It all began for Kenneth Cole in 1982 with a line of shoes. Nowadays he has become a household name, synonymous with style, quality and political awareness. His latest fragrance is Mankind, a title that signifies the social consciousness that Cole has infused in his brand and in everything he does.

Overall, Kenneth Cole Productions sells men’s and women’s fashions, footwear, fragrances and accessories under the labels Kenneth Cole New York, Kenneth Cole Reaction, and Unlisted. The company currently operates over 90 retail and outlet stores worldwide, also selling through catalogs and websites.

I spoke with the visionary designer on the launch of a fragrance perfect for the modern day Hombre.

HOMBRE: We’re at the launch of MANKIND, what can you tell us about your new fragrance?
Kenneth Cole: This is an exciting project and I always look forward to these sort of things because it gives me a moment to reflect and contemplate the context within which we’re trying to connect with consumers. Fragrance, specifically, is unlike anything else we do. Everything that we do kind of defines how a guy looks and how he presents himself and speaks to who he is on many levels. But a fragrance is very unique, a very emotional experience, its very intense.

H: How was the development process for the fragrance?
KC: It took us a while before we decided we were ready to go down that road and it’s a road I love to be on. But it also forces us to really think about emotionally how does that guy think. What inspires him, what gets him up in the morning and what’s on his mind as he goes to bed at night.

H: You’ve been designing for over three decades, how is your marketing process different now?
KC: Everything has changed so much today, the way the universe has evolved, people connect in more meaningful ways on so many levels. The bigger message being the evolution. We are evolving as people, and how we communicate and how we connect.  Everybody today feels their power on a whole different level. I’ve been saying very strongly that today everybody’s truly their own brand and my hope is that you’ll allow me to be a part of your brand. Everybody carries their brand on various platforms from Facebook, to Instagram, to Pintrest… They tell the world who they are and they present themselves daily and they represent themselves constantly. Then they curate not just their brand but their audience and who they’re going to allow access to their brand, who can see and experience their emotions and thoughts.

H: Who is your customer today?
KC: It’s an exciting time, there’s kind of a sense of a renaissance guy and he pushes the limits. Strong but sensitive, competitive but fair, witty but respectful. He knows where he’s been and he has a sense of where he is and a clear focus on where he wants to be and what it’s going to take to get there. There’s a sense of humanity today that I think is embedded in everything we all do.

H: What does MANKIND represent?
KC: There’s a sense of passion and also compassion. MANKIND represents all people and it’s a part of what I try to do with my personal life and with my business. Hopefully that will connect with people. The fragrance is reflective of people defining themselves in their own terms. I believe my job, as a designer today, is to enable you to be the best that you can be. And if I’ve done my job people will tell you what great shoes you have and what a great fragrance you’re wearing.

H: What role does fragrance play in a guy’s style?
KC: The goal is that the fragrance shouldn’t arrive before you and shouldn’t linger after you’re gone.  It should make you all that you can be and hopefully your wardrobe do as well.

H:  How will you market the fragrance?
KC: Hopefully this will speak to guys in a unique way and the marketing campaign today its not about advertising, its about multimedia and multisensory ways because we aren’t connecting with audiences as we did before. We will have this micro site which will have video content and it will have all these images and, again, it will have all this multicultural diverse universe that we exist in and guys will connect. And there’s a shareable mobile activation.

H: What do you hope the name MANKIND conveys?
KC: One of the messages we’ve been communicating and feel connects with our bigger message is the goal is to enable people to look good, and then to feel good about looking good, and, hopefully, to do good.

H: How involved are you with the development of the fragrance?
KC: I’m involved basically in the look and feel with everything we do. We want to elevate what we do, who we do it with and how we do what we do with who we do it with. It’s a big focus now, that’s what we set out to do here with this project and I’m fascinated – as I said before – with how we’ve evolved and how we communicate. How we talk about what we do, and who we talk about it with. It’s a cool time to kind of figure out how to talk about, how to position it, and how to connect with people in different kinds of ways.

H: In 1982, when you began, did you ever visualize that you would build such an empire?
KC: No, it was never about being big in those days. It was just about being better. It wasn’t until going public about ten years afterwards that I realized I needed to get bigger in order to have a physical retail presence, in order to control our destiny, to have that direct relationship with audiences. Now that we’re private again,  we’re smaller again and I try to elevate the experience.

H: What advice would you give somebody who looks up to you and wants to do something similar, in whatever field?
KC: I would say that you can make whatever you do be meaningful as a part of the journey. Whereas there was this notion in the past where that was the destination and you did well and one day you could afford to do good. Whereas today doing good you could do well.

H: But that’s always been the philosophy in your company, hasn’t it?
KC: It always has been, but it’s more apparent today as it can be. In the past we were more subtle about it.

H: Finally, how important is the Latin market and Latin America for your brand?
KC: We love the Latin audience. We love the Latin guy, he’s very globally interconnected and he has a very modern sensitivity and he’s also very emotional and engaged with his individual universe. At the same time today, with the global universe, we love that relationship. We’re focusing on how to make it richer and more meaningful.

Kenneth Cole with HOMBRE Magazine’s Francisco Romeo