Rare Collection is our look into the things people keep, including their stories, habits and obsessions. For this edition, Sonnyboy Vintage’s Raphael Lao opens up his world of Americana, from Navajo rugs and vintage leather jackets to the pieces he’s kept for the stories they carry.

PHOTOGRAPHY Gab Villareal
CREATIVE DIRECTION Paolo Chua

Raphael Lao has spent years developing an eye for the kind of vintage that feels a little harder to come by. Through Sonnyboy Vintage, that means everything from old leather and denim to Americana and objects picked up on sourcing trips around the world.
But his own collection is far more selective.
Along the way, Lao learned that collecting isn’t really about keeping everything. Some pieces come and go. The ones he keeps tend to have something else attached to them, like a trip, a person, a memory or simply the feeling of knowing he won’t find that exact one again.
For Rare Collection, Lao talks about how his taste took shape, the thrill of the hunt and why the pieces that mean the most are rarely just the rarest ones.

How did your collection start — was there a specific vintage piece that set it off?
I was always into cowboy shit, any Americana thing, way before I knew what it was called. Then, in grade seven, the first watch that really caught my eye was a vintage Rolex Submariner. That led to me selling watches, and it just tied into everything. Eventually, I started buying vintage. The piece that set it off was this one Navajo rug. For as long as I could remember, anytime I saw those rugs, I was like, there’s something about them that I like. You know, the color, how rustic they look and how impractical they are. So I started with whatever money I’d save. I got that rug, a vintage new old stock Stetson from the ’60s, and a jacket from the Ralph Lauren Western line from 1978.
When did you realize it had become a collection and not just a few of your favorite vintage pieces?
People always assume, ‘Oh, you must have a ton of stuff at home.’ Well, not really. The fun part for me is going out and finding it. It is the hunt. And I have a rule: if somebody is happier than I am to own something that I have, let them have it. You know, we can both win, and that’s how I’ve run my business for the last five years or so. My first customers — like that first batch of stuff that I got — one guy came over to my house. I set up in the living room, like a little trunk show, and he bought everything just because he was into the same thing. He was into Ralph Lauren and he was into the cowboy stuff.
What do you think makes something worth collecting? Is it design, rarity, story or something else?
For me, it’s the story. Most of the stuff [I have], they’re not exactly the rarest stuff, but the story of them is what gets me. Like, a belt buckle. I don’t think you meet a lot of people that go, ‘This is my precious belt buckle,’ but this is my precious belt buckle. When I went to Langlitz Leathers Japan, I was talking to the founder, Taka, and he gifted me this buckle. It was a prototype — there are only six of them — and they’re made by Jeff Decker. So that’s a story for me. That makes it special. It takes a lot for something for me to call mine, because all these material things — they’re fun to get, but it’s the story that you make with them. Without the story, a jacket is just a jacket.

You own a lot of leather jackets — what’s the story behind those pieces?
The first leather jacket I had, I was in grade five. I loved Indiana Jones. I geeked out. I was like, ‘I need that jacket.’ So I found the guy that made the jacket for Harrison Ford and begged my dad, ‘Can you help me buy this thing?’ I got it from Wested Leather Co. I still have that jacket. Then I watched The Wild One. [Marlon] Brando in that black leather jacket — I was like, ‘God damn, that looks like a great jacket.’ Eventually, I found my first black leather jacket, but it was more like a fashion jacket.
I stopped for a bit until I got back into vintage when I was much older. There was this one brand called Buco — it’s the holy grail of biker jackets. I got very deep into that. I hunted down vintage ones from the ’40s and ’50s, but it never really felt like something I could wear the way that I wear my stuff. Until I got a vintage Langlitz. The moment I put it on, I was like, ‘Oh shit, now I understand why Langlitz has this stature in the leather jacket game.’ They’re motorcycle jackets, so they’re made to be comfortable. And then everything else followed.
Which vintage piece do you consider the rarest or most meaningful in your collection?
For me, it’s gotta be my cuff. Because it’s been with me to so many places. It’s been with me since the start. It’s not even about the places, it’s more like what I started with. I remember the day so clearly, coming home from Brimfield Antique Flea Market wearing all the cuffs that I bought because I didn’t even have space in my pockets or my bag. I’ve owned this cap I’m wearing for 12 years. It was a present from my dad from that RRL store in Tokyo. I wore it out until I had to repair it myself because it’s just been with me that long. It may be raggedy looking, but it’s like, that’s mine.
Is there one piece you regret not buying when you had the chance?
It was September 2021. On the way out of Brimfield, I remember thinking like, ‘Shit, I’m all out of money,’ but there was this chief’s blanket, like a third-phase Navajo chief’s blanket. At that time, it was very expensive to me. If I had it then, I would have gotten it. But the thing is, if I had gotten it, I probably would have already sold it. Most of the rarest things that I’ve found were with me for like, two months — tops. I’ve seen many other blankets like that, but I’m just like, it wasn’t that one. I still think about it. I still remember what it looks like.

Do you ever hunt for specific vintage pieces, or do they usually find you?
It’s a little bit of both. I always say I’m not someone that shops. I’m someone that already has a catalog in my head of, like, all right, if this ever presents itself, I have to have it. It happened at Inspiration Tokyo 2025 which is like the Super Bowl of vintage sellers. I went in, and at the first booth, there were two racks of vintage Langlitz jackets. Only two caught my eye. One was from 1948 and the other was a very rare one from 1947 with a hand-stamped tag from Langlitz's founder. I bought that one. It was the first thing I saw when I went to that show. Of all the things I could find, it could have been a pair of vintage Levi’s, but of all the things, it was a 1947 Langlitz jacket. These are some things you can’t really explain. That’s what happens when you say yes to these things — you find good things.
What does collecting mean to you beyond fashion? Do you think what we collect says something about who we are?
Yeah, if done properly — there are people that collect via quantity, which I understand. Everybody gets their rocks off somehow, right? But for me, if you put your collection together and lay it out, you should be able to look at it and tell your own story. Or it should tell you a story you might have already forgotten.
Just today, I was putting together what I should wear. I was like, ‘Oh, this is my favorite [Grateful] Dead shirt that I got on tour.’ Then I realized, this is what I wore at the last Dead show I was at in San Francisco. Just from seeing that graphic T-shirt layered underneath that denim shirt, I remembered my whole trip — all the friends that I made, all the places I went to. I think that’s what things should be. I don’t think you should be owned by it. You own it. So, as much as things can reflect your character, I think they reflect who you are and where you’ve been.
How has your collection evolved with your career or where you are in life right now?
It’s gotten a lot more personal. Quantity-wise, it’s gotten fewer, which I’m proud of. I’m by no means a minimalist — I like loud stuff. If I could wear a fur coat here, I would. But I’d like to have just one. There was a time when I was collecting watches and I was like, ‘No, I have to have a model from every year it was released.’ But the moment I reached that point, I was like, ‘God, no, I have six of the same watch!’ You kind of scratch that itch of collecting everything, but are you using them? Because I think things are useless if they’re not used.

Inside Raphael Lao's Vintage Collection

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