Jonny Johansson, the creative director of Acne Studios, does not trust your nostalgia. In fact, he has grown tired of the lazy kind. “The tricky thing with nostalgia is that it feels good. It’s pleasant, familiar and safe. But that’s exactly the problem. It can become too recognisable,” Johansson remarked during the preview of the Acne Studios FW26 men’s collection in Paris. He resists the urge to roll his eyes at the mention of a vintage revival — not because he hates the past, but because he refuses to let it hold the present hostage.

While the rest of the industry is busy strip-mining the 1990s for a “Tom Ford at Gucci” high that never quite returns, Johansson understands that one cannot simply conscript the past back into service. He recognises the trap: Gen-Z consumers love the romance of the era, but not its history. For this generation, fashion is a form of lore-building, where saying, “You do not get it? I’m Shalom Harlow getting spray-painted by robots” is far more evocative than understanding the micron count of a sweater’s wool. Johansson knows that nostalgia often inhibits intellect, providing a historical consciousness that allows one to feel immediately superior to its peers. Rather than fighting this apotheosis of the modern consumer, he manipulates it.

For Acne Studios — often dubbed the industry’s maximalist-minimalist answer — the goal is not to replicate the past, but to distort it until it feels new again. Spending 30 years building a fortress of beautifully bored indifference between Stockholm and Paris requires the bravery to edit. It is perhaps slightly pretentious to suggest that a pair of trompe-l’œil jeans makes one better than someone dressed head-to-toe in Dior, but these garments exhibit the qualities of clothes that can actually alter a life. Style might make a man, but Acne Studios defines that style by filtering the noise of history through a lens of distinct, modern friction.

Johansson has become the accidental architect of this particular “cool,” a role he treats with mild amusement. Emerging from a creative collective that viewed clothing as a design problem to be solved, his outsider perspective remains his superpower. From the 100 pairs of red-stitched raw denim that launched the brand in 1996 to today’s high-concept collections, he has perfected the “awkward phase.” He gives the youth the references they crave — muddy palettes and grunge silhouettes — but breaks the algorithm by pairing them with the dead-eyed Face logo, a read receipt to the industry’s constant demand for engagement. It is a brand that invites Hikaru Utada, Ecco2k, and Robyn to the same function not just because it looks good in theory, but because they belong at the same table.

In our interview, we strip away the myth of the “coolest brand in the world” to examine the business of servicing nostalgia without succumbing to it. We trace the three-decade arc of a brand that began as a side project and became a global powerhouse. Before the pink bags and global flagships, there was just an acronym, a stack of denim, and a refusal to accept the status quo. Johansson takes us back to the start, proving that the only way to honour the past is to treat it with a healthy level of disrespect, fuelled by an ambition to create novel expressions in a world perfectly content with the familiar.

What is your idea of the contemporary, Jonny?
For me, it’s personal. I think if you want to set a historical footprint — which sounds very grand, I know — you need to be a sign of the times. You have to be contemporary so that when you look back, you understand the context of “why we made what we made.” Fashion is very much just decoration, you know? So you have to ground it in something that feels honest to the moment.

But fashion seems obsessed with the past. Nostalgia has become an unavoidable topic. Do you use it as an emotional value, or is it a commercial shortcut?
Look, it’s not a flat “no.” We live in the now, we’re aiming for the future, and we’re dragging history along with us as we go. All three of those layers are moving at once. To say we aren’t nostalgic, or that we don’t romanticise history, would be a lie. It’s always there. It’s just about the mix. Sometimes there’s more of the past, sometimes less. But in the end, it all has to come together, right?

Where do you draw the line when you have to use the archives?
It shows itself in the styling process. When you’re shooting, you’re trying to balance all these different parts; you need the right amount of everything. It’s a constant balancing act. The tricky thing with nostalgia is that it feels good. It’s pleasant. It’s familiar. It’s safe. But that’s exactly the problem — it can become too recognisable. I’ve always tried to counterbalance that. I like it when the contrasts are there, that specific tension between two things that don’t belong together.

Do you think it is bad that we always lean toward nostalgia?
Definitely no.

What earns trust today: consistency, or transparency?
Do we have to choose? They both have their place. It’s not a binary. You need that playful, intuitive side; the part that just knows what feels right for yourself. But you also need to understand the weight of what you’re dragging along from the past. If you overthink it, you kill the magic and start making the wrong calls. But if you don’t think at all, it’s just noise. For me, it’s always about finding that sweet spot where history and the “now” actually speak to each other.

Speaking of trends, how do you decide whether a collaboration adds value or is just about visibility?
In my view, collaborations are almost entirely selfish. It’s all about the meeting; that collision with another creative and seeing how they actually approach their world. That’s the whole essence of it. Branding collaborations are difficult. They rarely turn out well, to be honest. I’ve tried them a few times, and they feel… less.

But working with someone like Frédéric Malle? That was an actual journey. I was learning about perfume, about his life, and seeing our brand through his eyes. I walked away with so much more than a scent. Sure, the perfume is great, but that’s only because he’s great.

How do you choose who to work with?
I never really ask anyone in that sense. We don’t have a list; it’s more organic than that.

How did the Frédéric Malle collaboration happen?
I received a handwritten letter. And when you get something like that, you’re almost like, “Oh, who’s this from?” You know? It started there.

So he basically asked you out, like on a date.
Yeah [laughs]. I guess you could say it’s almost like a date. And then you’re like, “Ok, interesting.” You go from there, you know?

There is a growing expectation for brands to stand for something. How do you navigate that?
What do we stand for? I think people approach us because we’re not the average fashion brand. We don’t only deliver clothing. There’s a cultural value and aspect to what we do across all these different disciplines.

Is that where Acne Paper comes in?
With Acne Paper, the collaborations, the shows, the musicians— we make vinyls and interact with graphic designers and artists. The whole cultural aspect involving these different disciplines has always been a part of the brand, which makes us unique. And we have this, in a way, for free. Now, almost 30 years later, you look at that, and you feel like you have a house to live in. You’re not just searching for some place to be, right?

Where do you see Acne Studios in another 30 years?
From now? Oh, I’ll be dead [laughs].

You never know. Science is moving fast.
Yeah, it is. It’s funny you mention science, because fashion is always evolving. But there’s a structural, logistical issue with fashion. Somebody needs to make the fabric, somebody needs to stitch the garment, somebody needs to design the zipper puller… There are so many people intertwined in making your jacket.

It feels like fashion is still very traditional.
Yeah. It’s a structure you can’t bypass today, unlike music. When I grew up, you had to play an instrument. You couldn’t just sit with a computer and say, “Oh, I want this to sound like a guitar.” Music had this big revolution, you know? But there hasn’t been anything like that in fashion yet. It’s this old factory style thing, which I love. I hope people can eventually make their own fashion.

How do you measure success beyond sales? Do you always have to chase numbers?
I mean, of course, in fashion, you always have to chase the numbers and stuff. But one thing you know is that when you design something, like when I did the first trompe-l’œil lately, you can feel that it’s an interesting piece that’s going to create a lot of noise. I just knew it; it’s like making a hit song.

So it’s an instinct?
Yeah. These products have their own life. They become something more than you, more than just a piece of clothing. If I make something that attracts someone on the other side of the world from where I am in Paris, maybe Tokyo, or you in Singapore, the garment travels by itself. It’s quite amazing, actually.

So, success from sales becomes subjective?
I measure a lot in sales, but it’s not about “cool people or not cool people”. It’s about those products that take off, and you just know it. I see it in the team. All these young people whom I work with look at me, and they’re… well, they don’t actually say it, but I can see it. And that is the feeling I go for. I go home after work, and I go, “Yeah, I made something cool.”

What matters more for relevance now: taste or values?
If you ask me today, I’ll say values right away. If you had asked me a long time ago, I would have said to have the best taste of them all. Values are so important today in how the world looks. You can’t choose anything else.

But, of course, having your own approach to aesthetics is more important today than aligning with everyone else’s. You have to propose something different, because everyone’s in the same channel. There are always these big trends — “quiet luxury,” or whatever — and that race is just really, really sad. It’s not easy to handle.

Does that race ever concern you?
You know, people in the industry use these words that become fashionable. I don’t hate it, but is it something I need to bother about? I can only do what I can do. That’s the hardcore truth about design: don’t think you can do just anything. It’s only what you bring to the table that’s going to be measured. It’s unfortunate like that.

Are you proud of the brand for what it is today?
Ridiculously proud. It’s my identity, even though it’s not my name. My biggest pride is when someone asks me, “What do you do?” because nobody knows me. Sometimes I say I work with fabrics. I don’t want to be a celebrity. Ever.

You have the coolest people wearing the brand, though.
Our audience? We’re proud of them. It’s different and doesn’t feel like someone just putting on clothes to attend a show. There are many bold attendees. Real celebrities are getting paid, that’s normal. But I think what really strikes the young people is someone like Ecco2K coming to the show. It really shows where we are with the current audience. It means we did something right.

The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity. Once you are done with this story, click here to catch up with our March 2026 issue.