The star-spangled suit Kid Rock donned for an Oval Office visit with President Donald Trump has spread on social media. However, its designer, Manuel Cuevas, is much more under the radar via WWD.
At 92, the designer still works 12 to 14 hours seven days a week from his studio outside of Nashville. When asked where does all that energy come from? Cuevas said Wednesday:
“I have no idea,”
“I just love what I do. I don’t become a tyrant or a giant or Superman. I just say, ‘Well, thank God I got through this. I’m happy if people are happy.”
Making a house call to Kid Rock to alter some clothes, due to weight loss, the musician had asked Cuevas to make a couple of suits. For the White House visit, he requested the “250” insignia as a nod to the upcoming 250-year anniversary of American independence. All of other creative license was left to Cuevas, who only had a few weeks to make the custom look.
Having recently been shown some of the media coverage of Kid Rock wearing the $20,000 suit with Trump, Cuevas said:
“People make a big thing about this stuff. I go and hide and go work for my next client. In fact, I’ve had a lot of clients, since I started this business.”
That’s an understatement. Known as the “Rhinestone Rembrandt,” his client list has included Dolly Parton, Lady Gaga, John Lennon, Marlon Brando, the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Harris, George H. Bush and his son George W., Bob Dylan and Post Malone among others.
“People love it, because it’s not just the only jacket like it in New York, but in America or Mexico. It’s the only one in the world. It’s also because their wishes are identified with it,” he said. “It’s like a precious jewel.”
“The thousands and thousands” of suits that he has made are all one-of-a-kind, and the majority require intricate embroidery. While making a custom coat might take two and a half days, the handwork could take a month or longer, due to the complexity of the pieces. How did he learn to do such complicated work? “Well, just be being a stubborn [laughs] and being contrary to what everybody is doing in the industry. I am not a fashionista. I’m a stylist. It’s a very different hat,” Cuevas said.
As unlikely as it sounds, Cuevas had started sewing at the age of seven in Mexico. While watching his brother sew a pair of pants, Manuel asked how the tailoring business was going and was told it would be better if he would help.
“So I did, and I haven’t gotten away from the sewing machine yet,” Cuevas said.
In his homeland of Mexico, he began his professional career at 12 and relocated to Hollywood eight years later to “prepare people for movies and how to style people,” he said.
At the time, he worked with the famed costume designer Edith Head and many other notables.
“A lot of people sometimes have the tendency to think that nothing exciting happens in Mexico, I had fantastic clients in Mexico,” Cuevas said.
“Through a few jobs, I go to the top point of working with the stars. Edith Head explained to me one time, ‘Work for the stars. Don’t make things for those dummies that get killed in the first 10 minutes of the movie.’ That’s just the funny way that she was. Apart from having the language of a truck driver, she was nice. She was my kind of person. I loved her and she loved me. That’s how you develop friendships.”
