OK, I admit it, I don’t know Victoria’s secret — I’m more of a sleep-in-sweats (if anything) kind of gal — but Anthony Noce certainly knows the Nutz & Boltz of men’s boxers and briefs. The Delaware Valley native did a brief stint in the fashion industry in New York City before coming home to get into men’s underwear. (I’m sure that joke never gets old for him …)
We spoke to the boxerpreneur about the fun of opening a gay-owned and -operated business in the middle of the Gayborhood.
PGN: Where in the Delaware Valley are you from?
AN: I grew up about 30 minutes outside of Philadelphia in Montgomeryville. It’s a little weird because it doesn’t actually have its own mailing address so we use North Wales, even though it’s not in North Wales.
PGN: It sounds like … What was the musical about the hidden city that only can be seen for one day every 100 years? “Brigadoon”!
AN: Yes! It feels a little like that.
PGN: Tell me about the family.
AN: I’m the oldest of five kids. You met my sister, Emily, at the front of the store and two of my brothers help out on occasion. The youngest is in college so I haven’t harassed him to work for me yet. I thought I’d let him enjoy his college days first.
PGN: With a household full of kids, what was your best Christmas?
AN: [Laughs] I hate to say it, but the first one, when it was just me! But the most memorable one was when my parents decided to surprise us and took four of us (before my sister was born) to Disney World. They bought me a camera, a pink Minnie Mouse camera because all the blue Mickey ones were sold out.
PGN: They turned you gay!
AN: [Laughs] Right! I guess it was apt; my brothers got a He-Man shirt or something like that. We’re a Roman-Catholic family so Christmas was always a huge event in our house. Christmas Eve is the big night; we have over 30 people at our parents’ house each year to this day.
PGN: What do the folks do?
AN: My mom is a home-ec teacher … wait, we’re not allowed to call it that anymore. I think it’s now called FCS for Family and Consumer Sciences. She runs the department at North Penn School District. My dad is a lawyer and a civil engineer and has his own consulting firm. He’s also the president of Drexel’s alumni association.
PGN: Did you go there?
AN: We all did, including my mother — well, except for the second-oldest, Joey. He went to Villanova. Drexel is where my parents met. She was in a sorority, he was in a fraternity, which my brother Michael is now the president of. My dad wanted me to join but I passed on it. I didn’t go to Drexel until several years after graduating high school so I was a little too old to be hanging with frat boys.
PGN: When did you come out?
AN: It was by accident, back when I was about 14. I was talking to somebody on the phone and apparently my sister was listening in on an extension. She told my mother to pick up the phone and she overheard my conversation and I was busted. She’d actually asked me about it a week before and I denied it.
[His sister’s voice is heard from the front room: Wait, what? I outed you? I do not remember that.]
AN: You were little, maybe 4? I think you just were playing with the phone and mom heard me and listened in.
EN: I was gonna say … That is funny though.
AN: It was a little difficult coming out in a Roman-Catholic family but they’re obviously OK with it now. My dad’s met my boyfriends over the years and he’s been in here a bunch of times, most of my family has.
PGN: Has he gotten underwear from here?
AN: Actually, yes. He has a large group of friends from his fraternity who all get together each year for a New Year’s Eve party. Apparently it gets a little rowdy and there’s something involved where he needed underwear — I don’t know what or why and don’t think I want to know!
PGN: I’m guessing you didn’t give him the Nasty Pig brand.
AN: No, no, no, no. He’s not allowed to go near that. Besides, it’s my most popular-selling brand so I don’t give those away. There’s something about the masculinity of them that appeals to Philadelphians. They’re one of my favorite brands too, they really hold up well.
PGN: Were you always into fashion and clothing?
AN: Yes, I’ve always been an artistic child. My grandfather was a tailor so I learned to sew at a very young age, around 5, but then when I was still young we went to Rhode Island and I saw all these amazing houses from the Gilded Age. We went on several tours and I thought I wanted to be an architect and do interior design until I realized how much math was involved. When I graduated high school, I started working and wound up as a CNA, a certified nurse’s aid. It was a really fulfilling job — helping out people and making a difference in people’s lives, but sad at the same time because you’re dealing with a lot of death. I did that for quite a while and I still have friends there, but after a while I wanted something else. So I went back to school and got into the fashion program at Drexel, which is pretty hard to get into, and I did an internship for Michael Kors. It was a good experience because unlike most internships, where all you do is fetch coffee, I got to actually have some input in the designing. When I graduated, I ended up with a job in New York with Macy’s childrenswear line called Greendog, until they decided to outsource everything. That was right before I was supposed to be hired on a permanent basis. So I had to move back to Philly and live with my parents until I got a job with another children’s clothing company, Hartstrings, based out of King of Prussia. They’re a very preppy line of kids’ clothes. I ended up as head designer for the boy’s line until they got bought out by a company that wanted to base operations out of New York.
PGN: Do you have to be up on the latest princess and train trivia to be able to design for kids?
AN: Well, I did boys, so no princesses. But yes, you do a lot of online research to see what’s hot and I paid attention to my friends who had kids and what they were into. The boys are pretty limited — mostly planes and trains; even when we wanted to try something different, like dinosaurs, we were told they weren’t preppy enough. But it was a fun company and I liked the people I worked with.
PGN: So what prompted you to open up Nutz & Boltz?
AN: Well, as I mentioned, two years ago, the whole company got laid off, right after I’d just bought my first house. I didn’t want to sell the house or go to New York, and my goal was always to get into menswear. Womenswear is fun because of the variety, but there’s a lot of attitude that comes with the people involved. Menswear seems to draw people who are more relaxed. I like to have fun and talk to people; I don’t enjoy an environment where everyone screams at each other. The epiphany came when I was in D.C. We’d gone down there for the anniversary of Stonewall and I noticed that there were a ton of boutiques specializing in men’s underwear and T-shirts targeted primarily to a gay clientele. I’d noted that New York had similar stores on every block and even Pittsburgh, but there was nothing in Philly. So I decided to go for it.
PGN: What kinds of things do you have in the store?
AN: We’re mostly underwear and swimwear. I try to have a combination of things that you can’t find elsewhere, as well as brands that people know and want. It’s difficult trying to figure out what’s going to sell, how much to have, what to get, but we’re working it out. I also have some clothing, mostly jeans and T-shirts. I try to keep it on the casual side; I don’t plan on ever carrying anything you could wear to an office setting, except maybe on a very casual Friday. The closest thing I have is a brand called Eleven Paris — they’re also sold at Nordstrom, but I like them because their quality is insane. We carry brands like Marco Marco, Andrew Christian, loungewear from Diesel, shirts from a Spanish company called Costalamel — I think we’re the only ones who carry them. In the near future, I’ll start bringing other products into the store, some things that are a little racier, like a cock ring, primarily because to me it’s a kind of jewelry, but that’s the closest I’ll get to anything pornographic.
PGN: Do you have many straight customers?
AN: We do have some. We also have straight women buying gifts for their boyfriends, and sometimes for themselves. Our Cheap Monday jeans are unisex so anyone can wear them. We also have meggings, which are leggings for men but anyone can wear them. There’s a lot of stuff that’s androgynous and I’m working on more products that would be a little more butch.
PGN: For butch women?
AN: Well, I meant butcher stuff for men, but women too. I get a lot of women who like the menswear products for themselves. Everyone’s welcome. It’s exciting and what’s nice is that I have room to expand to the back room eventually where I’ll probably carry more items for women. I also plan to create my own Nutz & Boltz line of underwear and other apparel down the line.
PGN: What are some of the other things you’re looking to do here?
AN: I want to get involved with other gay businesses and organizations in the city. I’ve done some collaborating with Josh Schonewolf and Bearlesque and will be helping Valanni’s with the Emerald City event on March 17. As you can see, the area around the cash register is full of promotional materials, with everything from fliers for doggie daycare to a health and wellness center to the bath house. I want that, I want to help the community. In fact, I’m very open to ideas from my customers, especially local designers. I would love to feature products from Philadelphia designers.
PGN: We have so much talent in Philadelphia, we should be able to conjure you up some people. How should they contact you?
AN: That would be great. They can email, call the store or stop in.
PGN: Very nice. OK, time to do some random questions. What’s your favorite genre of books: mystery, romance, biographies?
AN: Ha. It’s a little embarrassing. I like sci-fi. Well, it’s a little more specific; it’s a sexually based sci-fi genre. It’s hard to describe.
PGN: Give me two authors in the genre.
AN: Laurell K. Hamilton. She writes the “Merry Gentry” books, which are a really cool series about fairies, but not the kind you’d thinking of flying through the air: real people who are kind of god-like creatures and very sexual beings. [Laughs] They’re straight so I skip over a lot of the sex parts, but the plots are riveting. And I love Christopher Rice, even though that’s a slightly different genre.
PGN: Favorite piece of clothing as a kid?
AN: It was a corduroy long-sleeved shirt with snaps instead of buttons. It felt cool because with the snaps you could rip it open like you were He-Man.
PGN: Silliest or most outrageous thing you’ve worn?
AN: I went to visit the rainforest in Puerto Rico and I was wearing a black button-down shirt over a black tank top with tan suede pants. I loved those pants until my cat decided to pee all over them, but anyway, it was silly to wear them to a rainforest. I also love my tie-dyed denim jeans. I like crazier pieces just because they’re fun and get people’s attention.
PGN: Ever worn women’s undergarments?
AN: A bra, quite a few times. I do drag at Halloween. Last year, I was Marilyn Monroe.
PGN: Something people would be surprised to find out?
AN: I can build things. I know how to use the majority of power tools out there and can build shelves from scratch and do construction with some pretty heavy-duty equipment. When I bought my house, I gutted the place, did most of the repairs and put in my own deck. I enjoy doing it. Bubble baths aside, I have a butch side too!
For more information on Nutz & Boltz, visit www.nutzandboltzfashion.com.
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