Jey Perie wears many hats: he designs and oversees creative direction of Kinfolk‘s in-house apparel label, sure, but he’s also responsible for making sure that the company’s booming nightlife operation is running well. This means regular visits to outposts in Williamsburg as well as in Tokyo, where Perie began his involvement with the lifestyle brand. Perie estimates that roughly 80% of his time is spent “on the business side of things,” while travel makes up for a significant portion of the remainder.

His travels also double as research and development for Kinfolk’s nightlife ventures, as Perie jet-sets to various party centers around the world, looking for the latest cultural movements and musical talent. He notes that while hip-hop has come to dominate the cultural conversation, it’s the amalgamation of genres that he’s interested in. “When you go to a party from Venus [X], for example, she’s great at mixing different subcultures. She’ll take baile funk from Rio and Sao Paolo, she’ll take Latin cumbia music and hip-hop, and she mixes it. That’s what makes her so successful: she’s not just playing trap, y’know? That’s something I’m very sensitive about.”

On this week’s episode of HYPEBEAST Radio, we caught up with Perie to talk about his work at Kinfolk, his time spent partying with Diddy, Drake and Gucci Mane at this year’s Art Basel, and how he got his start contributing for HYPEBEAST years ago.

Check the episode out in full above, also on Apple Music, Soundcloud and wherever you stream podcasts.