Inside the Internet's Largest Fashion Server: An Interview with Kylo

Despite the almost ten-year-old age of the app, Discord remains an anomaly within the fashion sphere. Many have never heard of it, some have but never bothered to engage with it, and then there’s a group of people whose sartorial experiences thrive on it. Discord is a great platform to meet friends, learn and collaborate, but the opposite can also be true. Safe to say that managing a server isn’t a walk in the park, let alone one that’s about to reach a whopping 20,000 members. We reached out to Kylo from Hong Kong, an eclectic creative, videographer, music enthusiast and the founder of the world’s largest fashion server. We discussed the early days of his server, the challenges of managing a community, the potential of Discord for fashion, the and his future plans. Read below!

KURB: Where are you from and what brought you to Fashion?

Kylo: I’m Kylo, a videographer, model, and manager of the largest fashion Discord. I’m based in Hong Kong but have an international background of German, American, Chinese. My introduction to fashion started with simply wanting to look better, whether that was for myself, friends, or women. But as I dove deeper into the rabbit hole, it became more about self-expression and wearing whatever the fuck I want.

KURB: What inspired you to begin the fashion server? I've noticed it's grown a lot from 17,000 members just the other month to almost 20,000 now.

Kylo: I didn’t grow up around people that knew anything about fashion. I wanted to learn more and have discussions about clothes, so I resorted to looking online. I was in a couple different communities, but none took my suggestions or ran theirs as efficiently as I thought I could, so I took the opportunity and started the fashion server. Fast forward, shit ended up succeeding, we’re gonna hit 20k in the next weeks.

KURB: what is your secret sauce, would you say?

Kylo: If I shared it, it wouldn’t be secret.

KURB: What do you think in the experience of hosting the Fashion Discord has been the most exciting thing so far?

Kylo: Definitely connecting and learning from other successful creatives in the fashion sphere. There’s many interesting and unique designers, brand owners, and enthusiasts in my community. Like as an example, there’s a guy called Cal I met on there, he does really dope 925 jewelry. Shoutout bro.

KURB: There's quite a team behind the server. What makes a good member of the fashion server team?

Kylo: I don’t know any of the team in person. I started this community back in high school, I was bored as fuck in math class on my laptop talking to hella people on my server. The reasonable and level-headed ones I ended up promoting and putting on the team. The quality and energy of the community is a reflection of the staff team, so I made sure that the people I chose were mostly socially adept, knowledgeable in fashion, and representative of the community. There’s hella hella weird people on the internet so I had to be careful with choosing.

KURB: Discord could be a great platform for people to showcase or to grow their brand as well.

Kylo: I think there's a lot of potential that people are sleeping on. Discord deservedly has a lot of stigma, but people neglect the fact that there can actually be thousands and thousands of people on one server and millions across the platform. It’s possible to grow a real community on there.

KURB: It's not just like not just passive people too. So if you have a community on Discord with a big following, it's a group who can be deeply involved in a project. It's a valuable connection compared to other kinds of community, as on Discord they’re almost directly in communication with a project.

Kylo: Yeah I think a Discord member is one of the most valuable social media metrics, it means a lot more than a YouTube subscriber or IG follower, because it’s a space for people to interact and engage, not just a one way street.

KURB: How do you think the online communities are shaping the fashion ecosystem?

Kylo: It's facilitating conversations between people much better than something like an Instagram comment section. Discord also makes you engage with a rich diversity of people from completely different backgrounds. When big fashion events happen, like when it was announced that Denma would be leaving Balenciaga, there was a lot of conversation about it with varying perspectives.

KURB: I only started following you recently but quickly noticed you're quite a presence in the Hong Kong cultural scene. How would you describe it?

Kylo: Hong Kong is the most slept-on city in the world. There are people here who are kind of pessimistic but that doesn't take away from the fact that I can look outside my window and it's literally like cyberpunk real life. While Hong Kong isn't the most recognized city in terms of fashion, the fact is that there's so much creative opportunity, alongside the fact it’s not oversaturated, meaning there's a lot to engage with. So that's kind of what I'm about. I'm trying to build this whole city scene up and put it on an international level.

KURB: It's so cool to have someone who's motivated to culturally invest in a scene and environment like that, especially from someone with such a diverse international background. What do you think is the most exciting thing you're doing right now in Hong Kong?

Kylo: Well, my main passion is videography. The fashion community is actually something I do on the side of that. I’m focused on making videos right now and developing work for a bunch of different clients. Shit like music videos, event aftermovies, fashion campaigns and material for my own personal brand.

KURB: How did you get yourself enmeshed into the scene like that?

Kylo: I would say it was two things. One is like me and my homie (Bonfils), when we go out somewhere, we talk to literally everybody. Chances are maybe 1 or 2 we have good chemistry with where we might develop a connection or friendship and through that find a new client. And two, it's, just bringing my camera around everywhere. Because if people see me with my camera, they find out I’m a videographer. Being able to send them the footage after or featuring them in a video is a great way to make that connection. So there's a lot of active networking at that level. Many of the people we’ve met ended up becoming photographers on our shoots or DJs at our events.

KURB: Who are your favorite fashion designers?

Kylo: Rei Kawakubo has to be there. Martin Margiela for sure. Currently? JW Anderson. I like what Stefano Gallici is doing for Ann Demeulemeester. I like Glenn Martens, not everything gotta be dark and avant-garde. Haters gon’ hate.

KURB: Yeah, I was one of those haters. Was there a lot of drama in the server when Demna went to Gucci?

Kylo: There was some conversation. There were people who were quite vocal about the change on the server with a lot of varying opinions about his time at Balenciaga. But I see a lot of people wearing Balenci. Time will tell.

KURB: What do you think is missing for online fashion communities today?

Kylo: What’s missing is a realization that fashion is ultimately supposed to fun. People have to stop taking other people's opinions so personally, even if you post a fit online and people want to shit on you for it, is it really going to change your life now? It’s all just for fun and games in the end. Though I think the culture is a bit better now than it once was, there are still some elements of elitism. It can be a touchy subject, because for some people how they dress ties into their own self-image.

KURB: What are some of the more challenging aspects of managing a big online community?

Kylo: Yeah there is definitely a lot of drama and personal beef between members - with some members taking it pretty far. It’s hard to manage because sometimes it’s important to entertain a degree of brain-rot behaviour simply because it’s funny, but it can also become excessive and be detrimental to the server's atmosphere. If you go too extreme on either end you end up scaring the members or they’ll become bored. There’s an important balance to strike between enabling the intrusive thoughts of members and also cultivating a safe and fun environment. Sometimes I do need to make decisions that go against the majority for the betterment of the community. There are some crazy people on there, like people engaging in religious rants, or being pushy and obsessive with their own personal politics.

KURB: I’ve noticed you have this incredible technology on the server that kind of structures rounds of fit competitions. How’s that going?

Kylo: “Fit Battles” has been a thing since the very beginning of the server. We used to do that, like manually but I'm not trying to wake up at a certain time every day just so I can do that anymore. So I coded a bot to do it for me. I’ve been developing it over the last couple of years, but it broke about a year ago and didn't have the time to repair it until recently.

KURB: What is your next biggest move in your personal life?

Kylo: I'm just working on larger, crazier videos for this year, and I'm trying to really hone into my style and develop my own look and become the face of my brand. Every big persona has consolidated their own identifiable look and now I want to see what will work for me. Often I draw inspiration from music videos- especially underground hip-hop, fashion runways, and what my friends are putting out. I try to extract the feeling I get by seeing them but I tend not to overthink it too much and prefer to intuitively select what works for me.

KURB: And finally, where do you want to take the Fashion server next?

Kylo: I'm definitely trying to keep expanding but I'm also trying to have some collaborations with other creators. Trying to have more events, more things happening that involve the server with other communities, and build the reputation to work with reputable people. I also have a couple people that I fuck with, and am finding ways of working with them.

Feel free to check out the fashion server here, or if you’re keen to connect with Kylo you can find him on Instagram. If you’re a fashion community owner like Kylo or a second hand designer reseller we want to hear from you! Please reach out if you’re interested in collaborating or finding ways where we can communicate your brand! Check our website for up to the minute listings of new items and stop by our Discord if you want to be in the second hand fashion culture loop or want up to date notifications for listings of your favourite brands from across the world.