VOILÀ’s Luke Eisner - STAGE THREADS Ep. 12

I wore this in Dallas and the butt ripped, so front row got an interesting view. When I was in high school, I served a detention for a cleavage violation. I wanted to take the waist in a little bit, make my shoulders look a little bit broader, so I can skip the gym some more. Hi, I'm Luke from Voila, and welcome to Stage Threads. Today I'm going to walk you through some of my clothes that I've been wearing on this Magic Word Tour. Yeah, it's really exciting to talk fashion with you. I think I've always had an affinity for it and an allergy to buttons. As a matter of fact, when I was in high school, I served a detention for a cleavage violation. I'm the only one who ever served that as a guy, because I just refused to button up my shirt. I feel like some of that's coming from Steven Tyler, Rod Stewart, but also just a lot of the books and movies that I loved to consume as a kid. I definitely got into all sorts of different fantasy books, fantasy movies, and I feel like a lot of those characters were always on horseback, or even Fabio on my mom's old romance books. Those kind of things I saw, and I was like, this is really interesting to me, and I feel like that translates to the music. With Voila being all magic themes, I feel like magicians Chris Angel all the way down to Houdini have always had an air for showmanship, for sparkle, for ruffles and frills, and I feel like that is kind of always how I've dressed. I don't even wear sweatpants and t-shirts in my own life. I always feel better in my own skin when I'm dressed up in the way that I feel the best. I was fortunate my first introduction into entertainment was through modeling, and so I kind of really got lucky. Someone was looking out for me from above and got me into all these fashion houses, and I kind of just picked things apart and kind of brought them into the Voila space. Voila, everything's about magic and magicians, and that's definitely where I take influence. I think of Chris Angel. I think of all the way back to Houdini, but a lot of it is like the Regency era, if I think of like the golden age of Bridgerton, so to speak, and then also pirates. So if we go over here, all right, so I tried to do a different outfit for every night of this tour, which was a nice thought, but it's been a little bit harder in execution, but this is kind of what we've got going on for the rest of the tour. This particular piece, I like. This is like a Regency era, kind of think Bridgerton, pirate-type situation. I think that might make it to my hometown show in Milwaukee. I like it a lot because it's a combination of fabrics. We have a velvet, and then we have this nice little like, I don't know, I think that's like a paisley, but yeah, it's really cool, and it's a long coat. It's kind of like the daughter to this one. Move over here, we've got this beautiful velvet, and it's got these high collars that'll pop out, and I love the detailing there. I think that's really nice. I might cut this zipper out because I'm not a big fan of zippers, definitely more of a button person, but I feel like these little almost military buttons and this little like decoratized situation here, it's kind of cool. I love things on the lapels. I think that's always really nice. It kind of breaks it up, especially on stage when you have the light hitting different parts, it kind of makes something that's solid black look a little bit more interesting. This is actually from the lovely city of Chicago. I had to get it tailored, brought it in here, but that's kind of like your classic Admiral pirate vibe, which I think deep down, I really want to be a pirate. And then it's a little sister over here. It's a little more Disney prince-ish. This would probably go with white pants, and that's like a real Admiral type coat. And that's kind of like the dichotomy I'm going for, really, is this like, as if a Disney prince was stuck on a pirate ship for a long time. It allows me to kind of grunge things up nicely, and it's just a nice history, and that's kind of my love of literature has always been from fantasy and historical fantasy, historical romance. So this allows me to be a character. And quite frankly, I don't love just being in front of the camera as me, so this allows me to be Voila. And then this bottom row is definitely my magpie tendencies. This is really cool. I like this a lot. This is probably one of the nicer pieces I've brought with me. I feel like this is red carpet ready, but I love this detailing. And the back shows the same, but this would catch the light really nice. It's just a standard suit coat length. Not quite the long coats that we see on the top, but that leaves room for belts. This one here is a two-piece. So this is the pants on the top. This is a blue, which I do like. It's one of my favorite colors, but this is got these awesome little sequins. This detail looks really cool. And we've got the double lapel, which I like. Wore this in Dallas, and the butt ripped. So front row got an interesting view for a while. This one I got from a tailor online. This is a three-piece suit. It's got the vest as well. I think it's really nice. Love these buttons. How cool is that? This guy's really talented. He did all the measuring over Zoom with me. And I have so much respect for designers. And that's actually kind of how I got into this whole thing, is started my career in entertainment as a model, doing runway and fashion and seeing the way that not only designers work, but also the tailors and how important it is to get something nice and tailored. And the fabrics that you're working with, so important with how it moves. These things can look good on mannequins, but guys have to look good on moving bodies. This last piece, it's pretty wild. This is what I might wear tonight. But wow, that's a brave choice. Got like a double-sided little sequin action and a silky little lapel. Yeah, we'll see. I'm feeling bold. But all this stuff is great. But it doesn't last the whole show because it's quite warm. These are really like thicker coats. So I like to do layers. And that's where this comes in. And this is kind of where it all... Actually, this is the shirt where it all started. This really felt like a Lord of the Rings shirt. And it's actually my mother's. And once I got over the tough guy portion of wearing my mother's shirt, it was kind of keyed into the look. But this is cool. It reminds me a lot of just like classic stage magic. And that's what Boileau is all about. His lace detailing, the frills, the loose cuffs. I love this little mother of pearl little button inlay. Pearl is my favorite stone. I try to find that in a lot of stuff. Yeah, a lot of these suits really aren't expensive suits. A lot of them are thrifted. Some of them are just kind of found in little corners of the internet. But I think what makes a suit look nice is the tailoring. So all of these, I have a tailor next to where I live. And I definitely try to keep him in business. But I take a suit to him all the time. He gets it done in a day, some very last minute. And then, yeah, like this one here, I think is really cool. This actually comes from someone in Chicago, but it did not fit super well. So I wanted to take the waist in a little bit, make my shoulders look a little bit broader so I can skip the gym some more. And yeah, now we've got this working out. So this is where I would get into like the under layering. These are some awesome see-through little lace tops. And they have ruffles too in the high collars, which I like a lot. But those will pair with any of these suits, which is nice. I'd probably go like that. Or I really like a black and white situation. So I'd probably go here or there. This is a cool shirt. This one doesn't have buttons at all. It's just a low V. And I would throw a vest on that puppy. And all of a sudden, you're playing in like elf territory. Cool. This is asymmetry, which I just love. This is like one of my favorite things. Same with this. This has like a nice little asymmetrical tie, which I think is really cool. It also has some glitter on it, like a gauze. Yeah, it's just neat. That's what caught my eye. Oh, I have no idea. Some sort of thrift store. Looks like it's on my mom would have worn too. Thanks, mom. Then this stuff is my favorite. I have these. I have like three of each of these. But they're similar to the see-through shirts or even to the one that I'm wearing now with the ruffles. But these have little rhinestones on them. Yeah, so this would look so cool with. He took this rhinestone jacket off and he had this underneath. Yeah, that's what I do. This is like these white lace tops like this and this. I feel like if you put this under a black suit, you get that like old school conductor with a tailcoat type look. Very magic. This one is I haven't worn this one yet, but this is like a tuxedo shirt. Maybe this will get its appearance tonight. We'll see. And then, of course, the most important part is your belt. When I wear the most is this lion belt that I got on our spin the bottle tour last year. And it's got a little sister here. But I've got a bunch. I've got some brown belts. These are all cool thrift store finds. This I got in Germany. It's this belt maker. All of these amazing handmade little buckles. This one's very like more spiking Scandinavian heritage. And this is like probably my favorite. It's quintessential big old pirate belt. This you could wear like this if you were over the shoulder. Really? Yeah. Will Turner vibe. And then I do like a scarf belt. I've kind of always done this. I just started when I was in I was doing modeling more and I would go from L.A. to New York in the winter. And in L.A. it was quite warm. So I get like a thinner scarf and I wear it around my neck. When I was going through the airport, they make you take your belt off. My pants would fall down. So I started tying a scarf around instead of a metal belt. So I'd get through security and it just kind of became something I do. I love a handkerchief too. Silk handkerchief. Tie it around your wrist. Tie it around the belt loop. But yeah, it gives it a little more character, which I like. And then, of course, jewelry. It's just kind of my tattoos. I'm always picking up new pieces. I have to wear less rings when I play guitar because they get caught. But yeah, I've kind of always picking up little pieces. I got this one on this tour. It's Latin and it says, as wise as the serpent and as innocent as the dove, which means to me, I have an old soul but a young heart. Yeah, I mean, when it comes to thrifting in general, a lot of this stuff is really just hidden. You kind of just have to enjoy going to thrift stores in general. I've never had success at a place that I thought was going to be successful. They're usually in places you don't expect it because you're really going through people's grandparents' clothing to find this stuff, especially with the vintage stuff. But also, costuming stores are really good. Most of this is just costumes. And yeah, so I mean, around Halloween time is a great time to start poking around. I have luxury living in Los Angeles. There's a lot of costume shops and estate sales. And a lot of these estate sales are from people who are in costuming. So as long as you are willing to dig and make a day out of it, you'll probably find some good stuff. For boots, I just have this one pair with me because I wear a size 14. And so this takes up a lot of suitcase space. So these have been holding up with a little bit of super glue for the entire tour. But normally, I do love boots. I have a lot of different boots. I'm also an equestrian, so I have a lot of like Ariat boots, old like British English riding boots. And once those get worn into and broken into, they look really cool. But they take up a lot of space. For pants, I usually have black dress pants. Or these black dickies are really nice because they're a little bit thicker. I get down on my knees a lot during the show or climb things. And these are really resistant to tearing on my Dallas pants, as we talked about. So I like these a lot. They're nice wide-legged. And they're pretty much indestructible. I've got these in black and white. Same with the dress pants. But yeah, I've kind of keyed into the dickies for a while now. Well, I have to go to soundcheck. It was nice talking with you guys. If you want to hear more about my band, Voila, you can check it out anywhere you stream music or anywhere you consume social media. Cheers, guys.