.
I have two sisters, an older sister and a younger sister, and they're the best people ever. They live in Michigan, and they have kids. My younger sister represents the brand so much. She's the best gauge for me because she's cool, but also she exists in this other world. We've talked about the cookie bag, and she was like, “Yeah, when you first gave it to me, I thought this thing is so weird. And then one day it just clicked.” It's going to be fine because one day it will just click.
Is there any connection for you in terms of playing more with accessories and shoes because they can be a little more connected to sculpture? Is that an area that you gravitate toward?
Whenever I'm working on the collections, I say this and it's very clear: I’m passionate about accessories and the finale looks. I feel good when I can dive into something. Accessories are great because as boring or basic as you want to dress, your handbag can still be crazy. Accessories are an addendum. It's like cherry on a cake. You can be wearing the most worn-in black T-shirt, but your bag can be crazy. That's how I think and that's how I dress. It's all the in-between stuff that is the most challenging for me. I'm figuring it out as I go.
Tell me more about that.
I want ready-to-wear to be as strong as the accessories in their own way. It’s about figuring out your voice—not just your voice so that you stand out in the crowd, but your voice so that you are truly in sync with yourself. I want to be in sync with the pieces. I don't want to look at it and be like, that does not feel like me, which has happened before.
I didn't fully understand that until I started seeing my product out in the world. Because putting together a runway show, you can put any fantasy you want down a runway. But when you start to see the clothes that represent you out in the world, it's a completely different experience. It brings you back into reality.
In what way?
Part of why I love runway shows is they feel so cinematic. Like I'm watching a film, or I'm watching a performance, or I'm watching a theater piece. But out in the world, whether you realize it or not, you have a bit of me on you right now. Is that who I feel like I am? Is that who I want to be in this world?
So would [you] say you feel quite attached to all of your work in a more personal way?
Almost too much. I'm always looking back. I’m moving forward, but I'm also reflecting. I need to learn how to let things go, but I can't.
You mentioned the shows themselves are part of the fantasy.
Yeah, I love the shows. I get really nervous at the shows. I'm floating above my body. But it's also part of why I fell in love with fashion again when I did, when all the young designers that I love and respect started to really come up. It's this vacuum. It's seven to nine minutes of high intensity, and it's incredibly ephemeral. It's there, and it's not. It's the energy in a room. You can't beat a show. Especially a good one? There's nothing like it.
Are there shows that you thought were particularly amazing that have inspired you?
There was one Vaquera show that really blew my mind when I was younger. Vaquera Fall 2017. That was the one with the American flag dress. The energy of the show, the clothes, everything about it. And then there was Luar in 2018. It wasn't a particularly big show, but the energy of that show was so incredible. I remember sitting there watching, being like, “I want to do this.”
You mentioned the ways in which the brand reflects you and the way that you dress. Could you tell me a little bit about that?
I dress fairly simply. I want to be comfortable all the time. If I'm going to work, I'm usually in something oversize. Like many of us these days, I'm wearing a good amount of Balenciaga. I think Demna is the most brilliant designer in the world right now. I also buy a lot of Martine Rose [and] Y/Project when I can. And vintage Comme des Garçons and a lot of vintage T-shirts.
Any particular kind?
I mean, I'm wearing Ghost in the Shell right now. The brand Puppets is named after my dog Puppet, but Puppet my dog is named after the Puppet Master from Ghost in the Shell.
That's incredible.
I have a lot of vintage horror T-shirts. I love horror films. I have this funny Death Note T-shirt I've been wearing. And then I love my friends who make music. My friend Dev [Hynes] gave me a bunch of Blood Orange T-shirts that I rotate. My friend who opened my show, Caroline Polachek, I'm constantly wearing her sweatshirt from her tour.
It's either horror films, anime, or friends' bands mixed with vintage Comme, Balenciaga, and Martine Rose. That's it. And then I'll wear a cookie bag or a pair of Puppets oversize pants I've designed and Puppets runway shoes. That's my uniform.
You've mentioned quite a few, but I just wanted to ask if there were any more major influences in your work. You mentioned Jim Henson earlier.
I love Jim Henson. A lot of directors. [David] Cronenberg, David Lynch. I guess I'm kind of boring. I mean, The Shining is my favorite movie probably of all time, I’ve seen it a million times in theaters. I think film influences me more than anything.
Do you have a favorite theater you like to go to in New York?
I love Metrograph. They're great at curating films. There's a special place in my heart for IFC and Film Forum. I’m really sad that Sunshine is no longer around.
What do you have planned as far as upcoming projects?
I want to build this business up while remaining true to me and the things that are special about this brand. I'd love to at some point have a brick-and-mortar store in New York and maybe do a show in Paris. My main focus right now is just breaking even in this business. That is so difficult to do. Every day is a new little challenge, but I’m doing my best. I believe in what I'm doing. I love this. I love what I do.
