Old scholar Peter Le launches Leftfield clothing range

He has more than one million followers on TikTok, is studying medicine and, now, former Blackfriars Head Prefect Peter Le has launched his own clothing brand.

The move into fashion may seem a little out of left field for the aspiring doctor – but that is part of the appeal.

Mr Le (BPS’20) described his clothing range, Leftfield, as “an aesthetic symbol of sophistication”.

“I knew when I was quite young that I really liked fashion,” said Mr Le, who is midway through a medical degree at Flinders University.

“Even when I was in school, I would always try to make myself presentable with the uniform.

“I was fortunate enough to grow a following on social media. And then I started thinking, how can I create something that people would like, something I have an interest in that I could turn into a business?

“And my first idea was a clothing brand, because that was something that I was really interested in.”

The first Leftfield drop was a basic T-shirt; the second a cropped boxy polo. Both sold out. The new drop is scheduled for early July.

Going forward, Mr Le hoped to launch larger collections.

“When we do have an even larger backing on the socials, and have established ourselves through multiple drops, that’s when I’d love to bring out a collection,” he said.

“But I think my focus now is just creating one piece that a lot of people universally appreciate … so that when we do release multiple, they know what they can expect – sophistication and excellence.”

That excellence is something Mr Le tries to bring to all aspects of his life.

“I think a lot of that is attributed to my parents always encouraging me to be busy,” he said.

“I think I got to a point when I was in Year 8 or 9, if I didn’t have something on after school, like being involved in water polo at the time, or in band, it felt like I was wasting time, like I wasn’t working on myself.

“Throughout high school, I looked up to a lot of role models, the big one being LeBron James, and just their work ethic and how they strive for excellence by trying to be 1% better every day. And that really stuck with me.

“I always tried to achieve as much as I could in whatever I wanted to do. Whether that was at school, trying to obtain a competitive ATAR; or in uni, trying to maintain really high academic standards; in sport, trying to compete as hard as I can.”

Out of Leftfield

The Leftfield range is proving to have wide appeal, with orders coming from across the globe.

“I’ve had orders from Slovakia, Russia … everywhere, and it’s just been incredible to see. I’d say the split is maybe 60% Australia, 40% worldwide, which is pretty cool,” Mr Le said.

“It’s a unisex range, but I’ve marketed mostly towards males – I think that’s predominantly where the audience lies – and they’re predominantly between that 15 to 30 years. So, that really aligns with my (social media) audience as well.”

Since leaving Blackfriars, Mr Le has garnered a huge social media following – including more than one million people on TikTok and more than 700,000 combined on Instagram and YouTube – initially posting workout videos.

Today, his social media is more “day-in-the-life” style videos, which regularly attract millions of views.

Find your passion

Mr Le’s advice to the current generation of Blackfriars students was to find their passion.

“I think a lot of us get fixated on the end goal, but it’s so much more important to appreciate, be present and fall in love with the process of what you’re doing,” he said.

“I didn’t really focus on trying to sell out Leftfield. I didn’t focus on a certain number for social media. I focused on falling in love with creating content that would resonate with a lot of people.

“And then I fell in love with learning everything I could about how to operate a business. And I do find a lot of enjoyment out of that.

“So, when people see that I have a lot going on, they might see it as work, but I see it as something that I love to do. I’m very fortunate to be in that position.”

• See leftfield.clothing or follow Leftfield on Instagram.