Glenn Martens Is Named Diesel’s Creative Director

Y/Project designer Glenn Martens has a way with denim, contorting it into plunging V-front jeans and oversize double-lapel jackets. Today, he’s taking his commitment to the material to a new level with a new gig in fashion: the creative director of Diesel. “I am extremely honored and excited to join the Diesel family,” Martens said in a release. “Synonymous with radicality, honesty, and optimism, Diesel helped shape the way we see the future. Its unique voice has made it an undeniable icon. Today, more than ever, I feel the need to celebrate these founding values, to build bridges through a message of hope.”

The Belgian designer is no stranger to the Diesel universe. In 2018, he collaborated with the brand as a part of its Red Tag Project, creating a fashion show on the streets of Paris that saw denim and leather warped into draped button-downs and bootcut trousers. (Other collaborators of the Red Tag Project include Hood by Air’s Shayne Oliver, A-Cold-Wall*, and Readymade.) The year before, Martens won the ANDAM Prize with Y/Project, an award also supported by Diesel owner Only The Brave.  He was awarded a special prize by ANDAM again in 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic alongside fellow former winner Marine Serre. 

“Ever since I met Glenn in 2017 I saw his experience grow and his talent cement,” wrote Only the Brave CEO Renzo Rosso in a statement. “Working with him on Diesel Red Tag, going through our company’s archives and heritage together, seeing him interact with the brand, brought us closer, and I am happy to now see him take the helm of Diesel, where he will marry his design vision with the iconoclastic values of this unique brand.”

Martens’s appointment is effective immediately.