Lauren Cochrane caught up with the stylist behind our Style Guides to chat inspirations, aspirations and what makes his sole bounce.
Jordan Dean Schneider remembers his first pair of Dr Martens, bought when he was a teenager. “They were a moleskin black pair,” says the stylist, his voice full of nostalgia. “I battered them to bits but I gave them to a friend of mine who still wears them…they get better with age. I get a little tear in the eye when I see them.”
Schneider, who also works as an art director and creative consultant, has made fashion feels like this a key part of his work.
Shooting for publications such as Man About Town, The Greatest Magazine and The New Order, and collaborating with bands like Fontaines DC and Soft Play (formerly Slaves), one of his trademarks has become going beyond trends to something deeper.
I always think about the bigger picture, the character first,” he says. “What would he be wearing in this moment?
His mum was a model as a young woman, while his dad - who fitted out shops for brands - was a clothes enthusiast. “My dad taught me the sensibilities about fashion,” he says. “But then my mother taught me to have fun with it. She dresses pretty out there.”
Then there was his uncle - the owner of Accent Clothing, an institution of menswear in Leeds, founded in 1988 and only closing its doors last year. It was here that Schneider got his own start in the mid-noughties, working in the shop as a teenager, and finding his crowd. “There was a culture where we [those working in shops] would all hang out on Thursday nights,” he remembers. “Leeds is forward thinking in terms of fashion because we have the influence of students… that drips down into the locals and it’s more acceptable to push the envelope.”
If this was the fashion side of Schneider’s education, there were also his school days to add to the mix. He winces at early mid-90s experimentation. “I used to love colour co-ordination a ridiculous amount,” he says, practically blushing down the phone. “I remember I had a Hawaiian shirt, with white and blue print, blue quarter length trousers, and these blue rubberised shoes.” Still, there were the early signs of how he would go on to approach styling. “I always wanted to dress up as characters,” he remembers. “I used to dress up in army [outfits] and go play armies with my friends.”
As a teenager, Schneider’s style leaned towards what is - sometimes derogatorily - called ‘grebo’. “We were classed as that because we skateboarded and we were listening to Limp Bizkit,” he clarifies
We came from such a quiet town, we rebelled by listening to heavy music. Those things inform your ways of dressing.
Even so, Schneider wasn’t cliquey. “I was a bit of a chameleon at school,” he says. “I never really had one tribe, I bounced around a bit.” He was also a singer in a band, with the distinction of accidentally headlining for Bring Me The Horizon. “They wanted to get the last train home, so they made us go on last,” he reveals, with a giggle.
Despite his immersion into fashion early on, the back end of fashion shoots remained something of a mystery. “Growing up reading magazines, I didn't know there was someone creating all this imagery,” he says. “I didn't really know what styling was.” His journey was more a question of instinct - after Accent, he moved to London and worked at a denim company before realising the creative side of fashion was calling.
Rather than going back to college, Schneider learnt on the job - first working at Arena Homme Plus, and then assisting renowned stylist Stephen Mann. He started to do his own shoots from 2015 onwards.
More than a decade on and Schneider is in demand, working across fashion shoots for magazines and brands - like Dr Martens - and musicians. His schoolboy omnivore approach to subcultures remains integral to his outlook. “When I think about my styling, I have a handwriting but I enjoy leaning into different cultures,” he says.
He gives the example of bikers, as the proud owner of a motorcycle. “I do wear certain things when I'm riding, but I also love wearing a mackintosh and a suit.” As with a lot of proper fashion visionaries, trends are antithetical. “I never wear things that are in fashion,” he says. “When I start to see things creep in, I tend to go the other way.”
Bands are the perfect canvas to create his characters. He started to work with Fontaines DC after a recommendation from photographer Theo Cottle, and they collaborated on the artwork for the 2024 album, Romance. “I kept in contact with [lead singer] Grian [Chatten] and I was sending bits and bobs that I thought could work for the theme of the album,” says Schneider. A couple of photo shoots followed. “We was really trying to push the narrative with the styling, which solidified me working with them,” he says. “I feel like we bonded in that I saw where the band wanted to be.” Schneider ended up styling them for their 2025 tour.
Beyond musicians, his bucket list of people to work with include Viggo Mortensen, Mads Mikkelsen and Daniel Day Lewis. “They've played these hard men in the past, but they also have a very romantic softness to them,” he says, clarifying that he would wouldn’t want to style them per se, but instead to “put them in some nice clothes and have the chance to sit down and chat with them.”
With a trajectory slowly but surely rising over the last decade, you’d be willing to bet these icons of masculinity could be on Schneider’s client list before long. After talking through his career for this interview, even the man himself acknowledges he’s on the right track.
“I'm a Yorkshireman, you don't really talk about stuff like that, you just get on with it,” he reflects. “It’s nice to go ‘I've done all right here’. You start on the shop floor, not thinking that you're going to be styling a band like the Fontaines on the main stage of a big festival. It’s been an interesting ride.” It certainly has.
BOX OUT:
WHAT MAKES YOUR SOLE BOUNCE?
Walking the woods with my partner and my dog
“Recently I was up in Yorkshire and we walked in the woods around Skipton Castle. It's just beautiful. It really resets me.”
Riding my motorcycle
“Trips away with my friends always feels like an adventure. We drive all around the country. I haven't been to Europe yet, but we're planning that this summer.”
Gardening
“I've just recently moved house, we have a massive garden and it's a big project. I'm not saying I'm any good at it, but last year, we planted plants, put shale down. I really like being in my garden, it’s just a nice place to be.”
