How to dress like a billionaire

How Billions Costume Designer Picks the Show’s Trademark Outerwear – April 1, 2019

On April 1, 2019April 16, 2019 By Gingersnap Comments Off

**No Billions Quant Is Ever Fully Dressed Without an Axe Cap Fleece Vest**

by Hunter Harris | Vulture | April 1, 2019

Photo-Illustration: Maya Robinson/Vulture and Photo by Showtime

The only thing Billions takes more seriously than making and closing deals is how flashily — and intentionally — the Axe Capital quants layer for their sleek windowed office. A fleece vest is the de facto uniform for a certain type of Wall Street worker, and it’s their most important wealth signifier. To hear Billions costume designer Eric Daman tell it: “The Scots have different plaids that their families are associated with. The Irish have fisherman sweaters worn according to their clans. The finance guys have their polar fleece vests with their company logo on it. You would think that these billionaires would be like, I’m not wearing this shitty fleece vest. But they have a pride in it.”

It cannot be overstated that I never, at any point, have a clue what is technically going on in the Billions-verse. Money! Trades! The Southern District of New York! But I do know a lot about gossiping and have spent enough time on New York City-area dating apps to know this to be true: There are few things more important to someone who works on Wall Street (ditto Silicon Valley) than the shapeless, muted-color fleece vests these people wear, the ones with their firm’s logo stitched on one side of the chest, the ones that look deeply and importantly unattractive. So: Here’s absolutely everything you (probably did not, frankly) need to know about how the Billions costume designer picks out all of the show’s trademark outerwear for Axe Capital’s traders.

Continue reading How Billions Costume Designer Picks the Show’s Trademark Outerwear – April 1, 2019

Billions Fashion and Style Print Media

‘Billions,’ ‘Succession’ and the Making of Wealth Porn – March 14, 2019

On March 14, 2019April 16, 2019 By Gingersnap Comments Off

The Ultrawealthy. The 1 Percent of the 1 Percent

by Alexis Soloski | New York Times | March 14, 2019

Eric Daman, the “Billions” costume designer, works with the actor Damian Lewis on set. Credit Antonio Santos for The New York Times

Two years ago, Aidan Sleeper needed to find an apartment.

Sleeper, the locations manager for “Billions,” returning Sunday for its fourth season on Showtime, scouted more than 100 places that list for tens of millions of dollars, but he couldn’t find the right one. “It was impossible,” he said.

The apartment wasn’t for his own use — he and his wife rent in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn. No, he had to lock down a Manhattan residence for Bobby Axelrod, the “Billions” hedge fund phenom played by Damian Lewis. The space couldn’t be comfortable or cozy. It needed to intimidate, astound, overwhelm, gut punch your breath away.

“We always joke, ‘billionaire, not millionaire,’” Sleeper said on a January morning at the “Billions” production office in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, as he scrolled through a desktop folder of photos. He clicked for a moment on a $65 million triplex that hadn’t impressed him when he toured it: “You walk in there and it’s like, really?” He shrugged and scrolled on.

Continue reading ‘Billions,’ ‘Succession’ and the Making of Wealth Porn – March 14, 2019

Billions Fashion and Style Merchandise

The Fashion and Style of Bobby Axelrod in Billions Seasons 1 Thru 5, Plus Season 7

On May 4, 2018October 28, 2023 By Gingersnap Comments Off

Bobby Axelrod: The CASHmere King

by Gingersnap | damian-lewis.com | May 4, 2018 (updated October 23, 2023)

You would think Damian Lewis and Bobby Axelrod couldn’t dress more differently but diving a little deeper, I found some commonalities. However, if we were to simplify, Damian typically dresses up with spurts of leisure whereas Axe dresses down with spurts of formality. Svelte Damian can wear a suit like a coat hanger and Axe can wear a hoodie like a dope Bankster. As Billions costume designer Eric Daman has said, “Damian looks like he just walked off a men‘s catwalk in Italy” so when “Axe does wear a suit, it’s like a punch to the face.”

Continue reading The Fashion and Style of Bobby Axelrod in Billions Seasons 1 Thru 5, Plus Season 7

Billions Fashion and Style Print Media

How To Dress Like a Billionaire – April 23, 2018

On April 23, 2018April 16, 2019 By Gingersnap Comments Off

Now on its third season, Showtime’s dramedy “Billions” masterfully captures the changing dress codes of the finance world

by Jacob Gallagher | Wall Street Journal | April 23, 2018

Bobby “Axe” Axelrod (next to his wife Lara, played by Malin Akerman) wearing his trademark hoodie. Source: Showtime – Photo by Jeff Neumann

TYPE “BOBBY AXELROD” into Google and the first recommendation that pops up is “Bobby Axelrod hoodie.” So, to satisfy your curiosity: Mr. Axelrod, the cool-as-an-ice-cube-in-Alaska protagonist of Showtime’s series “Billions,” wears Loro Piana zip-ups. They’re cashmere and just in case you’re really interested in dressing like the man who makes the billions on “Billions,” each one costs $2,295. For a glorified sweatshirt, they’re a needlessly expensive indulgence, which makes them perfect for a show that is the embodiment of what wealth looks like today.

Now on its third season, the drama unfurls a cat-and-mouse chase between Mr. Axelrod (played by Damien Lewis), an ethically flexible Manhattan hedge fund manager, and Charles “Chuck” Rhoades Jr. (played by Paul Giamatti), an ethically flexible United States attorney for the Southern District of New York. The plots weave stock swapping and legal loopholing with fist-bumping bros, strip-club sushi lunches and even an excursion to a BDSM dungeon. In short, the show is glorious, greedy fun.

More than that though, what “Mad Men” did to immortalize the style of 1950s ad agencies, “Billions” is doing for post-Great Recession financial firms. Aside from his used-Camry-priced hoodie, Mr. Axelrod dresses more or less like the guy who sold me my coffee this morning, with his simple, dark A.P.C. jeans and egalitarian Puma sneakers. Gordon Gekko would mistake Bobby Axelrod for an intern.

Continue reading How To Dress Like a Billionaire – April 23, 2018

Billions Fashion and Style Merchandise

Bobby Axelrod Merchandise Available in Billions Showtime Store – Feb 19, 2017

On February 19, 2017April 16, 2019 By Gingersnap Comments Off

Billions Merchandise Available in the Showtime Store

by Gingersnap | damian-lewis.com | February 19, 2017

How about your very own Bobby Axelrod standee for all your selfies?

Source: Showtime Store

Need an Axe T-Shirt?

Source: Showtime Store

Source: Showtime Store

Thirsty?

Source: Showtime Store

Source: Showtime Store

Piggy Bank (original is NOT bleeped out)

What’s the point of having f*ck you money, if you never say f*ck you? – Bobby Axelrod

Source: Showtime Store

For the Noggin’

Ornament for the Tree or Rear View Mirror

Cover Your Ass Blanket Throw

Kicks – BillionsxGREATS

Items are subject to availability, as Showtime marketing items vary from season to season. View store here.
For information about how to purchase the shoes pictured above or Axe’s signature cashmere hoodies, view here.

Billions Fashion and Style Print Media

Why Is This Billionaire Wearing a $22 Metallica T-Shirt? – Jan 29, 2016

On January 29, 2016April 16, 2019 By Gingersnap Comments Off

**The creative force behind Billions‘ very carefully considered aesthetic spills his trade secrets**

by Justine Harman | Elle | January 29, 2016

If you’ve been watching Showtime’s compulsively watchable pissing contest, also known as Billions, you’ve likely noticed that hedge fund manager Bobby “Axe” Axelrod (played by Homeland alum Damian Lewis) has an idiosyncratic manner of dressing. Most memorable, perhaps, was last week’s scene in which Axe schooled an uppity, old money family while wearing a well-loved Metallica T-shirt. But the sartorial specificity doesn’t stop there. Other tricks up our antihero’s well-considered sleeve: threadbare henleys in the workplace, T-shirts paired with perfectly tailored suits, sneakers in situations where the dress code most certainly does not call for sneakers. But what separates Billions from the other fashionable casts in costume designer Eric Daman’s impressive repertoire (Sex and the City, The Carrie Diaries, and six seasons of Gossip Girl) is the presumed wealth of its topline characters. Sure, Chuck Bass had panache, but did he have billions of dollars in his checking account? We think not. In anticipation of Sunday’s episode, nine rules we learned about dressing like someone who takes home a paycheck with as many zeros:

Continue reading Why Is This Billionaire Wearing a $22 Metallica T-Shirt? – Jan 29, 2016