Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon has dabbled in fashion design over the years -- some of us still have her X-Girl items hanging in the "never get rid of" section of our closets  -- and now has a small capsule collection for Sportsmax's artist-designed "Carte Blanche" series.  Gordon's line is inspired by nature and we chatted with her at Sportsmax's Fashion's Night Out party last night about the collection, nature in urban settings and who she'll be checking out as Fashion Week this year.


Why did you choose nature as the inspiration behind this collection?
Well, it was more like I've been painting on cheap pieces of plywood. I was thinking 'what's the most antithesis of fashion?' and that seemed to be nature or natural things. I live three hours north and there's a river by where we live and we like to walk along it.  I also started thinking a lot about the way that nature is brought into the city and urban environments. Like, in L.A., you see gas stations with landscaping and I think that's interesting -- natural things being used in the most un-natural way.

Can you think of examples of that in New York?
Yeah, like all of the high rises that have indoor gardens or courtyards.

The Highline feels a little along those lines, too -- elevated train tracks converted into a park.
And people flock to it -- 'Oh, the Highline!' It's interesting. But I also think that New York City is its own beauty.

What shows will we see you at this week?
Alexander Wang and Rodarte

How have you seen who you design for change over the years, since when you were doing X-Girl and now with Mirror/Dash and this collection for Sportsmax.
I don't really think of myself as a designer. I've always just thought about making clothes that me or my friends would want to wear. Stuff that's flattering and not too trendy. I mean, when we first started X-Girl, there was so little going on downtown. There was Daryl K and A.P.C. and that was about it. Now there's so, so much. It's sort of like, 'Why do it?'

The House of Style segment on X-Girl's 1994 sidewalk fashion show is on YouTube. Have you seen it?
I know. Isn't that funny it's on YouTube? I had forgotten about it.

That's so crazy that you guys were able to shut down the street in SoHo.
I know. Yeah, it was right after Marc Jacobs had his show down the street and then we put on ours. But there was no shutting anything down. We just did it right there. If you happened to be walking by, you got to see our show.