Meet Louby McLoughlin – the Founder of Interactive Fashion Platform, OKgrl
Get a HYPEBAE-exclusive preview of OKgrl’s latest project.
What defines a Louby McLoughlin look? Something colorful and fun with a sense of irony. Perfectly proportioned, pink-toned, style empress Louby McLoughlin is the CEO of the burgeoning online fashion and music portal OKgrl. Ripping the static, 2D fashion editorials right off the page, reinventing style through digital mediums, filtering fun and personality onto our screens, Louby is the poster girl for millennial pop culture.
Working as an intern for various glossy magazines since moving to London over eight years ago, Louby has styled front covers for POP magazine and styles regularly for the Sophia Webster label as well as her celebrity clients, who include Charli XCX, The 1975 and Pixie Lott. Identifiable by her playful aesthetic and unorthodox approach to creating a progressive mind-set via her multi-faceted outfits, Louby charges women with feeling empowered to dress as femininely and fierce as they choose.
Creating the interactive online publication OKgrl to universally unite lovers of style and music, Louby aspires to break down the social constructs which divide fashion and real life, allowing the high-end to feel accessible to anyone with a passion for it, regardless of bank balance or status. Her energy is tangible on first click. Constantly rolling out interactive editorials, Louby’s latest project stars the singer Pixie Lott – the perfect fun-filled blonde to front Louby’s left-field approach to fashion. Surrounding herself with larger-than-life characters and ambitious creatives, those rolling deep with the ultimate girlie “grl” are inherently innovative and irreverent. We caught up with Louby to find out what’s next in her fast-moving IRL world and get a HYPEBAE-exclusive first look at Pixie’s Pooch Parlour.
Why did you choose to create interactive fashion editorials?
The idea originated when l was working at a fashion print magazine, in 2012 or 2013. I would see Tumblr pages that were created by young people at home, they were so imaginative and highly-skilled, they really got really creative with the coding. I wondered how we could translate the same approach to a more high-end, polished publication. So l set out to try and make a platform that would be exciting for those people who had already made such innovative DIY pages.
How do you keep the high caliber of content so polished when funding is limited and the turnover of product and profit in the fashion industry is so fierce?
We rely on the collaborating artists to create something they are proud to present; everyone has their part to play. Luckily the teams we work with are perfectionists. If a digital agency, coder, 3D animator or artist has something exciting they want to promote online, OKgrl is a platform they can align their projects to so they tend to do a great job.
What does it take to make it as a young designer today? Will innovative, breaking talent able to thrive in the current fashion climate or will the future of fashion depend on those who have wealth becoming wealthier?
I think it takes a lot of talent, originality, self-promotion, comprehension of the market and an extroverted personality to succeed today.
Who is your team and what does it take to make it as part of the OKgrl crew?
The team is split between London, LA and New York. Most of the work is done with our digital directors, DVTK and Jack Wild who are London-based. We have Hello Velocity in New York too. James Orlando has played a big part by art directing projects from last season. LIZ in LA works to bring in music contributors, Hannah Diamond and R+D create photography for us.
There are multiple social media editors based in Canada, and Richie Minx from the U.S. created the voice of OKgrl on the socials; he’s really funny. All the contributors work in the ‘virtual office’ as we’re an international team. An OKgrl collaborator is anyone with a skill who fits in and is passionate about the work and projects we create.
How have you overcome adversity and judgement in your own career? What defines your own success?
It’s hard to keep your spirits high while you work for little or no money as an intern or assistant in the fashion industry. I didn’t make money from what I do for about four years and that was very hard – I had two jobs and worked seven days a week. So, for anyone who comes from a background without someone funding the start of their career, or are unable to live with their parents, you will struggle but that’s not to say you can’t get past that. I think what defines my success is to be able to do what I want and love and make money from it. Also the idea of creating new systems in the industry is something I am passionate about.
It takes a lot of talent, originality, self-promotion, comprehension of the market and an extroverted personality to succeed today.
What is the future of the runway show?
I saw that Vetements is about to start creating new ways of presenting its show by taking it off the normal schedule and runway. I think thats exciting. It’ll be good to see what it does and how runway shows progress.
You have shared an exclusive preview with HYPEBAE of OKgrl’s project, Pixie’s Pooch Parlour. What can you tell us about it?
We teamed up with Pixie Lott to create this interactive fashion game, in which the player styles the dog and Pixie models different designers including Fyodor Golan, Piers Atkinson and Ryan Lo. It was all shot by Bradley and Pablo. Henrick the artist crea
Why did you choose Pixie to collaborate with on the project?
I really like her new song “Baby,” it’s awesome. It’s my gym song! Pixie a lovely girl and a great model – she loves animals so she was super down to take part in the game. I first met her at a club, she is a very nice, sweet person and she likes OKgrl too!
- Image Credit
- Instagram/@loubymc, Hannah Diamond, Oliver Hadlee Pearch
