Meet Nathaniel Copes of Fashion District

Today we’d like to introduce you to Nathaniel Copes

Hi Nathaniel, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I started my entrepreneurial journey in middle school when I was 13 and selling Monster Energy’s to other kids in my classes. From there, I began selling on E-bay when I entered high school. I would go to goodwills and flip coffee mugs, tea kettles, whatever I could get a good flip on. My dad always took me to flea markets, tag sales, auctions, and everything in between growing up so I had a natural knack for knowing what to look for. When I was 17 I started getting into fashion and the world of reselling/collecting clothing particularly in mens traditional/modern dress wear. My friends and I would go to thrift stores, Nordstrom Racks, and Marshalls almost every other day after school hunting for heavily discounted designer items to flip.

After I graduated high school, I took a year off from school and moved from Connecticut to San Diego where I started working for Nordstrom Rack. This launched my online reselling business into the next level because I had access to much more product than I did before. After about a year of living in San Diego, I moved back to Connecticut and began going to college. I then started working as a men’s shoe salesmen at mainline Nordstrom. For the next 4 years I was focused on finishing school while also learning the ins and outs of the fashion industry at a major retail level. After my first year at Nordstrom I received the “Pacesetter Status”, an award which is reserved for the top 10% of employees. At 19 years old I was one of the youngest people in the company to achieve it.

A couple of years into college when I was 21 I took an intro to photography class. Over the years leading up to this I had developed an interest for fashion photography. I loved putting together outfits of clothing I would collect and building a scene in a photograph to cement in time. When I had started my class though, I was required to take photos of other people and places. This is was what started my interest for concert/musician photography where I would take photos at different shows I would go to, specifically in the underground Soundcloud scene. Every week I would drive after school to Boston, New York, or Philadelphia just to have access to shows that were not available in Connecticut. Over time I befriended some of the people I would shoot at these shows and even started throwing some events myself, mainly in Boston. This growing interest and passion of mine started to divert my attention from the clothing and retail world to the music industry.

In the summer of 2018, I had the idea to start combining photos I would take into merchandise designs for the musician’s I loved. I dropped my first shirt shortly after and that was the start of everything I’ve built since. Already having the insight of the manufacturing/retail world I had most of the knowledge I needed to conduct a merchandise drop by myself. After I saw the success of my first drop I knew that was the path I wanted to go towards. After a couple more drops I would have my biggest one to date in January 2019 with the artist Lil Tracy. With the success of that collaboration I was able to quit my job at Nordstrom to pursue my own path of working for myself.

A couple of weeks before I had quit my job I was offered to go on tour as a photographer for my favorite artist Wicca Phase Springs Eternal which had also influenced my decision to start this journey. This was the first tour I had ever been on and at the time had no idea if it would be my last, but I was hooked and wanted to keep going on more. Throughout that year I had gone on several more tours, doing more merchandise drops, and building my name in both the fashion/photography industry. Towards the end of the year I had started working with the underground rapper $not who over the next few years would find huge success in his career. We went on a dozen tours headlining shows throughout the country and opening for other acts such as Limp Bizkit and the $uicideboy$.

When the pandemic began in spring 2020 that put the breaks on everything I was doing in the touring industry. Nobody knew at the time how long these restrictions on doing tours would last and it left everything up to a lot of uncertainty. At this time I started doubling down on my online merchandise brand and started planning bigger drops. Prior to this I was only dropping 1 item at a time and it had always incorporated my photography in the designs. By the end of 2020 I had expanded my brand, dropping a variety of design styles and accessories in full merchandise line drops of a dozen pieces or so per drop. I had tremendous success in this and kept pursuing more and more clothing drops.

Fast forward to 2024, I have grown and expanded my brand to working with all types of creatives who I find myself passionate about. I regularly work with musicians of a variety of genres, Youtubers, tattoo artists, and I even have a pro wrestler collab in the works. My brand has developed a variety of loyal supporting fans over the years who love the products I make. My model is to always offer the coolest and highest quality product for the price point on the market and the loyalty of my customers has proven it’s effective.

Earlier this year, I opened up a storefront in downtown LA at 101-17 studios to showcase my brand for anyone in the area or fans around the world traveling to LA who want to stop by. Since opening we’ve had a several community events at the space with many my collaborators for merchandise. I enjoy having a spot I can meet and talk to other creatives who have the same dreams for success in whatever path they’re trying to go down. I love giving advice to those who ask for it and learning other industry’s that I’m not familiar with.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Working for yourself is never a smooth road. It is very difficult to carve a career path where the blueprint of what you’re suppose to be doing doesn’t exist yet. Over the years I have learned so much about manufacturing and sales that I never imagined I would know. There is always more to learn and things you have to adapt to as time goes on to remain at the top of your game. As your own boss if you don’t do something it won’t get done and that takes a lot of self discipline and dedication. It is easy to become comfortable with your achievements but you always have to remember it is your drive that you had when you started that will be what takes you further. Especially working in online retail, your competition is only growing by the day and you have to find your niche to remain relevant.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
In my photography, I specialize in portraits of people. I shoot all of my photos on film which I feel ages much better than digital photos. My passion for it is in my love for cementing a moment in time that makes you feel nostalgic to look back on. Even with the photos I was taking 7 years ago I love to look back on and remember all the details about when the photo was taken and what lead up to it.

In my clothing, I specialize in creating a wide variety of designs and items that when put together in a drop grab the eye of a wide variety of customers. I really try to make sure a merchandise line has an option for every type of customer of all kinds of backgrounds. I firmly believe it is impossible to go to my website and not find something you like regardless on who you are.

Is there something surprising that you feel even people who know you might not know about?
That my business is still run entirely out of my garage.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.copes.shop/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/copes
• Twitter: https://x.com/_copes_?lang=en

Image Credits
Nathaniel Copes