"Switching off provides more clarity in terms of an idea or the direction I want to take the brand."

At a young age, Australian designer Christopher Esber was given a crucial piece of advice: Put all of your energy into one thing and learn to do it very well. He’s shaped his approach to life and work around this notion. In time, it has earned him an international reputation for his exploratory design and precision tailoring. Yet perhaps more importantly, doing one thing well has served as an antidote to the designer’s greatest fear—mediocrity. Instead of being paralyzed by the enormity of his grand ideas, or abandoning his plans or passions when the going got rough, Esber has used his fear of mediocrity as fuel both for his imagination and his ambition.

Has your work process changed over time?

There’s something quite naive about how I create collections. I first sat behind a se...