One of the most prominent and influential American designers in existence, and the creator or what he calls “glunge” (grunge plus glamour), Rick Owens knows how to stay avant-garde and still sell tens of millions of dollars every year in over two hundred and fifty high-end fashion stores around the world.

The Paris based fashion designer, who started his label in 1994 and lives and works in a five-story mansion on the Place du Palais Bourbon, in central Paris, once said “I try to make clothes the way Lou Reed does music, with minimal chord changes, and direct. It is sweet but kind of creepy. It’s about giving everything I make a worn, softened feeling. It’s about an elegance being tinged with a bit of the barbaric, the sloppiness of something dragging and the luxury of not caring“.

With exquisitely designed namesake and successful stores in Paris, New York, London and recently in Tokyo to be your gaetway into the elusive Rick Owens World. Backed by a strong cult following of hardcore appreciators of what only he can provide, no wonder Details magazine asked him to share his “10 Rules of Style”, giving exclusive insight into what he thinks is luxury, attractive and “glunge”.

Rick Owens “10 Rules of Style”:

1. I’m not good at subtlety. If you’re not going to be discreet and quiet, then just go all the way and have the balls to shave off your eyebrows, bleach your hair, and put on some big bracelets.

2. Working out is modern couture. No outfit is going to make you look or feel as good as having a fit body. Buy less clothing and go to the gym instead.

3. I’ve lived in Paris for six years, and I’m sorry to say that the Ugly American syndrome still exists. Sometimes you just want to say “Stop destroying the landscape with your outfit.” Still, from a design standpoint, I’m tempted to redo the fanny pack. I look at it as a challenge—it’s something to react against.

4. When a suit gets middle-of-the-road it kind of loses me—it has to be sharp and classic and almost forties.

5. Hair and shoes say it all. Everything in between is forgivable as long as you keep it simple. Trying to talk with your clothes is passive-aggressive.

6. There’s something a little too chatterboxy about color. Right now I want black, for its sharpness and punctuation.

7. Jean-Michel Frank, the thirties interior and furniture designer, supposedly had 40 identical double-breasted gray flannel suits. He knew himself and is a wonderful example of restraint and extravagance.

8. I hate rings and bracelets on men. I’m not a fan of man bags, or girl bags either—or even sunglasses. I don’t like fussy accessories. Isn’t it more chic to be free? Every jacket I make has interior pockets big enough to store a book and a sandwich and a passport.

9. With layering, sometimes the more the better. When you layer a lot of black you’re like a walking Louise Nevelson sculpture, and that’s pretty attractive. Allowing yourself to be vulnerable is also one of the most attractive things you can do.

10. It’s funny—whenever someone talks about rules, I just want to break them. I recoil from the whole idea of rules.