On Instagram, streetwear and future: an interview with Lil Jupiter A chat with the anti-influencer from New York, at ComplexCon 2019 on the occasion of his new K-Swiss sneaker

Lil Jupiter became famous through Instagram.
The 20-year-old New Yorker's account (closed and then recently reopened) looks like a stream of images taken from the world of fashion, film and pop culture seemingly unrelated and inconsistent with each other. Thanks to the excellent aesthetic taste and humor of their curator, they have managed to become a real moodboard for contemporary culture. Over time, this semi-anonymous account has been very successful and attracted the attention of distinguished followers such as Virgil Abloh, Jerry Lorenzo and Sean Wotherspoon. Even the New Yorker, one of the most important cultural magazine in the world, dedicated an article to him in which it attributed to him a "post-normcore streetwear sensitivity" and called him "inscrutable".

Lil Jupiter was at the 2019 edition of ComplexCon, in Long Beach, and nss magazine had the chance to talk to him about his vision of the world, Instagram and, above all, to have a look at his new shoes with LuisaViaRoma and K-Swiss.

Can you tell us about your collaboration with K-Swiss?

Lil Jupiter: My collaboration with K-Swiss began about two years ago. I went to meet the president, Barney [Waters, editor's note], and the team at K-Swiss and I think from that they realized it would have been a good partnership and that’s how we started with the first shoe, which was only a hundred [pairs, editor's note]. It was more of a simple shoe just to get things started. We saw that it was a success and we decided to do a second shoe. And with the second shoe we were able to do more – put more details, put more elements on the shoe, than the first one. The first one was more simple, the second was more complex, more materials.

How do you feel about designing? Do you want to keep on?

Lil Jupiter: I wanna keep designing, that’s what I want to do for a living. I’ve so many ideas in my head,  so many designs that I just wanna express. By putting them on hoodies, on t-shirts. I haven’t got started yet because I’m just doing t-shirts. I haven’t really started cutting suits and doing more complex things. So, I think I’m just getting started with design. I just hope I learn more and just be able to expand my designing abilities.

Who are your favorite rappers?

Lil Jupiter: At the moment it’s Travis Scott, Trippie Redd, Lil Yachty… That’s probably my top three, at the moment.

On what ideas or projects are you currently working on?

Lil Jupiter: I did a collab with Advisory Board Crystals. I have my own brand, Designer Humans, which I’m gonna be launching soon. I’m getting that prepared in the meantime. I’m gonna keep working with K-Swiss and hopefully keep doing more shoes. I’m gonna possibly work  with their shoe in case it’s coming up soon. And there may be more projects on the way. Like I said, I’m just getting started. This is just the beginning for me.