Protecting design at any cost, interview with Jonny Johansson We met the creative director of Acne Studios at the brand's Swedish headquarters

When you arrive in Stockholm, one of the first places everyone recommends you go to is the Acne Studios store at Norrmalmstorg 2, in what was once the bank where August 23, 1973, Jan-Erik Olsson pulled off the robbery of the Sveriges Kreditbanken headquarters, thus giving rise to the so-called Stockholm Syndrome. There, in that location somewhere between retail space and place of worship, the status achieved by Acne Studios twenty-six years after its inception is expressed to the fullest. Originally an acronym for Associated Computer Nerd Enterprises, later to become Ambition to Create Novel Expressions, the founding fathers of this Swedish prodigy are Mats Johansson, Jesper Kouthoofd, Tomas Skoging, and Jonny Johansson. It is Johansson, the brand's creative director, whom I met in the Acne Studios HQ at Floragatan 13, once the Czechoslovakian embassy and now among the fashion industry's most envied locations. Patagonia sweater, ripped jeans, and a pair of rubber boots, I meet Jonny on the top floor of the building, in what was once the ambassador's private office and now, after years of construction, has become an extension of Acne Studios. The Brutalist-style building encapsulates the entire soul of the brand, from the bookstore to the canteen - once the ambassador's cinema and now furnished with two sculptures by Helmut Lang - each space tells the soul of Acne Studios.

This a concept that Jonny Johansson has talked about several times over time and returned to again during our chat. «The concept of honesty is nothing but my way of working. The show we did in Paris is a very good example of that. Mattias - CEO of the brand - wanted to find a way to celebrate ten years since our first show in Paris, but I didn't want it to be something self-celebratory. It's ridiculous when people celebrate themselves. But then someone I work with, Leopold Duchemin, got married, and on Instagram I was able to follow the whole wedding. I think a moment like that represents an iconic celebration that can embody a great deal of tension and conflict. That was something that was happening to me and I decided to use it in my work. That's what honesty means to me.» So if there is anything we can be sure of, it is the founding values on which the brand is based, in many ways unique because of the freedom is given by the independence it can enjoy. In addition to the aforementioned "honesty," the concept of "freedom" is part of the brand's strengths. As CEO Mattias Magnusson also confirmed to me a few nights later. But there is no freedom without risk, as a colleague suggests by asking, «Haven't you ever been afraid of going out of fashion?» «It's a double-edged sword,» Johansson replies almost seraphically. «You want to be accepted, but you also want to be unique. If you're part of this world you want to be loved but also to feel special.» If feeling special is the ultimate goal, we could say without much ado that Acne Studios has succeeded perfectly in its goal, ideally charting a course that many other brands should aspire to.