Frank Mechaly draws upon his earliest memories of spending time at the factory with his father as the inspiration for his lifelong passion for designing jeans.
Speaking in a candid interview he says: "I remember one particular Saturday morning back in the seventies, riding to the jeans factory with my father in his Porsche.
I used to have free run of the entire factory as a child and in these days before stonewashing came about, I would go into one particular room and lie down in a huge pile of fresh denim, which has a very distinctive scent, and I knew at that time that I wanted to spend the rest of my life making jeans."
At age 15,[3] Frank quit school and at 16 moved to St. Tropez, where he began to work in retail clothing stores as a sales person.
Every week he took a train to Rouen to purchase several large bagfuls of jeans, military issue shirts and football jerseys, which he then washed, repaired and resold.
Frank was helped by Maurice Marciano, the CEO of Guess, Inc, who hired him to produce private label apparel and admired his distinctive vintage, distressed and worn details in jeans.
[5] It was embraced by celebrities and particularly noted when actress[6] Cameron Diaz, who was never paid for any endorsements, actually went to stores requesting to buy 575 DENIM and then wearing them at red carpet events and during her Saturday Night Live appearance.
Backed up by his good friend Richard Koral, Mechaly embarked on an ambitious new venture of launching a line of premium denim, dresses and shirts under the RockStar brand.