Eduard

Posted on Feb 25, 2022Read on Mirror.xyz

Streetwear — Taking the First Steps into the Culture

Today, I’d want to discuss the origins of the culture that I and many others love, streetwear. It has a more than 40-year existence and has evolved into something that its forefathers could never have imagined. In the lines that follow, I will tell you about the founders of this culture and where it all happened!

Let’s start with the definition of streetwear. This culture’s dictionary definition is straightforward: fashionable, casual clothes. This simple concept has grown into a multi-billion dollar retail phenomenon, with roots in the 1980s and 1990s countercultures such as graffiti, hip-hop, skateboarding, and surfing.

The communities that pioneered the streetwear movement were predominantly male-dominated, and as a result, the style and aesthetics were initially embraced and driven by men, representing conventionally masculine appearances. When it initially appeared, the simple streetwear style was considered as an antithesis to the complex and detailed fashions that were popular at the time. People dressed in T-shirts and hoodies since that’s what they wanted to wear. At the time, this was the streetwear formula. This look incorporated both comfort and self-expression.

California and New York Movement

California and New York are the birthplaces of the streetwear movement.

Shawn Stüssy launches his surfboard business in Laguna Beach in 1979, and to make the boards more identifiable, he scrawls his surname signature on them. Stüssy comes up with an excellent idea of screen-printing the signature in white on black T-shirts in 1982 to assist boost sales at the Action Sports Retailer trade show. By the end of the show, he has successfully sold 24 surfboards and 1,000 T-shirts. Stüssy finally launches a clothing line with his buddy and business partner, Frank Sinatra Jr. ( not related to the artist ), in 1984. Stüssy is still one of the largest streetwear brands in the market today.

First Supreme Store was created by James Jebbia.

Along with Shawn Stüssy, James Jebbia is a pioneer in this culture. Born in the United States but raised in England till the age of 19, he opened the Union store in New York in 1989, followed two years later by Stüssy’s New York flagship. While still employed at Stüssy, he started a tiny skate shop on Lafayette Street in 1994, offering skate decks and components as well as gear such as T-shirts and sweatshirts. No one would have guessed that Supreme began so little and has since grown to legendary worldwide status.

Supreme is primarily recognized for its striking box logo. Its simple use of strong red and white writing in Futura Oblique, inspired by the work of Barbara Kruger, has become a hallmark of street fashion. Any product with a box logo is guaranteed to sell out in a matter of seconds. Supreme’s fame skyrocketed in the international market.

Supreme’s first flagship store opened in Tokyo’s Daikanyama neighborhood in 1998, courtesy to Jebbia. This store was followed by two more the following year, eventually expanding to six locations around Japan. Although the brand’s reputation has been firmly established in streetwear communities for many years, the quick growth of the Internet has played a significant role in Supreme’s rise to prominence. Supreme is now arguably the largest streetwear brand on the market. Jebbia effectively established and demonstrated the value of collaborations. Supreme has collaborated with some of the most prominent fashion labels over the years, including Louis Vuitton.

Designer Dapper Dan, based in Harlem, New York, was responsible for introducing streetwear to luxury in the 1980s, producing styles for hip-hop artists who were shunned by established luxury labels at the time. Dan suffered prejudice as he attempted to become a clothing wholesaler, finding it difficult to obtain the textiles he need due to his location and race. Instead of giving up, Dan decided to start building his designs from the ground up, making knock-offs out of bootlegged fabrics he invented himself. In 1982, he opened his first store on 125th Street between Madison and Fifth Avenues.

LL Cool J’s styling was the first step into hip-hop and streetwear fashion in 1985. He earned the nickname “hip-hop atelier.” Dan creates unique tracksuits for Erik B. and Rakim, which can be seen on the covers of the iconic album Paid in Full. He also designed clothing for The Fat Boys, Salt-N-Pepa, Bobby Brown, Mike Tyson, and Diane Dixon. In 2018, Dan opened Dapper Dan of Harlem, the first luxury fashion house store in Harlem, in collaboration with Gucci on Lenox Avenue. Dapper Dan is now an icon in the worlds of streetwear culture and luxury fashion. His legacy has been and will continue to be a vital pilon at the foundation of streetwear premium fashion.

Japan Movement

While the trend originated in California and New York, early adopters such as Hiroshi Fujiwara and Nigo, both famous DJs and designers, were significantly responsible for establishing the street-style and hip-hop scene in Japan in the early 1980s. Urahara, short for Ura-Harajuku, is an area in Shibuya, Tokyo, and it is the birthplace of Japanese streetwear.

Hiroshi Fujiwara, also known as the “Godfather of Streetwear,” was born in Ise, Mie, Japan in 1964. Fujiwara moves to Tokyo at the age of 18, visits London, where he discovers punk, and New York, where he discovers hip-hop. This is where he learns to DJ and begins to pioneer the genre throughout Tokyo. Fujiwara reaches Shawn Stüssy, who makes him an honorary member of the Worldwide Stussy Tribe and sends him boxes of free Stüssy stuff for him and his friends to wear in Tokyo at a period when hip-hop and skateboarding were not yet linked.

Fujiwara establishes his first solo brand, GOODENOUGH, in 1990, inspired by Shawn Stüssy and the BMX label Anarchic Adjustment, which quickly becomes one of the most regarded Japanese streetwear labels.

In 1993, he assisted Jun Takanashi and NIGO in opening their iconic Harajuku boutique NOWHERE, which laid the groundwork for other legendary future brands such as A BATHING APE, WTAPS, and NEIGHBOURHOOD.

In the year 2000, one of GOODENOUGH’s most significant collaborations — with Supreme — is released in the shape of T-shirts. “fragment design” debuts in Tokyo in 2003, ushering in a game-changing era of collaborations with some of the world’s most recognizable brands. Among the most well-known collaborations are Levi’s x Fragment Design in 2006, Fragment Design x Air Jordan 1 in 2014, which sells for thousands of dollars. In 2016 — Collaborated with his good buddy Kevin Jones (artistic director of Louis Vuitton menswear) on a capsule collection for FW17. Aside from these collaborations, several more were set to take place in the next years, including BVLGARI, Moncler, Apple, and DR. Mertens.

Fragment x Air Jordan 1

Hiroshi Fujiwara was (and continues to be) a pivotal figure in crafting streetwear culture as we know it. In the 1990s, he linked the dots between his Tokyo and the West, integrating streetwear and high-fashion and serving as an influencer and trendsetter — comparable to today’s influencers — even before the internet’s rise. He also popularized hip-hop in Japan. I believe he deserves to be known as “the godfather of streetwear,” and his work and everything he has done for this culture has been an inspiration to me, and I believe many of us.

Tomoaki Nagao, also known as Nigo, began his fashion career at Tokyo’s seminal Bunka College, where he met his future right-hand man, Jun Takahashi. Hiroshi Fujiwara, Harajuku’s one and only godfather, would also meet him here. This friendship earned him the nickname “Nigo,” which translates as “number two” — a reference to the assistant role he would later have with Fujiwara.

NOWHERE was formed in 1993 with the assistance of Hiroshi, Nigo, and Takahashi. In conjunction with SK8THING, the boutique carried a selection of foreign streetwear as well as Nigo’s flagship brand A Bathing Ape.

Nigo’s most well-known creation is the Bathing Ape or BAPE. Its name is derived from the Japanese expression “A bathing ape in lukewarm water,” which reflects the comfort and sheltered lives of Japan’s youth as well as referring to Nigo’s love of science fiction, drawing comparisons to Planet of the Apes throughout its history. The scarcity strategy propelled the brand’s popularity, with production runs only meeting 10% of demand. In 1988, the designer elected to reduce nearly 40 stores to just one in Tokyo and lower operations. Big hip-hop icons like Notorious B.I.G. were pushing the brand to the media, exponentially increasing its appeal and contributing to some of Nigo’s most profitable years. Nigo produced a riff off the Nike Air Force 1, Bapesta, in the early 2000s. Nigo created two incredibly successful businesses — Billionaire Boys Club and Ice Cream — with his long-time supporter, Pharrell, in 2005, along with partner SK8THING. BAPE continued to grow in the post-millennial era, thanks to partnerships with MAC, Pepsi, A$AP ROCKY, Kanye West, and others.

Notorious B.I.G. wearing Bape.

Despite this attention, the brand began to lose money, and in 2014, NIGO quit the label in an unexpected decision. Nigo is still working with the label Human Made and making waves in the music industry as one of the DJs of the Teriyaki Boyz group.

Fujiwara x Nigo

Fujiwara and NIGO, as well as Stüssy, Jebbia, and Dapper Dan, are at the heart of this beautiful, collective, and complex culture known as streetwear. Streetwear, like other important movements, arose simultaneously in major cities and regions around the world.

Aside from a brand’s coolness, exclusivity, and status symbol, streetwear contributed two more vital elements to the fashion industry: comfortable clothes and community. Each brand’s worth is derived from a variety of sources, including product quality and design, celebrity followers, musicians, and artists. But, without a doubt, there is no other component as vital as authenticity, which is obtained by a direct relationship with the customers who purchase the goods.

There are a few crucial moments in the industry that have signaled the rise of streetwear. Supreme and Louis Vuitton’s collaboration in 2017 represented a watershed moment in luxury fashion’s knowledge of streetwear. In 2018, the late Virgil Abloh was appointed as LV’s creative director. Great investments in the streetwear business began to become the norm, with the Supreme sale to The Carlye Group in 2017 fetching an estimated US$500 million. In 2018, Concepts, a footwear shop, reached an agreement with Amazon-owned Zappos, and Stadium Goods secured funding from LVMH.

Today, we can witness the progression of streetwear if we go back in time. What began as a fringe culture — beginning with the printing of logos on T-shirts — is now a key sector in the fashion business, embraced by all genders and spanning from luxury to mall brands.

*The story was first published on Medium on December 27, 2021. I decided to relocate it here for a step-by-step migration in Web 3.0.

Thank you for your time! Have a wonderful day/night!