Highsnobiety Magazine 14 - Summer 2017 by HIGHSNOBIETY

63740 HOODED COTTON SWEATSHIRT. HOOD AND SLEEVES IN THICKER MATERIAL THAT MATCHES THE GARMENT DYE. TWO-MATERIAL HOOD WITH ELASTIC INSERTS AT SIDES. RAGLAN SLEEVES WITH INSERT IN THE UNDERARM. COLLAR WITH HIDDEN ZIP, SLIGHTLY ASYMMETRICAL, ON BLACK TAPE.

41125 WATER REPELLENT SUPIMA COTTON HOODED JACKET IN SUPIMA COTTON, THE MOST NOBLE COTTON SPECIES, FOR ITS EXTRA-LONG STAPLES AND FOR THE STRENGTH AND FINENESS OF ITS FIBRES. IN WATER REPELLENT SUPIMA COTTON, THE VERY FINE YARNS ARE SUPER TIGHTLY WOVEN TO ACHIEVE NATURAL WATER REPELLENCE. THE ADDITION OF AN IMPALPABLE INNER POLYURETHANE COATING ENHANCES THIS FEATURE WITHOUT TAKING AWAY ITS BREATHABILITY. THE SEAMS ARE ENTIRELY THERMO-TAPED. HOOD WITH THERMO-LINED EDGE. DIAGONAL POCKETS ON FRONT WITH BELLOWS BASE, ZIP FASTENING AND THERMO-LINED FLAP. SNAP FASTENER AT CUFFS. ZIP FASTENING WITH RAISED THERMO-LINED EDGES. WWW.STONEISLAND.COM

WWW.STONEISLAND.COM

Defining new approaches to Danish sportswear, HUMMEL HIVE is created to explore the intersection between past and future, sport and style culture. Made by a collective of multi-disciplinary artists and designers, we meet in celebration of active life, function over form, diversity and equality. Founded in 2016, we are based in a creative studio at Hummel, the legendary sportswear brand with more than 90 years of history. We honor our legacy while looking beyond boundaries to be a constant inspiration. Rooted in our passion for sports, sub-cultures and underdogs, HUMMEL HIVE offers collections, relaunches from Hummel’s vast archive and projects made with likeminded souls.

HUMMEL_HIVE

Preface Editor-in-Chief

Pete Williams

Do subcultures still exist in 2017? Yes and no. If you look in the right corners of the world — or the web — you’ll undoubtedly find unique niche scenes and cultures. Yet the internet does not breed the enduring movements that once thrived through shared tastes in fashion, music and subcultural capital. Instead, it gives birth to fleeting, microcosms of togetherness based around moments, memes or trends. With the state of connectivity today — where every moment is tweeted, ‘Grammed or Snapped — the good (or, at least, the sticky) ideas spread like wildfire.

his home market of South Korea, while at the same time stands on his own, away from the bubble gum shackles of “K-pop.” Hyuk represents a new wave of more organic Korean superstars, and he’s ready to go global. The “pretty but loco,” gritty New York rapper Young M.A is a rarity in the sense that, as an openly lesbian, masculinepresenting woman, she doesn’t let her sexuality define her or her music. Though still relatively fresh on the scene, she’s been heralded as a return to the type of raw NY rap that’s been missing, and at the same time is showing the world that being yourself is all that matters.

Looking at the fashion and music trends that most prominently permeated Highsnobiety’s digital pages in the last year, we’ve seen countless subcultural styles of dress go global. From Drake championing Stone Island and the UK “road man” look, to the street style jet set-donning Gosha Rubchinskiy’s (and his contemporaries’) “Post-Soviet” gear, or Thrasher merch and vintage metal/metal band-inspired rap tees — and even the worldwide sampling of Kurt Cobain’s entire wardrobe — clothing that was once the marker of a like mind is now, in many cases, simply clothing that is “cool,” right now. In some ways, it feels as though we’re forgetting what authenticity feels like, yet at the same time it’s refreshing to see people discovering and enjoying styles, sounds and scenes that are new to them.

Last but not least is the legendary UK funk/acid jazz band Jamiroquai and lead singer Jay Kay. Having first risen to prominence over 20 years ago, the band laid the groundwork for many acts that followed, with the likes of Chance the Rapper, Tyler, the Creator and Pharrell all saying Jamiroquai inspired their music. Back after a seven-year silence, with Automaton, Jamiroquai’s mad hatter Jay Kay himself is featured exclusively in this issue. Beyond our four cover stories, this issue of Highsnobiety Magazine also looks back at the several origins of contemporary subcultures: photographer Gavin Watson weighs in on the controversial “skins” culture of the ’80s; while legendary death metal illustrator Mark Riddick shares his view on metal’s adoption by mainstream fashion and the double-standards of “selling out.” We also highlight a number of designers and creative nomads who are shining examples of todayʼs blended “remix” culture, including Matthew Williams of fashion label ALYX Studio; 19-yearold internet songstress GIRLI; NYC party crew GHE20G0TH1K; and Arizona-based tattoo artist and rapper Toothtaker. We even traveled to Cape Town, South Africa to go inside the young, post-apartheid creative scene and their unique take on niche culture today.

In this issue of Highsnobiety Magazine, we explore the theme of “factions,” highlighting how and why the lines are increasingly blurring between scenes and what that means for counterculture overall. From time immemorial, music has served as the baseline (and bass line) for almost all prominent factions. From punks and hip-hop heads to goths, ravers, indie kids and even skinheads, every group has their own codes and styles rooted in sound. With this in mind, we decided to turn the spotlight on four distinct personalities within music for our cover stories. Detroit rapper Big Sean has been something of a lifelong underdog, but having just released his fourth studio album, I Decided., he is finally, truly coming into his own, understanding what he wants and where he belongs. We caught up with Sean in NY to learn more about how his “hunger steady grows.”

If you are new to this publication, welcome. If you’ve been following along for years, thanks as always for reading and being a part of our journey. I hope this collection of written and visual work inspires you to get out there and spread your own message. Here’s to the next generation of great subcultures. Enjoy.

Though relatively under-the-radar on the world music charts, Korean indie frontman Oh Hyuk, of Hyukoh, is a certified star in

Preface Editor-in-Chief

Pete Williams

Though relatively under-the-radar on the world music charts, Korean indie frontman Oh Hyuk, of Hyukoh, is a certified star in

Contents 6

Preface

126

Club Kids

Selections

134

Young M.A

Urbanears

144

Where’s Waldo?

Scotch & Soda

152

GHE20G0TH1K

colette

160

Yonder

maharishi

166

Eagles Become Vultures

Jamiroquai

172

Stavros Karelis

Dior Homme

178

Ottolinger

Major

186

Big Sean

Vagabond

198

ALYX Studio

Gavin Watson

208

The Good Company

Oh Hyuk

216

Nervous Juvenile

Sides

222

Mark Riddick

106

Mélange

230

Isaiah Toothtaker

112

Facebook Groups

238

Cape Town’s Finest

116

Arkitip + PAM

248

GIRLI

118

Cult

254

Damaged Goods

Covers

` Big Sean

Young M.A

Jamiroquai

Oh Hyuk

colette

Photography by

Various Artists

Thomas Welch

CG Watkins

Hayley Louisa Brown

Vitali Gelwich

BORN OF PURPOSE IN 1959 ALPHA INDUSTRIES WAS COMMISSIONED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE TO DESIGN AND MANUFACTURE HIGH PERFORMANCE OUTERWEAR FOR THE US MILITARY. THE COMPANY QUICKLY BECAME SYNONYMOUS WITH DEVELOPING THE ICONIC MA-1, M-65, AND N-3B TRUSTED BY SOLDIERS, SAILORS AND AVIATORS TO PROTECT THEM FROM THE MOST DIRE CONDITIONS ACROSS THE LAND, SEA AND AIR.

TODAY, ALPHA’S MISSION IS TO PROTECT AND INSPIRE HEROISM IN ALL FORMS BY OUTFITTING MEN AND WOMEN TO REALIZE THEIR LIMITLESS POTENTIAL.

Contents 6

Preface

126

Club Kids

Selections

134

Young M.A

Urbanears

144

Where’s Waldo?

Scotch & Soda

152

GHE20G0TH1K

colette

160

Yonder

maharishi

166

Eagles Become Vultures

Jamiroquai

172

Stavros Karelis

Dior Homme

178

Ottolinger

Major

186

Big Sean

Vagabond

198

ALYX Studio

Gavin Watson

208

The Good Company

Oh Hyuk

216

Nervous Juvenile

Sides

222

Mark Riddick

106

Mélange

230

Isaiah Toothtaker

112

Facebook Groups

238

Cape Town’s Finest

116

Arkitip + PAM

248

GIRLI

118

Cult

254

Damaged Goods

Covers

` Big Sean

Young M.A

Jamiroquai

Oh Hyuk

colette

Photography by

Various Artists

Thomas Welch

CG Watkins

Hayley Louisa Brown

Vitali Gelwich

TODAY, ALPHA’S MISSION IS TO PROTECT AND INSPIRE HEROISM IN ALL FORMS BY OUTFITTING MEN AND WOMEN TO REALIZE THEIR LIMITLESS POTENTIAL.

Selections

If only I could play music in every room.

Photography Benjamin Robinson Styling Atip W

ADIDAS ORIGINALS KITH × NAKED NMD CS2

Listen Better at sonos.com

Selections

If only I could play music in every room.

Photography Benjamin Robinson Styling Atip W

ADIDAS ORIGINALS KITH × NAKED NMD CS2

Listen Better at sonos.com

Selections

PALACE SKATEBOARDS MINI GRINDER

I wish I could set up speakers in five minutes.

Listen Better at sonos.com

Selections

PALACE SKATEBOARDS MINI GRINDER

I wish I could set up speakers in five minutes.

Listen Better at sonos.com

Selections

NEMEN L.E.D. JACKET

Listen Better at sonos.com

Selections

NEMEN L.E.D. JACKET

Listen Better at sonos.com

HUGO BOSS AG Phone +49 7123 940

Selections

THOM BROWNE × DSM ‘SHARK’ HOLDALL

HUGOBOSS.COM

HUGO BOSS AG Phone +49 7123 940

Selections

THOM BROWNE × DSM ‘SHARK’ HOLDALL

HUGOBOSS.COM

Selections

CUTLER & GROSS VINTAGE 0383 SUNGLASSES

UTAH

spring summer 2017 18

woolrich.eu

Selections

CUTLER & GROSS VINTAGE 0383 SUNGLASSES

UTAH

spring summer 2017 18

woolrich.eu

carhartt-wip.com

Selections

CRAZY PIG DESIGNS JEWELRY

carhartt-wip.com

Selections

CRAZY PIG DESIGNS JEWELRY

Selections

MERCURY LITEKNIT JIFFY BLACK / SHELL WHITE

BELL & ROSS BR126 OFFICER SILVER ON STEEL

FOR MORE FUTURE CLASSICS NATIVESHOES.COM

# KEEPITLITE @NATIVESHOES

Selections

MERCURY LITEKNIT JIFFY BLACK / SHELL WHITE

BELL & ROSS BR126 OFFICER SILVER ON STEEL

FOR MORE FUTURE CLASSICS NATIVESHOES.COM

# KEEPITLITE @NATIVESHOES

Selections

VELDT FULL FACE CUSTOM HELMET WITH SILVER FOIL AND LEATHER

Selections

VELDT FULL FACE CUSTOM HELMET WITH SILVER FOIL AND LEATHER

Selections

IMPOSSIBLE PROJECT POLAROID SX-70 SPECIAL EDITION

Selections

IMPOSSIBLE PROJECT POLAROID SX-70 SPECIAL EDITION

Preserving the Human in the Music Experience Urbanears Words Jack Drummond

Perhaps the medium that has been affected by the technological revolution more than any other is audio. The evolution of how we consume music is well known; it has both transformed the industry and directed our own relationship with technology. Our smartphones are now just as much our personal stereos as they are our telephones, our diaries, and our receivers and connectors to the rest of the (virtual) world. Implicit in this is how we listen to that music, and one Swedish company has more than embraced the radical transformation of how we do just that. Urbanears is as much captivated by the possibilities new technology brings as they are by the human using it. This devotion to human-centered design is reinforced by their new line of Connected Speakers — speakers that sit between our now near-virtual lives and that indispensable, human need for physical experience. Founded in 2008 in Stockholm, Urbanears combines innovation with humanized technology to make products that are as accessible as possible to as many people as possible. The company has defined itself by creating what can be described as ‘classic,’ well-designed, high-tech headphones. Their Scandinavian heritage underpins this approach, prioritizing both essential functionality and streamlined form.

Chromecast built-in, AirPlay, Bluetooth and thousands of internet radio stations. Or, if you prefer it old school, you can connect your phone via the AUX connection. Which touches upon the main draw of Urbanears’ new speakers: they encourage you away from the screen and towards the speaker itself. Using the two knobs at the top, you can push to play or pause, and twist to control volume; the second gives instant access to your seven preset Spotify playlists and internet radio stations (so you can walk into your home and start playing music without even locating your phone). It’s also with this knob that you activate Multi Mode for synchronized play with two or more Connected Speakers. The two models, Stammen and Baggen, are crafted as solid blocks wrapped in acoustically transparent fabric ranging from muted pastels Concrete Grey and Dirty Pink, to the contrasting hues of Vinyl Black, Indigo Blue, Goldfish Orange and Plant Green.

The Connected Speaker range of Wi-Fi multi-room audio speakers represents Urbanears’ first step into our living rooms. While offering access to everything our digitized, wireless world of music now offers, the speakers somehow manage to have a grounding, near nostalgic quality about them — bringing us back to a physical, tactile way of interacting with sound.

Available starting March 30, 2017, Urbanears’ Connected Speakers are stylishly taking us leaps forward to the forefront of connectivity, and one thoughtful step back to experience the charm and simplicity of walking up to the home radio and twisting the dial.

As you’d expect, the wireless speakers connect you to your music however you want, supporting access to Spotify Connect,

— urbanears.com

Preserving the Human in the Music Experience Urbanears Words Jack Drummond

As you’d expect, the wireless speakers connect you to your music however you want, supporting access to Spotify Connect,

— urbanears.com

Amsterdam label Scotch & Soda mixes wearable menswear classics with just enough notes of forward-thinking streetwear. It’s equal parts class and youthful punch. with timeless classics. From the outside, the building is unassuming, with only a small placard designating its resident. Once you get inside the doors, you’re transported into a creative’s dream office.

Amsterdam is a traditional port city where many worlds converge. It’s hard to think of a place where some of the most relevant tailoring, denim, streetwear and sneaker brands are not only being born, but flourishing. And its stylish citizens are equally adept at mixing those styles together, whether on the street or in the globally-informed designs of home-grown label Scotch & Soda. The label’s designs are a veritable assembly of every inch of the menswear spectrum. The pieces have a way of pulling wearers in, from plush velvet sport coats to quilted jogger pants that help your best sneakers stand out, the brand truly offers something for every discerning man’s style. Like all great labels, Scotch & Soda’s strength is its ability to make clothes that mean different things to different people, but still unite them under the brand’s “From Amsterdam, From Everywhere” ethos. As disparate as some of the pieces may seem, they somehow still look good no matter how you put them together. It’s a foolproof approach to dressing that means great outfits practically require no assembly at all.

An Assembly of Modern Men’s Style Scotch & Soda Words Jeff Carvalho Photography Chris Danforth

In 2010, Scotch & Soda launched Amsterdams Blauw, an elevated collection that could compete with the trendsetting designs gracing the runways from New York to Paris — and a little touch of Japanese workwear, too. For Scotch & Soda, taking a leap into the world of premium denim was core to their surroundings and The Netherlands itself. While Italy and Japan are often lauded for production, the country has become a denim capital in its own right, mixing Japanese attention-to-craft with an effortlessly stylish European sensibility. Amsterdams Blauw, and its dedicated store experience, was just the start. With their return to New York Fashion week and their lauded Spring/Summer 2017 presentation — inspired by the illustrations of Dutch cartographer, Peter Plancius and his vision of astrology, botany and animal science — Scotch & Soda is solidifying their position as a Dutch fashion brand with a true grasp on global style. To better understand the unique fusion behind their Spring 2017 collection, and the influence of Amsterdam’s local flavor, we visited Scotch & Soda’s design studio. Housed inside a converted 17th-century church in the heart of Amsterdam, it’s no wonder those working inside know a thing or two about mixing modern style

Emptied of the church pews, the design floor is uncluttered and airy, with work tables set apart in a way as to allow designers personal space to think and move. Runs of archived clothing racks, filled with samples, specimens and garments of inspiration fill the mezzanine level. It’s an impressive archive that runs for meters across two sides of the building, and also functions as a microcosm for how men want to dress today — an uncanny valley between formal, casual and sporty, with an overall emphasis on clothes whose design stands on its own merits. We spoke with Scotch and Soda’s Creative Director, Marlou van Engelen, and her team, for a rare glimpse inside their design world. Thanks for sitting down with me, Marlou, and congratulations on the launch of Spring/Summer 2017 in New York. The Angel Orensanz Center in the Lower East Side was a great venue to present the new collection for spring. In terms of marketplace, am I correct in feeling that there’s going to be a larger push from Scotch & Soda this year? We thought, “Okay, we have the products and we let them talk for themselves. The product will say enough.” But in this time and age, it’s not saying enough anymore. There is so much happening with social media — everybody is so on top of things — you have to tell your story. Otherwise people will make a story for you. And we have a beautiful story to tell. We are super proud, but being a Dutch company, that comes with a certain modesty. It’s been part of our heritage. That’s why we’re trying to get out there a bit more. So when you leave Amsterdam and you go to a city that has a Scotch & Soda flagship and you stand outside of this store, what are your takeaways from the customers you see coming in and out? Does that change your perception of who you believe your customer to be? I was in our Abbot Kinney store in Los Angeles recently. We have really cool customers there. It’s surfer guys, it’s the younger skater (but not only them) and I think that’s really good. I’m really happy that we find such a wide audience.

An Assembly of Modern Men’s Style Scotch & Soda Words Jeff Carvalho Photography Chris Danforth

You’re making various connections with different people. What do you think makes Scotch & Soda so attractive to such a diverse group? I think it’s the freedom that breathes in our collection. We don’t tell you what to wear, we don’t tell you how to dress. I think when you go into Scotch & Soda stores, you can go in there and you can have a very dressed-up look, all the way to a more casual look. So we cater to a wide variety of consumers. But on top of that, each piece is still unique; it’s not just that we’re just broad brushstrokes. We have a very clear point of view of how we want everything to look and the aesthetic but at the same time, it’s got that diversity. And I think that’s what appeals to consumers and in the

Our New York presentation was about creating a mood, and a way to welcome you into our world — literally. Through this world, we invite you take a walk with us and see things through our eyes. We base every collection that we do on an authentic story, and we add a bit of fantasy to it. The inspiration for the Spring 2017 collection at New York Fashion Week was Peter Plancius, a Dutchman, who created maps according to heavenly creatures. These maps are super inspiring. Our team zoomed into one of his maps specifically for inspiration, and from this micro-look we thought: How would that world appear today compared to how those who viewed the maps in the 1500s saw it? So we started with that inspiration, created our own

marketplace. It doesn’t exist the way we do it. That’s where our success comes from.

vision of that world, and result is expressed through the garments found in our Spring 2017 collection.

I walked into the Scotch & Soda Amsterdams Blauw Kitchen concept store and went into the basement, and I was drawn to a very simple long-sleeved shirt. What’s interesting to me is that that’s not the type of thing I would’ve expected to find at Scotch & Soda. You have pieces that connect that are very simple and straightforward, but you also have pieces that are much more detailed, like embroidered sweatshirts. I’d love to get an idea about how you keep this balance of very complex and austere pieces. We always start each collection with a story. Everything we do within a season needs to fit into that season’s concept. Every garment is very important in expressing our story. Some are more outspoken pieces, and the others are more basic. To see the connections you need the story. I was quite taken by your Spring/Summer 2017 collection. How important is the show as an indicator of what to expect from Scotch & Soda in 2017? You mean, as in the visuals of the presentation itself? Exactly. There was a certain boldness to it. When you walked into that space, this was not a traditional presentation by any stretch. More importantly, the idea that you could physically walk through the presentation, take part in it, and observe what was happening was tremendous. I found that to be pretty amazing, and quite frankly I assume everybody that was in attendance felt the same. Is this a direction that you guys will be taking in the future? Or was this more of a statement? It’s nice to hear that you liked it, but no, this was not meant as a statement. What Scotch & Soda is saying is: “Here we are, and this is our story.”

For Scotch & Soda, what is the gateway into your world for someone walking into one of the hundreds of Scotch & Sodas stores globally? It’s the denim, the chinos, and the outerwear. Denim tends to be a staple for men in general. For women too, of course, but when you think about key features that men tend to go towards, denim tends to be something that’s very personal, right? You either put on a pair and they work, or they don’t. What drew you to join Scotch & Soda? The previous Creative Director drew me in and I’m happy he did. He asked me if I would do a children’s line for Scotch & Soda. Honestly, I didn’t know if that was my thing, but when I walked up here — into this church, for an interview — I thought, “Yeah, this is where I need to be.” As a port city, Amsterdam is a cultural hub for style. How important was it for you to work for a Dutch company? What’s the work culture like at Scotch & Soda? When I was first hired it did not matter. I can now see the advantages of being Dutch and working for a Dutch company. Having said that, we talk about “From Amsterdam, From Everywhere” as a statement for Scotch & Soda. We travel the world to bring home objects that inspire our collections. So while we are proud of our Dutch heritage, we are truly a global brand with footprints throughout the world. It’s a family you come into. The people are super nice, super caring, and they just take you in. — scotch-soda.com

marketplace. It doesn’t exist the way we do it. That’s where our success comes from.

vision of that world, and result is expressed through the garments found in our Spring 2017 collection.

colette Turns 20 Sarah Andelman Words Pete Williams Portrait Illustration Darcel Disappoints

One dog named Oscar (RIP), five pairs of Instapump Furys (sold on March 20, 1997), 37 compilation CDs, 92 podcasts, approximately 300 art exhibitions, 750 employees, 2,080 window displays, around 3,000 events, 5,000 emails received for a single YEEZY raffle, 8,600 different brands, 42,438 bottles of room spray, 100,990 newsletter subscribers, 140,000 bottles of Coca-Cola, 300,000 balls (for THE BEACH at Musée des Arts Décoratifs), 400,000 different items sold, 907,000 Instagram followers, 1,342,000 loaves of Poujauran bread, 2,460,000 receipts, and 700,000,000 website views. What do all these figures have in common? Well to start, two more numbers: 213 rue Saint-Honoré and Pantone 293c. Historic rue St. Honoré in Paris, France, has been regarded as one of “the most expensive streets in the world” for the better part of a century. In 1997, it also cemented itself as the arguable birthplace of the modern day high-low concept shop that combines fashion with sneakers, art, music and gadgets — a sort of early, physical version of Highsnobiety itself — with the opening of colette. Located at 213 rue St. Honoré the shop demarcates itself with Pantone 293c, or “colette blue,” a color that has been used across countless products and is instantly recognizable by anyone in the know. By any account, Parisian retailer colette is a global fashion destination and a force that has played a consistent and powerful role in the genesis and growth of the creative consumer culture we find ourselves immersed in today. With hundreds if not thousands of limited-edition collaborations to colette’s name (nearly all bearing the shade of blue mentioned above) as well as countless art shows, events and installations — including a bar dedicated exclusively to water — they are the prototypical torchbearer for the genre-bending sort of coolness that exists today and continues to grow. In 2017, the influential store turns 20 years old. To celebrate the milestone, colette did what they’re best at: putting together a line of 20 limitededition products with 20 different brands (including Nike, Medicom Toy, Converse and others) available exclusively at the 213 Rue Saint-Honoré store and, of course, mostly in Pantone 293c. They also partnered with Snarkitecture and the Musée des Arts Décoratifs to bring an interactive installation called The Beach to Paris. To have continuously stayed on top of the scene for the past two decades is quite an achievement — one that takes vision, dedication, and an openness to constant change. To learn more, we caught up with Sarah Andelman, colette co-founder (the other founder is her mother and the shop’s namesake, Colette Roussaux) who discussed the origins of the shop, her hometown of Paris, and her take on the global culture at large.

colette Turns 20 Sarah Andelman Words Pete Williams Portrait Illustration Darcel Disappoints

In 1997, a highly curated, multifaceted shop like colette was a very fresh concept — who or what were your early inspirations in opening the store? We didn’t have any inspirations. We knew that when we traveled to New York, London or Japan, that there were lots of products we couldn’t find anywhere in Paris. From beauty brands like Kiehl’s or a sneaker in Japan. It was really after we visited the space itself (we lived above it) that we had the idea that we could have everything we liked — fashion, food, design, art — and mix them together. But we didn’t have a model. We knew some shops like Moss in New York and, for example, for the restaurant there was Joseph’s in London a long time ago. We liked some places like these, but they were not an inspiration for the store. We really started from scratch. What was your original concept for colette and how has this a vision changed over the years? We had a little tagline saying “style, design, art, food.” And it was the fact that you would come to colette and find a pair of sneakers, a T-shirt with a cool design, you could have lunch all day long, you could buy music, you could buy a dress or a jacket from a fashion designer. You could see an exhibition, buy a lipstick. You could come to colette and find all categories of products. It was a personal selection of what we thought was most interesting at the moment. The concept was also to change all the time. From the beginning we had new windows every week, new displays, so that was part of the concept from the beginning; to be different each time you come. We always renew ourselves.

SO-ME

Darcel Disappoints

Curtis Kulig

What factors do you feel have contributed most to the longevity of colette? The fact that we always change everything. The fact that we don’t assume that because a brand works well or if it sells well that we’ll continue it forever. We like to not rest or sleep on success. We always challenge ourselves to surprise the clients. We always try to know in advance what’s coming next, we always try to have products you cannot find anywhere else. What were some of the first products colette carried? Are any of these pieces or brands still there today? I know we had the Insta Pump Fury from Reebok because I have receipts for what we sold on the first day we opened, March 20, 1997. We also had brands like Kiehl’s and we had Comme des Garçons. The biggest difference compared to today is design. We had much more furniture and design pieces like shelves, lights, plates and some vases, which we don’t carry anymore. When we opened, the culture and books were below the garage on the first floor where we now have beauty, so on the ground floor when you came in it was beauty on the right and design in the center… and where streetwear is now was light/tech. For many years I’d hear people were afraid to come in, saying things like “everything is expensive,” but it was the same product as today. Because everything was very clean and everything was well presented, people thought it was more like a museum. But it was the same experience we have now. One could argue that colette paved the way for a new breed of retail overall: the high-low mix, the fashion-meets-street and the collaborative culture that’s so huge today. How do you view the evolutions that have taken place in over the last two decades around the world? That’s true I think, because we always had fashion, we always mixed the brands — established big brands with young designers. We never had corners with just Gucci or Bless. All the mannequins back in the day mixed everything together, like you do in a fashion story in a magazine. And at the ground floor we always had the streetwear which became bigger and bigger and bigger. Back in the day when we went to see New Balance, they were surprised because we wanted to carry their sneakers — the only shops to carry New Balance were sports shops. Same with many other brands. You can tell the way I dress myself… I always wear sneakers with designer. I think it was a natural evolution because the web brought brands like Nike and adidas who were working on sneakers with the same sophistication as the fashion world. It’s very close [to fashion] with all these collections and all these collaborations. So at one point it was inevitable that the two worlds would mix or touch, and today it overlaps completely.

André

Kai & Sunny

Pablo Cots

Steven Harrington

Eric Elms

Iris de Moüy

Oliver Jeffers

SO-ME

Darcel Disappoints

Curtis Kulig

André

Kai & Sunny

Pablo Cots

Steven Harrington

Eric Elms

Iris de Moüy

Oliver Jeffers

There’s a lot of talk these days about all the trends of the ’90s being recycled, what are your thoughts on the fashion trends of 1997 vs. 2017? I have to tell you I don’t remember the trends from the end of ’90s! They’re recycled for sure. It’s fashion. It’s like this. I think at one point in our buying for fashion there was a real trend for each season, a real feeling that every designer would do something, say ’70s, or with a certain pattern or fabric. Now I don’t see trends like this anymore. For example, yes, there is a bomber flight jacket in many collections, but I don’t think that’s a trend anymore. I think it’s part of the vocabulary of fashion. And now there are so many extremes. When you look, we went from the minimalism of Céline to now the baroque of Gucci. But, besides this, you have space for lots of different direction now. You used to go outside of the fashion shows and lots of people would wear exactly the same thing. And I think nowadays it’s not like that anymore. There is more space for personal expression, in my opinion. Maybe I’m wrong, I don’t really concern myself with trends. We never did our selection thinking, “We want to be on-trend.” We always buy our selection thinking, “Ah, that’s an interesting story.”

Tiffany Cooper

Jeremyville

Jean Jullien

Soledad Bravi Geneviève Gauckler

Kevin Lyons

Jean André

James Jarvis

James Joyce Scott Campbell

I read you’ve been carrying Raf Simons since his first season — how do you view the changes that have taken place over his career and his impact in the present day? It’s fascinating. We always carried his own personal line, which in a way has always been very directional, with certain kinds of shirts and tops. He really had a strong identity. We had his line with Fred Perry and all the sneakers with adidas and we followed all his collections for Jil Sander, for Dior and now for Calvin Klein. I think it’s great because we can recognize his own touch and the brand history. He really integrates the brand history with his own code. I love that he has Peter De Potter and Willy Vanderperre — the same team — around him for all these brands. From Dior to Calvin Klein, he had the same team. And what he’s doing for Calvin Klein I think is fantastic: this evolution of an American brand from outside, for me it’s the best. To be able to refresh their classic jeans or underwear is fantastic. I think he’s extremely talented and it’s great to be able to carry him and follow the evolution over the years. colette has remained 100% Paris-based; how important is your city for you? It’s super important. We really opened for Paris. Like I said, in ’97 there were lots of things missing in Paris. Lots of department stores were really old and over the years they changed and refreshed. Our neighborhood changed a lot. Even if the selection is international — and I will never buy a brand because of where it comes from — it’s true we are here for Paris and for what’s missing in Paris. Also because we are a small team with a big operation — with so much love and attention to detail — we could not do the same thing for other addresses all over the world. That’s the main reason why we don’t open other shops anywhere else. Is there anyone you haven’t worked with that you would like to? No. Apple was a really important brand we wanted to work with and we did. I think now maybe the new brand for tomorrow… will it be Google? Will it be more brands from Silicon Valley or high tech? Maybe this will be the next stage, but for fashion I cannot think of any brands we would desperately like to work with that we didn’t yet. I touch wood; we have been lucky to show how we can receive a brand in a nice way. For them it’s a good experience to go out from their own stores to touch different customers. We even did cars. It’s weird to think we did a smart car — we did an Aston Martin car. We did special Coca-Cola bottles. Tomorrow it’s not only big brands; I’m happy when we do smaller things, too. For our 20th anniversary we’re doing 20 collaborations, from a Nike Woven, which I’m very happy with, to a clock with Solari, the old Italian company who did the black flip clocks in all the train stations. It’s not only about the famous brands, it’s more about those who have the authenticity, who have a history. That’s more important for me than the whole “famous” thing. What do you think the future holds for colette and the community around it? It’s difficult for me to think really far into the future. I’m always in the moment, always late for what’s happening… thinking about what do we do next week. I can’t really project myself because we keep a certain flexibility and reactivity to be able to do something tomorrow, if we want. Even our 20th anniversary event with The Beach by Snarkitecture, we really started to work on it in December, three months ahead. I think the internet is part of the future and the new generation will make us look differently at lots of things we thought were clear. I think lots of things will change in the future, but we will try to follow.

Tiffany Cooper

Jeremyville

Jean Jullien

Soledad Bravi Geneviève Gauckler

Kevin Lyons

Jean André

James Jarvis

James Joyce Scott Campbell

S/S

maharishi

RISHI Photography Amber Grace Dixon Styling Safiya Yekwai Hair Piera Berdicchia using Bumble and Bumble Make-Up Grace Vee Photography Assistant Lena Banning Styling Assistant Jess Nella Model Sol @ Select

2017

S/S

maharishi

2017

The Heart of an Automaton — Jamiroquai

Words Jake Boyer

Photography Assistant Charlie Robson

Photography Hayley Louisa Brown

Styling Assistant Sophie Casha

Styling Atip W

Printing Labyrinth Photographic

Grooming Kat Hand using Kiehl’s

SHIRT ROBERTO CAVALLI HAT TALENT’S OWN

The Heart of an Automaton — Jamiroquai

Words Jake Boyer

Photography Assistant Charlie Robson

Photography Hayley Louisa Brown

Styling Assistant Sophie Casha

Styling Atip W

Printing Labyrinth Photographic

Grooming Kat Hand using Kiehl’s

SHIRT ROBERTO CAVALLI HAT TALENT’S OWN

DOUBLE BREASTED JACKET LOEWE HAT TALENT’S OWN

Having first risen to prominence over 20 years ago, UK funk/acid jazz band Jamiroquai and lead singer Jay Kay laid the groundwork for many acts that followed, with the likes of Chance the Rapper, Tyler, the Creator, Anderson. Paak and Pharrell all saying Jamiroquai inspired their music. Back after a seven-year silence with Automaton, Jamiroquai’s mad hatter Jay Kay dishes on his storied career. Like many other people who lived through the glorious decade that was the 1990s, there came a time where I was transfixed by a certain music video. When I happened to catch it on MTV or VH1 (in the days when they actually played music videos), I would stare at the screen transfixed; utterly glued to a seamless visual trickery that my young brain could barely begin to comprehend. The video in question was one entitled “Virtual Insanity,” and it was created by a band named Jamiroquai. Despite finding international acclaim and renown for the aforementioned video and its accompanying single, no one has really known how to classify Jamiroquai — or even what do with them. They began in 1992, so named for the concept of a ‘jam session’ and the Iroquois, a tribe of Native Americans in Eastern Canada. An element of exoticism pervaded them from the start, no doubt aided by the fact that they must have been one of the only bands of the era to employ a member whose sole instrument was a didgeridoo. Time passed quickly, and after finding the heights of success with “Virtual Insanity,” from 1996’s Travelling Without Moving, the band entered a quieter phase, producing full-lengths on a less regular basis. The official members of the group proved to be something of a revolving door, with the only constant arriving in the form of lead singer Jay Kay, a performer with undeniable magnetism and charisma. For anyone familiar with the visual iconography of the band, he’s a performer that loves his hats — hats of the wild, stupendously original kind. Kay and his bandmates could have lived very comfortably going the route of a ’90s nostalgia band, enjoying the ride of their past success, but that isn’t how this crew works. Over the years they experimented with new sounds, mixing more funk, soul and disco influences with their trademark strings and horns, and with 2001’s A Funk Odyssey, they garnered a number 1 hit with dance track "Little L.” And though Jamiroquai are approaching nearly 30 years as a uniform outfit of electronic excellence, they are showing no signs of fading in their ability to weave sonic wonder. After seven years of silence, following 2010's Rock Dust Light Star, Jay Kay and his band are back with a new twelve-track work titled Automaton. Automaton, the band’s eighth studio album, explores themes of artificial intelligence and the relationship humans have with technology today. Through tracks including lead singles “Automaton” and “Cloud 9," the album looks at how we as humans are beginning to lose touch with our physical environment and with humanity itself.

DOUBLE BREASTED JACKET LOEWE HAT TALENT’S OWN

JACKET Y-3

What were some of the ways in which you approached this latest project differently than you would have in the past? This project was different because we had to try and take our old sound and give it a slightly contemporary edge, without it losing what we felt like people liked about us, and what’s always suited the style we always created music in. So instead of using plugins on Pro Tools, we decided to use a lot of old vintage ’70s and ’80s synthesizers in their analogue form as the basis for the music. On top of that, the drum recording was done initially with plugin drums and then embellished on top of the live stuff — sometimes just with live hats — to keep a fluid feel to it. We were also careful about how we use horns because in the past we were criticized perhaps for being too retro, so we decided just to be very careful about how we used them. So it’s a very fine line between having the sound that we’ve had and that our old fans enjoy, and bringing something newer that people who aren’t familiar with the band could enjoy. What is something we as listeners would find on Automaton that may surprise us? It’s difficult to say what would surprise people. I think it’s hard to quantify that. If you listen back to albums four, five and six, and film titles such as Titan A.E., you’ll find that actually we’ve been doing some electronic stuff all the way through our career, so I don’t believe that Automaton is the most electronic track that we’ve ever done. The only thing that’s a little different is the fact that I have tried not to — particularly with tracks like “Nights Out In the Jungle” — do a full song type of lyric. Which is difficult for me to do because I just like to write a song; and so in some sense, tracks like “NOITJ” represent a more remix-y approach to working on a track, which is, I guess, something different for us. What was the most challenging part of creating your new album? The least challenging? The most challenging part was actually starting up again. I didn’t know whether I particularly wanted to carry on in the business because it can be overwhelming. It’s a little bit different when you’re younger, but the whole industry has changed so dramatically now. Although you see artists who were from an era before me carrying on, they tended to have all their major stuff release long before the whole internet and social media thing ever came along. I still started at a time when you put out one single, an A- and a B-side, and then you had an album and that was really it. There might have been a 12-inch remix as well, but now things have changed so dramatically that you almost have four times the workload and there was no “least challenging” part to that. So it was definitely deciding to start up and debating whether it was worth it, but then again you continue to do it because you love doing it and you love creating music. I love the buzz of starting with a blank sheet of paper then seeing songs come together, especially when you see and know when they’re finished, and when you are overdoing or overcooking them, and when you feel you’ve got it right. The buzz of creating something from scratch and seeing that lyric you came up with in your head go onto a record, and then off to the radio and eventually you end up with 30,000-40,000 people singing that line that you thought of when you were wandering around your garden thinking, “What can I do for a chorus?” — that’s the buzz and that’s why most musicians do what they do. Visual aesthetics were a key part of your success earlier in your career, would you say they still play an important part in your role as an artist? Yes, absolutely, and yet although the landscape has changed for videos, it has been something that I have always been involved with, which I consider as the part B to the part A. Every video has been important and I have always liked to do my own stunts in my videos and have a lot of control over them, even with the editing. I like to have a lot of control over the process, partly because you know that you’re always the guy that has to live with it, unlike the guy that sits in the editing room who just does that and then does the next one, like being on a conveyor belt. It’s important, as every time it gets played you have to live with it right down the line, so it’s important it looks good after 10-15 years and retains its quality. It’s important to me, and dare I say, it’s not manufactured poppy stuff, which is not where I have come from. I started off on my own at 17 and got my first record deal, and from there I have done around 30 or so videos, I think, so the visuals were very important. It was imperative that the visual was right for Automaton, particularly in regards to how I was going to move the headgear forward from where it had been in the past, such as with the feathers, carbon fiber and now a lit electronic piece. I’m pleased that the visuals match the tune directly. I think it works, we’re very happy with it — and to still be dancing at 47!

KNIT ACNE STUDIOS TROUSERS TALENT’S OWN SNEAKERS ADIDAS ORIGINALS

JACKET Y-3

KNIT ACNE STUDIOS TROUSERS TALENT’S OWN SNEAKERS ADIDAS ORIGINALS

SHIRT KENZO HAT TALENT’S OWN

“I love the buzz of starting with a blank sheet of paper, then seeing songs come together, especially when you see and know when they’re finished, and when you are overdoing them, or when you are overcooking them, and when you feel you’ve got it right.”

SHIRT KENZO HAT TALENT’S OWN

TRACK TOP GIVENCHY

How would you describe your visual style? It’s difficult to describe my visual style but I suppose it’s a bit of ’70s old-school driver with a touch of ’70s B-boy thrown into it. Can you tell us about your experience with Top Gear? Did you always know you were such a speed demon? Yeah, ever since I was a little boy I’ve always been into aircrafts, cars and anything that shifts, so that’s something I’ve been lucky to indulge. I managed to, how can I put it, get some of the “toys” that young men want when I was younger, as opposed to as a balding old man, which makes a lot of difference. It also needs to be taken seriously, though: if you’re going to be a speed demon and get it wrong, it can literally kill you. As for Top Gear, the experience was just a little bit of fun, really. I know the guys from the show and they’ve been around to the house a few times. We have a little event called Motors and Rotors every couple of years, where there’s fly-ins with helicopters and we all get the old cars out, have a barbecue, and we sit around and talk about classic cars. So yeah, I’ve always been a speed demon and don’t see that changing anytime soon (laughs). What was your life like before adopting the hat? Did you feel complete after adopting it? When I was a kid I used to skateboard a lot, and I always had a hat on my head. After a period of time, and once I started doing music, I realized that having a hat was quite good because no one could recognize me, and I just felt more secure underneath a hat and like I could hide away. I also felt just like I do now, that I could get into a completely different alter ego on stage with a hat on my head. In some ways, I become a different person — I become Jamiroquai, not Jay — so it’s an intrinsic part of what I do and it’s never really going to change because I always feel complete when I have it on. It does make singing a bit more difficult and it certainly makes you a lot hotter on stage (especially when you are in places like Bogota, Colombia and South America in 38 degree [Celsius] heat), but it’s part of what we do, always has been and probably always will be. If you had to give up music forever, what do you think you would be doing? It’s a short answer, because I would probably be living a very quiet life nowhere near the public eye at all. What would you say is one of the biggest changes you’ve seen in your time in the music industry? The biggest change is the advent of social media and everything from YouTube to Spotify. It’s a completely different landscape and totally different from what it was in the past with vinyls, CDs, etc. It’s almost bewildering to me how much it has changed and I think it’s perhaps like that for a lot of artists. I mentioned before, but I think the workload outside of just creating music has gone up drastically and that’s by far the biggest change in the music industry. The record companies haven’t been able to keep pace with it. It’s taken them ages to get around to it, so yeah, it’s changed enormously. Who were Jamiroquai’s initial audience? What were these people like? How has your audience evolved over time? The initial audience for me were probably those who rejected the pop music of the early ’90s and who were into jazz and funk and wanted to see something a little bit different and wanted to see somebody do it live. They were kinda cool and young; we did all the student stuff across Europe where the audience were 150-200 people in the cooler clubs, particularly in France, the UK and Japan, and they were great times. Over time, the audiences evolved because at some point we hit the mainstream, with maybe not the second but certainly the third album, Traveling Without Moving. Suddenly there was press and, certainly in the UK, attention from the tabloid media, and that created a sea of change in how many people were exposed to me; some not necessarily for all the right reasons. Certainly not for the music but just for who I was, what was going on, what nightclubs I was stumbling out of, and so on. Yeah — as Tony Montana says, “That’s history!”

TRACK TOP GIVENCHY

S/S

DIOR HOMME

Down Down Down!

Photography Piczo Styling Naz Di Nicola [Tzarkusi] Hair Kiyoko Odo Make-Up Athena Paignton @ Bryant Artists Models Tylor @ IMG, Sol @ Select & Kalam Horlick @ Elite Special Thanks Chad Curry

2 017

S/S

DIOR HOMME

Down Down Down!

Photography Piczo Styling Naz Di Nicola [Tzarkusi] Hair Kiyoko Odo Make-Up Athena Paignton @ Bryant Artists Models Tylor @ IMG, Sol @ Select & Kalam Horlick @ Elite Special Thanks Chad Curry

2 017

MAJOR Photography James Pearson-Howes Styling Holly MacDonald Hair & Make-Up Alexis Day using MAC Cosmetics & Fudge Assistant Andy Price Retoucher Phil Jones Model Cassey Chanel @ Wilhelmina

COAT & TROUSERS ALEX MULLINS, BOOTS KICKERS

T-SHIRT NIKE, SHIRT SOULLAND, PANTS OUR LEGACY

MAJOR Photography James Pearson-Howes Styling Holly MacDonald Hair & Make-Up Alexis Day using MAC Cosmetics & Fudge Assistant Andy Price Retoucher Phil Jones Model Cassey Chanel @ Wilhelmina

COAT & TROUSERS ALEX MULLINS, BOOTS KICKERS

T-SHIRT NIKE, SHIRT SOULLAND, PANTS OUR LEGACY

ZIP-UP JACKET OUR LEGACY

ZIP-UP JACKET OUR LEGACY, TOP BARON

JACKET ALEX MULLINS

ZIP-UP JACKET OUR LEGACY

ZIP-UP JACKET OUR LEGACY, TOP BARON

JACKET ALEX MULLINS

T-SHIRT & PANTS OUR LEGACY, TOP AROUND THE WAIST BARON, BOOTS KICKERS

SPORTS BRA NIKE, CARDIGAN ALEX MULLINS, TROUSERS SOULLAND

T-SHIRT & PANTS OUR LEGACY, TOP AROUND THE WAIST BARON, BOOTS KICKERS

SPORTS BRA NIKE, CARDIGAN ALEX MULLINS, TROUSERS SOULLAND

S/S

Prada

Vagabond Photography Alexander Bortz Styling Anthony Konig Hair Antoine Martinez Make-Up Sara Tagaloa Model Henry Stambler

2017

S/S

Prada

Vagabond Photography Alexander Bortz Styling Anthony Konig Hair Antoine Martinez Make-Up Sara Tagaloa Model Henry Stambler

2017

Under the Skin Gavin Watson Words Rachael J Vick Archive Photography Gavin Watson Portrait Photography Lydia Garnett

In a sleepy town in the green belt northwest of London, Highsnobiety spent three hours in the company of photographer Gavin Watson. He is a tightly-wound ball of energy. Wiry and angular, he is reminiscent of the teenage boy seen in the self-portraits staring back from the pages of his seminal photographic publication on British skinheads, Skins. The tastefully renovated pub that Watson settles on for our interview feels a long way from the council estates of High Wycombe of the late 1970s and early ’80s, where he spectacularly captured a deeply insightful portrait of a controversial subculture. As a young skinhead, Watson took pictures of his friends and family, tracking their subcultural evolution from when Madness burst into their homes on Top of the Pops in 1979, through to the introduction and energy of Oi! in 1980, and eventually the downfall of what was widely perceived as a racist and insular youth culture. Taking thousands of photographs and printing them himself, he kept them all in what he refers to as the “boxes of death.” From this box he created the finest archive of visual material on the second wave of skinhead subculture. Yet his big break as an established photographer would seemingly never come: Watson tells me he has been on the dole for pretty much all of his life. However, just as the photographer had almost turned his back on his photographic career, Roger K. Burton of the Horse Hospital in London stumbled across some of his work at the Camera Press library in 1994. He reached out to the photographer to discuss the possibility of an exhibition. It was in this moment that Watson’s revival began.

Skins was published that year, giving the world a rare insight into the underbelly of British youth culture. This was a period that had been lost in terms of source material, but was still very much alive within the British public’s psyche and memory – and not always for the right reasons. Skins found its way around the world, into the hands of industry insiders and tastemakers alike, from Terry Richardson to Shane Meadows – and, notably, to Gavin McInnes, who co-created Vice using Skins as an inspirational reference. Vice continued to play a part in Watson’s career, as Andy Capper commissioned him to shoot for the UK content as soon as the UK office was established. This relationship led to the publication of the now rare Skins and Punks: Lost Archives, 1978-1985 (which Watson himself does not even own), published by Vice in 2008. Raving ‘89 followed in 2009; a collaboration with his brother Neville. Since then, Youth Club, a not-for-profit archive chronicling youth cultures around the UK, has digitized 20,000 further images from Watson’s collection on a dedicated platform.

Under the Skin Gavin Watson Words Rachael J Vick Archive Photography Gavin Watson Portrait Photography Lydia Garnett

Watson grew up as the middle sibling of three brothers in High Wycombe with his parents. Against the backdrop of a failing Labour government, a newly-forged multicultural society, and rising levels of poverty, he spent his formative years in the breeding ground of nationwide discontent that would go on to spur the second wave of the skinhead movement. Before its arrival in 1979, Watson was a kid wearing cheesecloth shirts that complemented his long hair and dreamy attitude; a long way from the iconic image of the photographer in an MA-1 bomber jacket, stacked against a wire fence and scowling down the lens. He did not fare well in his early years at the local comprehensive school, and art – the one subject he did not deplore – was his escape. He channeled his energy into comic books and staring at the night sky. This love of sky-gazing became the accidental catalyst for the purchase of Watson’s first camera. “I went to Woolies to get some binoculars to look at the moon, but the camera was next to it,” he explains. “A Hanimex 110. I’d never seen one before – everyone else had a Kodak Instamatic, but this camera had a glass lens. I bought that instead. When I got the first photos back they were unlike everyone else’s; they were clear and sharp. There was something in them, and I thought, ‘I could be a photographer.’” He left school six months before his final term finished, as his application to become a Darkroom Assistant for the illustrious photographic agency Camera Press was successful. He was quickly engulfed by the photography world and exposed to some of the greatest photographers of all time, but Watson disagrees when we suggest that perhaps this helped inform his own early work.

put the best ones in the lone ‘Youth Culture’ box in the library. I’d get the occasional £25, and that’s all I thought about.” By the time Watson had left his job, he was a fully-fledged skinhead. He freely admits that it was his overriding priority – it wasn’t a cult or fad; it was a way of life. After he and his friends saw Madness jumping around on the television for the first time, they were sold. It was the first band they’d seen that spoke directly to them; that they could relate to. His sartorial aesthetic changed overnight – the first stage in his skinhead evolution – but it was about a lot more than just clothing. “It just did something that was so fundamental and organic to a 14-year-old; that was what my work was all about,” he explains. “Wherever you are, something will speak to your tribalism at that age. The hangover from childhood starts – it kicks you out. It was Madness for me, being part of the zeitgeist. I was attracted to being a skinhead – to that cult – because there was an honesty to it; a purity to it. A tribalism to it, but with confidence. And a dignity. It was good to be a part of that; it really helped me, as somebody that was a bit nebulous and a bit undefined – it defined me for years. But that can be a very double-edged sword.” The older kids were the leaders – such is the natural order – and when Watson reminisces about seeing older Skins around town, he describes it as “powerful”; something he yearned to be a part of. Surprisingly, his younger brother Neville was his way in, and a large part of why Watson became the Skin he did.

“I was attracted to being a skinhead – to that cult – because there was an honesty to it; a purity to it. A tribalism to it, but with confidence. And a dignity.”

“I didn’t have any photography heroes,” he says. “Just knew the names of the gods: [Yousuf] Karsch and Ansel Adams – then I was printing them up. Sure, there were your McCullins and those ’60s photographers, but they were too close to [a place] I would never get to in my insecure, working class mind. So I had no influences.” Thomas Blau, Camera Press’s founder, published some of Watson’s early work for news agencies to use. Watson was a published photographer at 16 years old, but had left Camera Press within a year. “I felt like I was missing out on [time with] my mates, so I jacked it in and started working on building sites – but it did open their [Camera Press] library to me. My idea of being a photographer was to be an agency photographer, where I would go out and find stories to submit and then they would send them worldwide as a set. But I never did that, I could never be bothered. I never went out to find those stories, so that side of my career never went the way I was expecting it to. I’d just print pictures of my mates and

“The older guys were the leaders, but they loved Neville,” Watson says. “He was, like, the coolest-looking 18-year-old skinhead that had been shrunk into a 10-year-old boy’s body. He looked like a serious fucking man at the age of 10. As soon as the Skins saw him, they took him as their mascot. My dad used to open the front door to this big gang of skinheads asking, ‘Is Neville in?’ He was still at primary school!” It was Neville who shaved his head first, becoming the star of Watson’s early images. He jumps out – muse-like – throughout the photographs; juxtaposed against a backdrop of domesticity.

“I was attracted to being a skinhead – to that cult – because there was an honesty to it; a purity to it. A tribalism to it, but with confidence. And a dignity.”

“The images were mundane at the time – it was me going downtown with my mates, or in my house,” he muses. “It was very insular. But I could walk up to any Skin and just snap away. It could have gone very wrong, but I had Nev; my golden key. In the beginning, there was no way I would have been accepted into the gang, no way at all. In fact, a few of the Skins were like, ‘Who is this cunt?.’ They all got to know me, though – the kid behind the camera. I wouldn’t have been able to take those pictures if not. The photography was a part of me.”

in a fucking council estate where they left everyone to rot. Everyone was angry and depressed, but somehow we were to blame for the unrest. I had to put that right.”

Talk drifts back to those sartorial codes of old; the ones we associate immediately with particular youth cultures. Even today, you can tell Watson is still particular about his clothing – something he believes was instilled in him from the rigid dress codes of the Skins.

“The National Front was big,” Watson says. “Kids were being preyed upon; it was easy – but there was also a lot of anti-National Front feeling everywhere, too. It [racism] wasn’t embraced as much as it was made out to be; but, yes, there were pockets. I remember fighting the Nazi skinheads after they started to beat up a black kid at a gig.”

“The first time I felt like a proper Skin was when I got the Crombie,” he says. “It was from the Indian guys at the market, and they were knocking them out for £25. It was black, and I was 15. We would also go to jumble sales looking for stuff; it was really exciting. It was a wonderful time, emulating how my grandad used to dress. The whole thing was actually based on ’50s fucking Harvard preppies. Look at those preppy images, and you will see smart skinheads in button-down shirts, Levi’s jeans and sensible shoes.” Naturally, going to gigs came with the territory: “Once you are in a culture, you’re in the culture,” and Watson would head to the multicultural center in Aylesbury, usually with his camera. The manager of Peter and the Test Tube Babies had seen Watson taking photos and asked him to take some shots. Watson saw them in Sounds magazine a couple of weeks later – “I thought, ‘You dodgy cunts!’” – and called the magazine to complain. They asked him to come into the office and offered him a job on the spot. “My photography style didn’t change,” he says. “There is no difference between getting a group of mates together for a picture and getting a band together for a picture. All bands are a gang of mates. I didn’t think about it. My favorite band I shot for Sounds was Buttonhole Surfers; they all came around to my house and did acid. That was a mental day. I literally couldn’t see anything, and the pictures still came out great.” Being a skinhead in the second wave wasn’t without controversy, and the subculture’s ethos was tainted by accusations of widespread racism within its ranks. “When I put out Skins, it was me saying, ‘Yeah, I was a skinhead, but it wasn’t like you’re saying it was,’” Watson clarifies. “Who else was standing up to say anything? No one. I was sick of all the lies, but I was proving the truth photographically without having to write anything. It was the honesty of kids trying to find their way in one of the poorest areas of Buckinghamshire,

However, Watson’s work covered only one small sect of the subculture. There were Skins all over the country, and a lot of them were disaffected and looking for new outlets. The National Front knew this and picked through the riotous Skin gigs around the country, recruiting new members.

Watson rises passionately to his feet when he discusses the misconceptions about skinheads, but he also refers to the right-wing Skins as “the ultimate ‘fuck you’ to society.” Within the ranks, there wasn’t a definitive line between those on the left and right. All the Skins were in it together – that was more binding than individual political views. “For me, being a skinhead was apolitical,” Watson explains. “It was about hating both extremes.” Watson fell out of the skinhead life as quickly as he fell into it, at the age of 25. Neville, again the guiding light, had discovered rave culture. Ecstasy, illegal sound systems and good times appealed greatly after the tight constraints of being a Skin. Watson had nothing left to prove as a skinhead at that point, and as he followed his brother into raving, his camera came, too. The resulting images were yet another rare and valuable insight into the next – and arguably last – great British subculture. Youth Club, the subcultural archive, was especially key in cementing Watson’s work as a milestone in British social history. Watson says that he didn’t know what to expect at first, but a longstanding working relationship resulted. Watson was chosen as the first photographer to whom Youth Club gave archival space. “He had always been misrepresented or underrepresented,” explains Jamie Brett of Youth Club. “He didn’t have a web presence. So, we thought it would be great to give him a dedicated space; unfolding and growing as he continues to shoot. He photographed his subject matter in a very intimate way. It is an incredibly rare and special form of photography, and we wanted to make sure that we gave it the platform it deserved.” Indeed, most photographers do not have the privilege of personally experiencing the subcultures that they are photographing, which is what makes Watson’s work stand out. It is an entirely individual body of work.

in a fucking council estate where they left everyone to rot. Everyone was angry and depressed, but somehow we were to blame for the unrest. I had to put that right.”

“When we think of skinheads in general, most people think visually of Gavin’s work, and that aesthetic,” Brett continues. “He was only one documenting it. That’s his world – it’s a feeling that you pick up from the photographs, it’s the authenticity of his work.” “My photographs tell the real story, not just the surface story,” Watson agrees. “Because I couldn’t be educated, I used those things immediately around me. A lot of the images look almost like movie stills; they don’t look real. Even though it was my life, no one styled it.” The images from Watson’s halcyon days became a key influence in Shane Meadows’s film, This Is England. Watson himself could not have higher praise for the film.

There is a distinctly British element involved in the legacy of subcultures, though. No other country has produced the volume or variation of youth culture movements as the UK. “It’s something to do with being British, that whole attitude of British resolve,” Brett agrees. “Even elsewhere, it is always an offshoot from Britain. We are the home of subculture, and I think that’s due to the way we deal with hard times.” The current kickback against austerity and growing disillusionment with political elites should prove fruitful in that regard. “Subculture might not be over after this year, after Brexit and Trump,” Watson says. “It comes out of poverty; adversity. I just think everything has got so Laura Ashley’d up and uniformed that there is no room for it anymore – but that’s actually when things start to happen.”

“He created the most honest depictions of my youth; the best depiction of skinheads,” he enthuses. “God love him. To know that I inspired that is amazing. He shows the macrocosm but hones in on the microcosm, much like my work. That was a big thing for me. It represents all of us; all my mates that were Skins.”

“I think there needs to be an element of dark times to create subcultures; being aware of escaping mainstream society. In a positive way, it is about creating the world you want to live in.”

Watson enjoys being a spokesperson for his lost subculture, but what does he think about youth culture today? In a time when many think the world has become devoid of originality, what will happen to subcultures? “Young people have no [experience of] subculture in the past, so, for a young person discovering that even today, it’s comparable to seeing the Sex Pistols for the first time,” he explains. “It’s new. I guess the only thing I can liken it to nowadays is Grime; they might look back on that eventually in the same way. But the last [subculture] that I think really stuck out was Rave, then it all sort of ended.” It had ended for Watson, at least: he was growing up, having a baby and looking toward other paths for fulfilment. Most subcultural journeys feed off youth, and his was departing. According to Brett, we may have seen the last of what’s now seen as the “traditional subculture,” but with a new era of discontent, we could see new, non-traditional subcultures emerge: “The way that the world is moving, we aren’t necessarily seeing traditional subculture and youth culture; it’s more complex,” he explains. “We’re seeing young people reacting to hard times by creating; whether that’s [in the form of] protest, art or music. It’s sort of a hark back to that feeling of a hostile world after the war. ... I think there needs to be an element of dark times to create subcultures; being aware of escaping mainstream society. In a positive way, it is about creating the world you want to live in. It’s becoming far more nuanced with the internet now – everyone is connected.”

As our time together comes to a close, discussion turns to his current work. The majority of people hiring Watson see him as a direct link to British subcultures and wish to capitalize on this authenticity for branding purposes, which Watson is tetchily aware of (“There is definitely a thirst for it, a need for that authenticity.”). Indeed, many users of Youth Archive are creative agencies. Subculture has evolved into something of a commodity for brands to buy into, in direct opposition to the values its members stood for in the first place. Working with brands sits OK with Watson – he sees it as an evolution of his photographic career – but as he leans back and looks into the distance during a rare moment of quiet contemplation, he hits the nail on the head. “Just imagine if my work was removed from the world – there would be a big fucking hole from that time,” he says. “Great technical photographs of skinheads, boom! I was there, I had no agenda. I loved being a skinhead, I loved taking photos, and I took photos of people I loved for no greater reason than that I loved it.” And that is exactly what you see in his work: true love for a subculture; one that loved him right back.

“I think there needs to be an element of dark times to create subcultures; being aware of escaping mainstream society. In a positive way, it is about creating the world you want to live in.”

Shifting Grounds — Oh Hyuk

Words Jake Boyer

Photography Assistant Marius Knielig

Photography Vitali Gelwich

Styling Assistant Madeleine Machold

Styling Ye Young Kim

Special Thanks ANCHORET

Hair & Make-Up Yvonne Wengler

SHIRT MARTINE ROSE HOODIE BALENCIAGA

Shifting Grounds — Oh Hyuk

Words Jake Boyer

Photography Assistant Marius Knielig

Photography Vitali Gelwich

Styling Assistant Madeleine Machold

Styling Ye Young Kim

Special Thanks ANCHORET

Hair & Make-Up Yvonne Wengler

SHIRT MARTINE ROSE HOODIE BALENCIAGA

ALL TOOGOOD

Though relatively under-the-radar on the world music charts, Korean indie singer Oh Hyuk, of Hyukoh, is a certified star in South Korea. Representing a new wave of more organic Korean superstars — away from the bubble gum shackles of “K-pop” — Hyuk is ready to go global. “K-pop” is a genre that easily lends itself to the rapidly-condensed viral culture that pervades various corners of the music scene. It has become synonymous with sugary bubblegum pop, the kind that features choruses of pitch-shifted voices, booming dance beats and chic aesthetics that are represented by groups that more closely resemble a squadron of popular school kids than a band. This idea is so ubiquitous that it’s easy to forget that there is a whole world of Korean music that is in no way part of the onslaught of confectionary-techno tunes within the K-pop banner. And perhaps no better example of this fact can be found than in the music of Hyukoh. Who are Hyukoh? In the simplest of terms, they are an indie/alternative band hailing from the South Korean capital city of Seoul and are so-named for lead singer Oh Hyuk. But those more familiar with the band know that they are nothing short of a sensation. Their story is one that is something of a Cinderella story; one that has seen Hyuk endure great pains, wading through a sea of adversity to thrive in the manner that he has. For starters, his family was vehemently opposed to his passion for music; so much so that he was forced to strike out on his own post-high school and was left to fend for himself in the harsh and often unforgiving world of the music industry. And yet, he prevailed. After linking with his bandmates and releasing their debut EP 20 (named for Hyuk’s age at the time), the group was given an opportunity that comes but once in a lifetime: they were featured on the Korean television variety program Infinite Challenge. From there on out things spiraled up quickly. Their proceeding EP, 22, (which was launched before the program) entered the Top 10 on Billboard’s World Albums chart, and their YouTube videos have racked up millions and millions of views. Fame almost never happens overnight, but in some ways, it really did for these boys. Musically, their work is certainly not something one encounters often; any one of their songs seems a patchwork quilt of influences from various eras of rock history, with the uniting element arriving in the emotionally raw vocals from Hyuk. He sings in a mixture of both Korean and English and, as we learned in our conversation, this is something that only aids their appeal in a way that other bands may find alienating. They have yet to release a proper followup to their last album 22, which arrived in 2015, but as a recent mixtape proves, we can expect bigger and better things quite soon. We spoke to frontman Oh Hyuk on the genesis of the band, breaking out from K-pop, and differentiating between Korean and international audiences.

ALL TOOGOOD

HOODIE VETEMENTS × CHAMPION TROUSERS MARTINE ROSE SHOES SUPREME × NORTH FACE CHAIN HOMME BOY

“I tend to get attracted to something new and different. I could say my visual aesthetics have greatly influenced my identity, which has shaped my attitude and directivity.” SHIRT MARTINE ROSE

T-SHIRT STUSSY

HOODIE BALENCIAGA

INNER TOP & SKIRT YANG LI

TROUSERS MARTINE ROSE

SNEAKERS NEW BALANCE

OUTER ZIPPED PANTS ALYX STUDIO

CHAIN BLESS

SNEAKERS NEW BALANCE LEATHER BELT ALYX STUDIO CHAIN BALENCIAGA

“I tend to get attracted to something new and different. I could say my visual aesthetics have greatly influenced my identity, which has shaped my attitude and directivity.” SHIRT MARTINE ROSE

T-SHIRT STUSSY

HOODIE BALENCIAGA

INNER TOP & SKIRT YANG LI

TROUSERS MARTINE ROSE

SNEAKERS NEW BALANCE

OUTER ZIPPED PANTS ALYX STUDIO

CHAIN BLESS

SNEAKERS NEW BALANCE LEATHER BELT ALYX STUDIO CHAIN BALENCIAGA

INNER SHIRT, OUTERWEAR & TROUSERS YOHJI YAMAMOTO POUR HOMME SNEAKERS NEW BALANCE BELT & CHAIN HOMME BOY

TOP & BLANKET UNDERCOVER

INNER SHIRT, OUTERWEAR & TROUSERS YOHJI YAMAMOTO POUR HOMME SNEAKERS NEW BALANCE BELT & CHAIN HOMME BOY

TOP & BLANKET UNDERCOVER

TOP, TROUSERS & BLANKET UNDERCOVER INNER TOP YANG LI CAP TALENT’S OWN

Tell us how you first got started in music? What are some of your earliest musical memories? I was invited to sing at a birthday party for my friend’s younger sibling. I met my mentor there and started thinking about becoming a musician. My parents were very against it at first. How would you describe your visual aesthetic? How important is it to your identity as an artist as a whole? This is still very hard to describe. I tend to get attracted to something new and different. I could say my visual aesthetics have greatly influenced my identity, which has shaped my attitude and directivity. Stagnant water is bound to rot, so I shall be open to anything new and constantly absorb the good ones quickly. What is something you hope to achieve professionally and personally by the end of 2017? I’m hoping to get positive responses for the upcoming album, and want to experience the worldwide market, including Asia and beyond. Personally, I’m hoping for a happy year. Have you found it challenging to distinguish yourselves in the Korean music scene? I would say distinguishing ourselves wasn’t that challenging. Rather, we were worried we would sound too distanced from the scene. For those who know little of it, how would you describe the music scene in Korea? There are many great things about the scene, but the market changes very quickly. When saying K-pop, dance music tends to be the most famous. I recommend that anyone interested should try listening to bands or musicians like us, because you’ll find many awesome, unconventional teams in the scene. Do you find a difference between how your work is received back home vs. abroad? Yes. Back home we are mostly received how we are shown in the TV shows or the images we have in the broadcasting media. But abroad, it might be because we are not that exposed to those shows or media… but it seems like our music and fashion-related content tend to get covered more. What’s the most difficult part about your job? The easiest? The most difficult part is that taking a break is not solely a break, but the easy part would be that, comparatively, we tend to have a lot of time to rest. What’s one of the strangest things to happen to you while performing/while on tour? When we perform on stage, it always rains. It just always does, even in the dry season or area. It’s like a jinx. Does Hyukoh have a band philosophy? If so, what would it be? Let’s do something fun and be cool, for a long time. If you could collaborate with any artist alive or dead, who would it be and why? Elliott Smith or David Bowie. We might make something awesome together.

TOP, TROUSERS & BLANKET UNDERCOVER INNER TOP YANG LI CAP TALENT’S OWN

Sides Photography James Pearson-Howes Styling Kusi Kubi Grooming Takao Hayashi using Bumble and Bumble Styling Assistant Sarah Mistura Dawodu Models George @ Models 1, Gabriel Vieira @ Wilhelmina, Phoenix-Blu @ Select & Nimshi @ TM Casting

[GABRIEL] TOP OFF-WHITE × UMBRO, CAP Y-3 [GEORGE] TOP SANKUANZ, PANTS KAPPA [PHOENIX] ALL COTTWEILER [NIMSHI] ALL STONE ISLAND

JUMPER UMBRO, PANTS STONE ISLAND

[GABRIEL] TOP OFF-WHITE × UMBRO, CAP Y-3 [GEORGE] TOP SANKUANZ, PANTS KAPPA [PHOENIX] ALL COTTWEILER [NIMSHI] ALL STONE ISLAND

JUMPER UMBRO, PANTS STONE ISLAND

ALL STONE ISLAND

JERSEY TOP KAPPA, BUCKET HAT STONE ISLAND

WINDBREAKER & PANTS STONE ISLAND, SNEAKERS REEBOK, CAP KAPPA

TOP & PANTS Y-3

ALL STONE ISLAND

JERSEY TOP KAPPA, BUCKET HAT STONE ISLAND

WINDBREAKER & PANTS STONE ISLAND, SNEAKERS REEBOK, CAP KAPPA

TOP & PANTS Y-3

ALL COTTWEILER

JUMPER CHAMPION, ZIP-UP JUMPER ELLESSE

TOP OFF-WHITE × UMBRO, CAP Y-3

ALL COTTWEILER

JUMPER CHAMPION, ZIP-UP JUMPER ELLESSE

TOP OFF-WHITE × UMBRO, CAP Y-3

TRACKSUIT TOMMY HILFIGER, JERSEY TOP HENRY HOLLAND × UMBRO, SNEAKERS ADIDAS ORIGINALS

HOODIE & PANTS Y-3, JACKET SANKUANZ, SNEAKERS STONE ISLAND

TRACKSUIT TOMMY HILFIGER, JERSEY TOP HENRY HOLLAND × UMBRO, SNEAKERS ADIDAS ORIGINALS

HOODIE & PANTS Y-3, JACKET SANKUANZ, SNEAKERS STONE ISLAND

Mélange Photography Thai Hibbert Styling Nayaab Tania Make-Up Hannah Williams Styling Assistants Elias Riadi & Lewis Bloyce Model Savannah Blake @ Select

JUMPSUIT CHARLIE MAY, SWEATER GIVENCHY, SHEARLING JACKET BLOOD BROTHER, SNEAKERS CHANEL

SWEATER GIVENCHY

Mélange Photography Thai Hibbert Styling Nayaab Tania Make-Up Hannah Williams Styling Assistants Elias Riadi & Lewis Bloyce Model Savannah Blake @ Select

JUMPSUIT CHARLIE MAY, SWEATER GIVENCHY, SHEARLING JACKET BLOOD BROTHER, SNEAKERS CHANEL

SWEATER GIVENCHY

JACKET & PANTS MISBHV, SNEAKERS GUCCI

DENIM JACKET & JEANS GIVENCHY, BRALETTE MDV, BELT OFF-WHITE

JACKET & PANTS MISBHV, SNEAKERS GUCCI

DENIM JACKET & JEANS GIVENCHY, BRALETTE MDV, BELT OFF-WHITE

DENIM JACKET & JEANS GIVENCHY

HOODIE VETEMENTS, TRENCH COAT WEEKDAY, CULOTTES COS

DENIM JACKET & JEANS GIVENCHY

HOODIE VETEMENTS, TRENCH COAT WEEKDAY, CULOTTES COS

Facebook Groups Fill the Void Left by Streetwear Forums Words Chris Danforth Illustrations Teddy Kang

Facebook is fostering some of the most close-knit communities in sneaker and streetwear culture today. To learn more, we spoke with the admins behind some of the biggest groups on the platform. Last October, New York City skate label Supreme issued up the latest in their series of photo T-shirts, featuring none other than Atlanta rap legend Gucci Mane, photographed by cult film director Harmony Korine. Gucci had just completed a 39-month-long stint in jail, and following his release, quickly unleashed a salvo of new trap bangers. I was pretty hyped, along with many other Guwop fans. And I really wanted that tee. Not at all a stranger to Supreme drops, I thought I had a decent chance of copping direct through Supreme’s online shop, but as the story goes for so many people these days, I just didn’t have the chops to add-to-cart quick enough. My plan B was to ask a friend who was fairly tight with the Supreme Paris crew, but no luck. Then I scrambled to get a proxy for the Japanese release, which was two days later. Again, no luck. I quickly realized there was nowhere to go but the secondary resale market. I found the Gucci Mane shirt for sale through Facebook group Supreme Talk, and although I paid about double retail for the T-shirt, the story ends well — it arrived in the mail quickly and I was happy. This is the case for so, so many sneaker and streetwear fans today, on both the buying and selling sides of the equation. Certain highly-coveted products, especially from brands like Supreme, have created huge secondary markets, giving rise to reselling websites like Grailed and Klekt, as well as burgeoning groups on social media platform Facebook, of all places. Take Yeezy Talk Worldwide, for example, a Kanye Westfocused Facebook page with over 125,000 subscribers and thousands more pending. The group is a key marketplace for buying, selling and discussing everything Kanye related, but speaking the right language is a prerequisite to navigating

112

the crowd. For members of Yeezy Talk, it’s second nature to unpackage cryptic messages like “WTS DS Beluga V2 $400 OBO.” Over Facebook, fittingly, 19-year-old Yeezy Talk co-founder Vivian Frank explains: “People start to figure it out over time from being on the group. Eventually there will be new terminology.” [The above phrase means a user wants to sell an unworn, box-fresh pair of adidas YEEZY Boost 350 V2 sneakers in the Beluga grey and Solar red colorway for $400, or best offer.] While direct commerce is a big part of the Yeezy Talk platform, the page also fosters discussion, and many users frequent the group with the hopes of getting and staying educated on everything to do with the page’s namesake, Kanye West. And while music and fashion are naturally part of that content, the insane popularity of West’s adidas YEEZY footwear collection means a lot of the discussion revolves around fake sneakers. As Frank sees it, “The page helps educate people about shoes, and could help kids to know the difference between fake and real YEEZYs.” He says they are in talks with BBC to do a fake versus real comparison guide, so people don’t get scammed, but concedes the transactional nature of the page isn’t likely to change: “Reselling is part of the game.” Frank seems largely nonconciliatory with members of his group that pay high prices to resellers, explaining, “I never really had anything against reselling. That’s the grind. People that usually hate on reselling are the salty ones that always miss out.” Facebook has even integrated limited shopping functionality that allows users to specify the price, tag a location, then hit post and wait for offers. For now, Facebook is still hands-off in terms of facilitating payment and delivery of the products.

113

Facebook Groups Fill the Void Left by Streetwear Forums Words Chris Danforth Illustrations Teddy Kang

112

113

Vivian’s efforts with Yeezy Talk have even expanded into the realm of physical merchandise, including hoodies and T-shirts that have been worn by the likes of Justin Bieber. “There’s so much hype for merch right now, so me and my friend Jake Binning thought we should make some exclusive merch for the heads to rep. The response has been good, even Justin Bieber has been wearing it.” In fact, the Canadian crooner actually liked the Yeezy Talk gear so much that he took to Instagram with a picture of two hoodies, and requested a hookup in the comment, writing: “Can anyone pull some strings I want this hoodie!” That’s a strong cosign by any measure, and the fact that Bieber is paying attention certainly attests to the sway of communities like Yeezy Talk Worldwide. For Supreme Talk, the Facebook page that solved my Supreme/Gucci Mane T-shirt dilemma, the community is equally important. Though the group’s popularity has increased continuously over the last few years as Supreme has gained more mainstream appeal, founder and admin Lew Lower reminds us they have always been the biggest Supreme-related group, gaining traction soon after the opening of the Supreme London store in 2011. The page is populated by Supreme heads, including a lot of truly knowledgeable followers of the brand, but also many young kids who have discovered the iconic New York City skate label more recently, and may not be as well-versed in terms of Supreme’s early years. “I’m surprised at the group’s audience now. First, the Supreme target audience was late-teens to mid-thirties. Now it’s typically 12-18-year-olds, not that there is anything wrong with that,” Lew elaborates. While criticism has been leveled at some of these young Supreme fans, especially those who drop substantial amounts of money on the brand despite still being in elementary school — older heads call them out for spending their parents cash — Lew quickly rationalizes the situation, stating: “They’re into it for all the same reasons older people are. They might wear it because their idols wear it, or because they’re into skating, or because they just want to be onto something cool. I believe that age doesn’t change the reasons why people get into Supreme.” Of course the youth of today have access to one big tool that previous generations did not: social media. Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and the like allow access to previously niche information at an unprecedented rate. As a testament to the page’s roots and reputation, Supreme Talk occasionally works directly with London legend and Supreme London store manager, Jagger. Jagger posts from his personal Facebook account from time to time to ensure that queueing on release day is done in a calm and orderly manner, which is a huge help to his store’s staff, who are often inundated by the madness. “For certain drops, it’s become absolutely insane on Peter Street,” notes Lew. On particular release days, many even rely on images and tips shared in the group, for example, to find out how far the lineup snakes through London’s Soho streets on any given week.

If anyone is positioned to understand the inner workings and benefits of the new frontier of digital fashion communities, it’s probably Leo “Gully Guy” Mandella. Introduced to sneaker and streetwear culture through Facebook groups, the 14-year-old has amassed an Instagram following of over 140,000 by keeping his feed regularly updated with the biggest signifiers in streetwear, including the latest and rarest pieces from Palace Skateboards, Supreme, Gosha Rubchinskiy and the like.

“ I think Facebook groups are a huge benefit to the fashion game. Not only do they allow you to buy and sell the clothes you want, they also allow you to connect and make friends with people that are interested in the same things as you.” — Leo “Gully Guy” Mandella Leo puts it simply, making his opinion quite clear: “I think Facebook groups are a huge benefit to the fashion game. Not only do they allow you to buy and sell the clothes you want, they also allow you to connect and make friends with people that are interested in the same things as you. I’ve been a member of The Basement for a while, where I made the friends I’ve still got today, and learned a lot about fashion.” [The Basement is another prominent Facebook group, and one that actually spawned from Supreme Talk. Lew Lower explains: “Supreme Talk eventually got too cluttered up with non-Supreme posts which is why we decided to create The Basement.”] Like Vivian’s Yeezy Talk Worldwide merch, Leo’s social media clout has provided a platform for him to start his own brand, which hasn’t officially launched at the time of publishing this article, but seems to be eponymously named Gully Guy. So far, we’ve glimpsed a range of T-shirts adorned with pastel graphics of what looks like a mid-1990s Nokia cellphone, which is, ironically, an avatar of a time that Leo is too young to have ever experienced. These Facebook pages, and others like them — many of them frequented by members of the Highsnobiety staff — seem to be filling a void that was left with the decline in popularity of internet forums frequented during streetwear’s (online) infancy. OG forums like superfuture, 5th Dimension and Nike Talk were once some of the only places to connect with other fans of sneakers and streetwear, especially if you didn’t live in a big city. Ironically, today’s Facebook pages are being modeled around the very forums that turned all but obsolete a few years ago with the rise of social media. In fact, one could argue that Facebook page names like Supreme Talk and Yeezy Talk are an homage to, or at least a coincidental reference to, early forums like Nike Talk.

114

Today’s Facebook moderators and admins ensure a loose hierarchy remains in place, vetting requests to join and settling disputes, endorsing approved sellers and filtering problematic ones, just as the forums did years ago. But with thousands upon thousands of active members, self-policing has become commonplace out of necessity, and just one bad transaction is reason enough to cop yourself a ban.

gain access to a largely un-curated stream of user-submitted information shown in real time; a digital mood board of sorts that delivers news with little or no latency. Scrolling through these streetwear-dedicated Facebook groups on any given day, you’re bound to pass a bevy of WTS and WTB posts, listed by those who are looking where to sell or where to buy respectively, but also a handful of memes.

One of the most interesting facsimiles of these Facebook communities is the act of a “legit check.” Items for sale have their authenticity tested by expert members who are able to identify bootleg product. Whether it’s the stitching on a Supreme box logo hoodie or the sole insert on a pair of YEEZY sneakers, certain telltale details will reveal if a product is genuine or not, but you have to know exactly what you’re looking for. Users themselves can also be “legit checked” based on references and past interactions in the group. All in all, this process is quite democratic.

As a byproduct of the strange rabbit hole that is the internet, meme culture eventually met together with the world of streetwear, and this cross-pollination has given rise to a number of running jokes that surround brands like Supreme, Air Jordan, Palace Skateboards and others. The most prominent or successful example of a streetwear meme is surely the ubiquitous image of a tearful Michael Jordan from his Basketball Hall of Fame induction speech in 2009, but the examples go on and on. Obviously Supreme’s polarizing box logo design and products like the branded brick have provided a seemingly endless source of pictorial quips around Supreme — one mathematically adept fan even calculated that a 2,400-square-foot home made solely from Supreme bricks would cost $4,704,000.

Conveniently, sneaker groups dedicated to specific shoe sizes or cities also exist — like Berlin’s Hauptstadt Treters (Capital City Kicks) or the hilariously named Toronto Streetwear Mandem — helping to simplify the process of buying, selling and meeting like-minded people. If you really dig deep, you might even stumble across obscure corners of Facebook like Roadman Talk, or a spin-off of The Basement dedicated to dark humor called The Bathroom. Going well beyond the forums of the past, on Facebook there’s something for everyone, no matter how niche or mainstream your interests. These growing digital communities seem to indicate a lot about the future of streetwear culture. Kids subscribe to

In terms of valuable, original content, these feeds are still quite adolescent in nature, and many users re-share a lot of content from primary sources like Highsnobiety but simply put — as I’ve been finding out — if you strike out on Gucci Mane T-shirt or a YEEZY drop, have a question about a Supreme piece from 2007, or want to link up with other sneakerheads in your area, Facebook is the place to go to make it happen.

114

Cult

ALL Y-3

Photography Takahito Sasaki Styling Atip W Hair Takao Hayashi using Bumble and Bumble Make-Up Jennifer Mika using MAC Cosmetics Photography Assistant Takumi Monji Styling Assistant Sophie Casha Casting Director Sarah Bunter @ Bunter Casting Models Francois @ Wilhelmina, Gabriel & Rayan @ AMCK

[RAYAN] JUMPSUIT & CAPE Y-3, JACKET MAHARISHI, BOOTS DR. MARTENS × YOHJI YAMAMOTO [GABRIEL] CAPE NH(O)RM, TROUSERS MAHARISHI, BOOTS Y-3

Cult

ALL Y-3

[RAYAN] JUMPSUIT & CAPE Y-3, JACKET MAHARISHI, BOOTS DR. MARTENS × YOHJI YAMAMOTO [GABRIEL] CAPE NH(O)RM, TROUSERS MAHARISHI, BOOTS Y-3

ALL YOHJI YAMAMOTO

TOP MAHARISHI, COAT ELLEN PEDERSEN, LEATHER TROUSERS LOEWE, BOOTS DR. MARTENS × YOHJI YAMAMOTO

ALL YOHJI YAMAMOTO

TOP MAHARISHI, COAT ELLEN PEDERSEN, LEATHER TROUSERS LOEWE, BOOTS DR. MARTENS × YOHJI YAMAMOTO

[RAYAN] COAT Y-3 [GABRIEL] KNIT TOP PRINGLE, JACKET Y-3

KNIT PRINGLE, COAT LOEWE, TROUSERS MAHARISHI, BOOTS J.W.ANDERSON

[RAYAN] COAT Y-3 [GABRIEL] KNIT TOP PRINGLE, JACKET Y-3

KNIT PRINGLE, COAT LOEWE, TROUSERS MAHARISHI, BOOTS J.W.ANDERSON

SWEATSHIRT LOEWE, CAMO COAT MAHARISHI, COAT MACKINTOSH, TROUSERS Y-3

[RAYAN] KNIT & JACKET LOEWE, COAT MAHARISHI, KILT BARBARA GONGINI, BOOTS DR. MARTENS × YOHJI YAMAMOTO [GABRIEL] JACKET MAHARISHI, PANTS BARBARA GONGINI, KNIT CAPARA, BOOTS Y-3

SWEATSHIRT LOEWE, CAMO COAT MAHARISHI, COAT MACKINTOSH, TROUSERS Y-3

[RAYAN] KNIT & JACKET LOEWE, COAT MAHARISHI, KILT BARBARA GONGINI, BOOTS DR. MARTENS × YOHJI YAMAMOTO [GABRIEL] JACKET MAHARISHI, PANTS BARBARA GONGINI, KNIT CAPARA, BOOTS Y-3

Club Kids Photography Damien Fry @ One Represents Styling Atip W Hair Takuya Morimoto using Bumble and Bumble Make-Up Andjelka using MAC Cosmetics Photography Assistant Benjamin Breading Set Designer Josh Stovell Casting Director Sarah Bunter @ Bunter Casting Models Maria @ Select & Jordan @ AMCK

[JORDAN] ALL BERTHOLD, SNEAKERS NIKE [MARIA] SHIRT ETAUTZ, WAISTCOAT ALEX MULLINS, TRACKPANTS COTTWEILER, SNEAKERS Y-3

SHIRT WOOYOUNGMI, GILET CHRISTOPHER RAEBURN, SUEDE JACKET COTTWEILER, JEANS ETAUTZ

TOP MARNI, JACKET KENZO

SHIRT WOOYOUNGMI, GILET CHRISTOPHER RAEBURN, SUEDE JACKET COTTWEILER, JEANS ETAUTZ

TOP MARNI, JACKET KENZO

SHIRT ETAUTZ, WAIST COAT ALEX MULLINS, TRACK PANTS COTTWEILER, SNEAKERS Y-3

TOP & JACKET QASIMI

SHIRT ETAUTZ, WAIST COAT ALEX MULLINS, TRACK PANTS COTTWEILER, SNEAKERS Y-3

TOP & JACKET QASIMI

TOP & PANTS MARNI, COAT ETAUTZ, SNEAKERS RICK OWENS × ADIDAS

T-SHIRT COTTWEILER, JACKET & TRACKPANTS CHRISTOPHER RAEBURN

TOP & PANTS MARNI, COAT ETAUTZ, SNEAKERS RICK OWENS × ADIDAS

T-SHIRT COTTWEILER, JACKET & TRACKPANTS CHRISTOPHER RAEBURN

PRETTY

Young M.A didn’t choose initials that stood for “Me Always” by chance. The rising New York emcee figured out at a very early age that being the lone wolf can sometimes mean you’re the only survivor. There are few famous, outwardly queer-identifying female musicians in the industry, and fewer still seem to be entering. In fact, M.A is a rarity - she is an artist who is openly a lesbian and also presents as more masculine-identifying. Despite that, being true to herself has always been the only available option.

BUT

Young M.A arrives at the photo studio close enough to call time to be considered tardy, but not actually late. Her hair — a silky cloud of near-elbow-length unbraided tresses – makes it through the narrow white door before the rest of her does. She takes a quick, almost imperceptible survey of the room before sliding her surprisingly diminutive frame into the studio. Her manager and two videographers trail in after her, promptly fanning out to find seats on the couch or in one of the Eames-inspired chairs littering the space. Although her rider requests several bottles of Belaire Rare Rosé (Rick Ross’s brand ambassadorship seems to have made it a popular choice), M.A seems unperturbed that the drinks, nor the grilled chicken, shrimp cocktail or Smart waters that were also requested, are nowhere in sight. In truth, our crew is much more noticeably disgruntled about the lack of food. Provisions were somehow relegated to the bottom of the priority list in the frantic preparations for her arrival. M.A doesn’t outwardly indicate that she picks up on any nervous (or hungry) energy, though she circulates the space in that way of the deceptively observant — never saying too much but probably missing very little.

LOCO

After a brief discussion about the styling and direction of the shoot, M.A is shown to the makeup chair. She seems resigned to the prospect of what’s to come, though she’s also seemingly unenthused. As primer, concealer and makeup brushes are laid across the table, the hairdresser hovers over her, anxiously surveying the top of her head like it’s unmapped terrain. M.A hasn’t had time to get her hair re-braided and it’s clear the stylist is nervous about being responsible for perfecting her signature fourbraid style. “Can I?,” he asks hesitantly, hand poised just over her scalp. M.A shrugs noncommittally as if to say, “I don’t know, can you?” It’s confirmation enough for him to timidly begin to part her hair and attempt to apply some product. “Hold up,” M.A says almost immediately, “what are you using?” He holds aloft a natural hair conditioning cream from Shea Moisture with the expression of a doomed man who can see gallows rising above the horizon line. M.A momentarily studies the label before finally giving a nod of approval; his relief is tangible.

— Young M.A

M.A isn’t intimidating, dismissive or remotely impolite, she’s actually quite the opposite. She often pauses before responding to questions, carefully weighing her answers as if confirming the verity of her statements internally before sharing them with the larger world. Soft spoken but quick to flash a toothy, gold-grill-accented grin, she projects an aura of uncommon reserve. Especially for a rapper whose breakout single, “OOOUUU” is a cheeky little hat-tip to lesbianism, the bond of bromances, and “HennyNHoes.” The latter being a phrase M.A, in true millennial fashion, reappropriated as an Instagram handle. She also released a single of the same name via her 2015 debut mixtape, Sleep Walkin. At the time, M.A was an under-the-radar artist who had to fund the full cost of the project on her own. When pressed about where she acquired the money to pay for the mixtape, she curls the right side of her lip into something resembling a smile and says, “I can’t tell you that. I did have a job right out of high school though because I wasn’t with the broke shit.” Without skipping a beat she redirects back to the album, “I called it Sleep Walkin because that’s how I felt,” M.A explains, tilting her head meditatively in the direction of the hairstylist’s steady hand. “It just felt like a lot of people were sleeping on me and my talent.”

T-SHIRT, JACKET & PANTS VINTAGE TOMMY HILFIGER SNEAKERS AIR JORDAN HEADPHONE BEATS SOLO 3 WIRELESS SPEAKER BEATS PILL +

Words Stephanie Smith-Strickland

Hair Nero @ Vijin using Amika

Styling Assistants Rashied Black & Victoria Espinoza

Photography CG Watkins

Make-Up Kunio Kataoka using MAC Cosmetics

Special Thanks Carlito Ross from

Styling Jenny Haapala

Photography Assistant Matt La Barbiera

#UNKNXWNSKELETXN

PRETTY

BUT

LOCO

— Young M.A

T-SHIRT, JACKET & PANTS VINTAGE TOMMY HILFIGER SNEAKERS AIR JORDAN HEADPHONE BEATS SOLO 3 WIRELESS SPEAKER BEATS PILL +

Words Stephanie Smith-Strickland

Hair Nero @ Vijin using Amika

Styling Assistants Rashied Black & Victoria Espinoza

Photography CG Watkins

Make-Up Kunio Kataoka using MAC Cosmetics

Special Thanks Carlito Ross from

Styling Jenny Haapala

Photography Assistant Matt La Barbiera

#UNKNXWNSKELETXN

ANORAK SANKUANZ T-SHIRT & PANTS VINTAGE TOMMY HILFIGER EARPHONE BEATS X

She was probably right. The project was generally regarded as a thoughtful, well-conceived rookie effort, but that alone wasn’t enough to propel her onto the playlists of a broader audience, although she’d already amassed an impressive East Coast following. In 2016, however, Sleep Walkin received a visibility boost when one of M.A’s old freestyles went viral. The grainy YouTube footage from 2014 features a wifebeater-clad M.A dropping bars over the late Chicago rapper Young Pappy’s “Chiraq” beat. Social commentator and economist Dr. Boyce Watkins posted a well-timed, if not slightly supercilious, video takedown of the freestyle, deriding the lyrics for promoting genocide and homicide in black communities. Yet for all his rancor, even he couldn’t pretend M.A wasn’t without impressive talent. Watkins openly stated that, in his opinion, she delivered the best remix he’d heard. As an introduction to M.A, “Chiraq” is a jarring, raw display of her ability to string together gritty narratives and malevolent punchlines informed by the realities of violence and murder. Lines like, “Put the Desert Eagle to his forehead and make the nigga have a change of mind” flow innately into lyrics, that, by content alone, separate M.A from her heteronormative male counterparts — many of whom still labor under the restrictive rules of masculinity ever-present in hip-hop. “Stop talking that tough shit ‘cause you dyke bitches ain’t ‘bout that,” she crows, before later following up with, “Never been a pussy type / but I know a lot of pussy dykes / your shit’s trash you can’t rap.” M.A’s ability to occupy the space of being other, without being othered — both in her music and everyday life — is part of what has made her ascension to the top of New York’s hip-hop elite so fascinating. She is an openly lesbian, masculine-presenting rapper who talks freely — and sometimes with a flair of misogyny, though she expertly sidesteps the subject when I bring it up — about her sexual desires for women. Yet even in doing so, she refuses to allow her orientation to define her artistry, or even her identity. M.A doesn’t care to be idolized as the new “lesbian rapper” championing gender parity in hip-hop any more than she cares if her preference for women is a source of fascination or revulsion to others. “I don’t give a fuck,” she says, with the frank confidence of someone who knows what giving too much of a fuck feels like. She understands that sometimes the better option really is to stop caring. For M.A, making that choice directly parallels her journey in music. All of it is underpinned by the moment she finally found the courage to come out.

“One of the first rhymes I remember writing was like, ‘Pimps in the club ridin’ on dubs smoking that bud we ain’t tryna show them love,’ or something like that.” Young M.A was born Katorah Marrero in East New York. Her mother, Latasha, raised her and her two siblings with the help of M.A’s grandmother, who lives in Crown Heights, Brooklyn to this day. As a child, she was exposed to classic New York hip-hop and gangsta rap by her mother, who M.A describes as a lifelong music lover and a former aspiring musician. “I probably started writing raps when I was like eight or nine. I didn’t even know what I was talking about back then,” M.A says. When she got bored with her classes she would scrawl half-conceived rhymes in her school notebook to tame her wandering mind. In 2003, she heard 50 Cent’s debut studio album, Get Rich or Die Tryin’, a record that would go on to deeply influence M.A’s approach to lyricism, and cement her young ambition of being a rapper. “One of the first rhymes I remember writing was like, ‘Pimps in the club ridin’ on dubs smoking that bud we ain’t tryna show them love,’ or something like that,” says M.A with a self-deprecating laugh.

ANORAK SANKUANZ T-SHIRT & PANTS VINTAGE TOMMY HILFIGER EARPHONE BEATS X

Life in a single parent home, though loving and supportive, wasn’t always easy; nor was life in East New York. When M.A was 10, her mother moved the family to Chesterfield, Virginia in pursuit of better opportunities. There M.A excelled in sports, particularly football where she was the first and only girl to play on her school team. She also continued to hone her music skills, writing raps at every opportunity and even partnering with three friends to form a pseudo rap crew. Despite feeling fairly content with her life in Virginia, M.A says something still nagged at her for most of her adolescence — it was the notion that maybe who she thought she was or who she thought she wanted to be, wasn’t actually what would make her happy. “I knew I liked women very, very young, since I was like five years old or something,” she says. “It’s not so much I was scared to come out or anything like that. I just think where I was it wasn’t really that common. In New York there’s so many different kinds of people. Shit, there’s gay people everywhere, but it wasn’t like that in Virginia.” After years of summers shuttling back and forth between New York and Virginia, M.A finally moved to Brooklyn in 2009 when she was 17. For a teenager anxiously suppressing her sexual identity, returning to the cosmopolitan thrum of the Big Apple must have felt like a welcome relief. Sadly, it was short-lived: only a few months after relocating, M.A’s older brother Kenneth was murdered in Pennsylvania following a gang-related dispute. He was only 20 years old. Kenneth’s tragic passing and the nature of his death would eventually lead to incorrect assumptions about M.A’s RedLyfe crew affiliation. “I hate that people think it’s about gang shit because it’s not,” she says of her longtime group of friends. “Everyone thinks we’re on some blood shit but really red is just my favorite color and they been holding me down,” she shares. Kenneth, who M.A admits was involved in the street life, was like an older brother and father figure in one. She was immediately devastated by his loss. “I was really dealing with a lot of shit then,” she says. “I wasn’t happy, I was unfocused and I wasn’t really in a space for music.” Despite that, she kept writing songs, cycling through her grief, confusion and pain in lyrics. She also finally came out. “I came out after my brother died because I just stopped giving a fuck,” she shares. “I don’t know if he knew but I think he probably did. I was a tomboy growing up — I always wanted to play sports and be around the boys — he used to tease me sometimes and tell me I was gay, but I’d always be like ‘no I’m not!’” At one point, she says she even tried to wear more girls’ clothing, hoping that her mother, who, over the course of M.A’s childhood occasionally dropped hints and even asked her if she was gay, wouldn’t think she was. When she finally dropped the pretense, M.A says the conversation was surprisingly anticlimactic. “Man, my mama already knew,” she laughs. She touches on the topic in “Quiet Storm,” rapping, “Mama wondered why I never liked to wear a skirt / Or wear a purse, I tried to be girly once / But fortunately it didn’t work.” It is fortunate for the fans who herald her as a return to real, gritty, street-centric New York hip-hop. Even though coming out was never intrinsically connected to her ability to make music, M.A admits that a lot of the internal turmoil that mired her in self-doubt resolved itself once she felt like she was at peace with who she was. “Before I came out I used to be really shy, like I wouldn’t want to perform on stage or go to events to meet industry people and stuff like that,” she admits. Picturing a bashful younger version of M.A isn’t actually that difficult. Even today, she retains a certain reticence that sometimes requires a bit of prodding to overcome. What’s apparent is that her reservation isn’t borne from a lack of self-confidence, but rather a lack of care about the way others perceive her. M.A likes what she likes and she won’t compromise her conviction for anyone. The makeup artist gets a firsthand lesson when she peers at herself in a mirror and promptly pronounces her face too heavily made-up. “I only used primer and concealer,” he tells M.A appeasingly, but she isn’t budging. “I was just on the phone and there’s makeup on my screen. It’s too much,” she says with a finality that soon has him resignedly blotting the excess from her face.

T-SHIRT & PANTS NAUTICA SNEAKERS AIR JORDAN EARPHONE BEATS X

“People from my community, the gay community know what I’m talking about. If other people don’t like it or they’re curious that’s not my problem. They can figure out how all of that works if they really want to.”

T-SHIRT & PANTS NAUTICA SNEAKERS AIR JORDAN EARPHONE BEATS X

TOP AIMÉ LEON DORE EARPHONE BEATS X

During interviews if the topic sways from her music to something as personal as her sex life, as it occasionally does with curious journalists and hosts hoping to land some titillating content, she handles herself with the same charming tenacity. If there’s one thing M.A has become a pro at it’s communicating that who she is isn’t predicated on who she sleeps with, and who she sleeps with has absolutely nothing to do with her music. While she’s never shied away from proclaiming her preferences on a track, she’s made it clear that her personal life is off limits. “I just say whatever I feel like saying in my music,” she says. “People from my community, the gay community know what I’m talking about. If other people don’t like it or they’re curious that’s not my problem. They can figure out how all of that works if they really want to.” Last year when she appeared on Power 105.1’s notoriously uncensored morning show, The Breakfast Club, she demonstrated that mentality in real-time. For emerging entertainers, facing down the tag team gauntlet of Charlamagne Tha God, Angela Yee and DJ Envy is a rite of passage. When Charlamagne mentioned “OOOUUU”’s most-perennially discussed line: “Baby gave me head, that’s a low blow / Damn she make me weak when she deep throat,” and promptly followed up by asking M.A, “What the hell was she deep throating?,” the rookie pulled an Olivia Pope move on the vet. “Listen, I’m not going to tell you that. That’s none of your business, that’s my business. You shouldn’t even want to know what a dildo does buddy,” she said, earning a round of laughs from the room. Moments later she pulled another firm but polite evasive maneuver on DJ Envy, who had followed up with a question of his own about her sex life. It was one of the first times she had been publicly challenged to steer the conversation away from her sexuality and back to the topic she wanted to discuss: music. “Yeah, you see how I handled that,” she laughs. “I expected that because it’s The Breakfast Club but I do think it’s weird that so many people feel like they can ask me stuff like that — it’s like me asking a dude about his penis, it’s weird.”

“I definitely felt like it was a fit just because Beats is just so part of the culture, you know? Back in the day it was the big speakers you carried around and then iPods and stuff… now it’s Beats.” These days, though, weird is just a normal state of being for M.A. The success of “OOOUUU,” which currently has over 100 million views on YouTube, catapulted her into a new echelon of stardom, taking her from local talent to globally recognized name. Even the grocery store in her new, more gentrified neighborhood has become a forum for meet-and-greets: she tells me how a cashier offered to help her pick out some cheeses the day before, but really it was just an excuse to ask for a picture. “OOOUUU” also triggered a roll-in of record deal offers last year, something M.A admits she thought she wanted at one time, but realized she didn’t need after seeing how well she was doing making music on her own terms with her own team. She turned down a recurring role on Empire for the same reason. That, and because she was slated to be cast as a gay female rapper and didn’t want her actual reality to become blurred with that of a fictional character. M.A is making moves in the business department too, securing relationships with behemoths like Beats by Dr. Dre. She recently appeared in the company’s celebrity-filled “Got No Strings” campaign. “I definitely felt like it was a fit just because Beats is just so part of the culture, you know? Back in the day it was the big speakers you carried around and then iPods and stuff… now it’s Beats. Dre was a huge part of hip-hop and somebody I looked up to coming up. Everything just felt really natural the way it happened and it didn’t feel forced. They were really willing to work with me and my team so it was just a great opportunity that made sense to us,” M.A says of the burgeoning relationship. At the rate her star is rising, it’s unlikely Beats will be the last of her endorsement deals or partnerships. What seems more likely is that a self-described “pretty but loco” girl from East New York will cement herself as the city’s reigning rap king, and nobody will have a thing to say about it.

TOP AIMÉ LEON DORE EARPHONE BEATS X

Where’s Waldo?

SUNGLASSES MODEL’S OWN

SUIT DIOR HOMME, SHOES MAISON MARGIELA

Photography Timothy Schaumburg Styling Dogukan Nesanir Grooming Manu Kopp Styling Assistant Nordine Makhloufi Casting Director Crystal Murray Production Fania Fuchsia Folaji & Catharina Klaeren Models Noah Bikie, Joris Ebong Boumba, Gomes Alexandre, Joseph Ekoko, Brandon Akinotcho, Jonathan Beteg, Arnaud Boade, Pierre Constant, Paul Dingulu & Jean Ndjoli

[BRANDON] SUIT GIVENCHY, CAP MODEL’S OWN, [JEAN] TRENCH COAT MAISON MARGIELA, BELT CHRISTIAN DADA [PIERRE] SUIT GUCCI [PAUL] SUIT DIOR HOMME

Where’s Waldo?

SUNGLASSES MODEL’S OWN

SUIT DIOR HOMME, SHOES MAISON MARGIELA

[BRANDON] SUIT GIVENCHY, CAP MODEL’S OWN, [JEAN] TRENCH COAT MAISON MARGIELA, BELT CHRISTIAN DADA [PIERRE] SUIT GUCCI [PAUL] SUIT DIOR HOMME

SUIT DIOR HOMME, PULLOVER CHRISTIAN DADA

SHIRT OFF-WHITE, COAT ACNE STUDIOS

ALL CHRISTIAN DADA

SUIT GIVENCHY

SUIT DIOR HOMME, PULLOVER CHRISTIAN DADA

SHIRT OFF-WHITE, COAT ACNE STUDIOS

ALL CHRISTIAN DADA

SUIT GIVENCHY

SHIRT ZEGNA, JACKET ACNE STUDIOS, PANTS OFF-WHITE

TRENCH LOUIS VUITTON

ALL CHRISTIAN DADA

SHIRT ZEGNA, JACKET ACNE STUDIOS, PANTS OFF-WHITE

TRENCH LOUIS VUITTON

ALL CHRISTIAN DADA

SHIRT MAISON MARGIELA

SUIT DIOR HOMME, SHOES MAISON MARGIELA

SHIRT ALEXANDER MCQUEEN, BLAZER MAISON MARGIELA, PANTS ACNE STUDIOS

SHIRT MAISON MARGIELA

SUIT DIOR HOMME, SHOES MAISON MARGIELA

SHIRT ALEXANDER MCQUEEN, BLAZER MAISON MARGIELA, PANTS ACNE STUDIOS

Courting Catharsis Through Chaos GHE20G0TH1K Words Nico Amarca Photography Julien Boudet Styling Airik Henderson Hair Nero Make-Up Seiya Iibuchi Photography Assistant Charles Roussel Models Venus X, Louie Vasquez, Christen Mooney, Zakmatic, LSDXOXO, Arianna Gil & Brytani Studio Not For Them

New York City has long been a hotspot for creative ingenuity. Bolstered by an exceedingly diverse ethnic makeup, endless opportunities to express new ideas, and an insatiable appetite for reinvention, the Big Apple has birthed some of the most eclectic and influential subcultural movements the world has ever seen. While the internet has played a pivotal role in diminishing the exclusivity affiliated with niche tastes and aesthetics, there exists a tribe in NY that continues to provide a pulse for the city’s thriving underground scene: GHE20G0TH1K. Launched in 2009 as a local club night by DJ and Manhattan native Venus X, the project has since turned into a globally-recognized institution hellbent on crushing fashion and music stereotypes — and looking damned good doing it.

152

153

152

153

SHIRT HOOD BY AIR, BUCKET HAT GUCCI, GLOVES PURPLE PASSION

Upon scrolling down your Facebook feed, you come across an event flyer bearing ominous biohazard symbols, Fraser spiral patterns, bold-lettered typography, evil clown illustrations, and a DJ roster laden with names so arcane they’d make a search engine self-destruct. Interest piqued, you order an Uber and type in the party’s location, which appears to be a warehouse nestled somewhere off the beaten path in Brooklyn, New York. After multiple quarrels with your driver over which route is quickest, you ultimately arrive and halt before a queue comprised of characters more diverse than a costume display at your local Halloween pop-up store.

SHIRT LUAR

Face tattoos, Buffalo platforms, chokers, bondage trousers, Marilyn Manson T-shirts, lime green braids, blinged-out gold name chains and head-to-toe Hood By Air. You walk inside to a scene reigned by chaos and mutability. Dark rap, Jersey club, ballroom, industrial, nu-metal, dancehall, grime, reggaeton, baile funk and Aaliyah all rammed into each other at frenetic cadence. Vogueing, shuffling, dabbing, twerking. Welcome to GHE20G0TH1K. From the people that crowd its dance floor to the fusillade of music that penetrates through its speakers to the irregular spelling of its name, nothing about GHE20G0TH1K (pronounced “Ghetto Gothic”) is conformist. Launched in 2009 by Manhattan native Jazmin Venus Soto, more widely known as Venus X, the party began as a space to funnel aggression through dark sonics and visceral dancing, in addition to altering the notion of goth being an exclusively Caucasian subculture.

SWEATER JUST CAVALLI, TROUSERS MARCELO BURLON COUNTY OF MILAN, BOOTS HOOD BY AIR,

154

RINGS, BRACELET & EARCUFF CHRIS HABANA, NECKLACE NASTY PIG

SHIRT HOOD BY AIR, BUCKET HAT GUCCI, GLOVES PURPLE PASSION

SHIRT LUAR

SWEATER JUST CAVALLI, TROUSERS MARCELO BURLON COUNTY OF MILAN, BOOTS HOOD BY AIR,

154

RINGS, BRACELET & EARCUFF CHRIS HABANA, NECKLACE NASTY PIG

“I was a 23-year-old college student at the time and was going to a lot of punk and goth shows,” Venus briefed. “I just started learning how to DJ and my first gig was at this bar that my boyfriend at the time worked at. He gave me a night to play and I called it ‘Death Wish’ and it was billed as a ‘ghetto gothic’ party, but inspired by ’80s goth rock band Christian Death.”

“ I think what we mostly wanted was a place to party where all of our cool friends who were listening to a very specific, weird range of music from the internet could come to and hang out in, because we didn’t really have a place to go.” What’s traditionally viewed as goth stems from a subculture that originated in England during the early 1980s, an offshoot of post-punk defined by macabre aesthetics, gloomy lyrics and black clothing. Though broad in what musical styles it encompasses, goth, in the old school sense, isn’t commonly known for its diverse membership. But Venus and her pan-ethnic clan of like-minded misfits would soon shatter this white-washed illusion of what goth is, expanding the subculture to include a whole new community and breathing new life into its definition. “Me and my friends were listening to a lot of juke music, Three 6 Mafia and Memphis rap, which is a very dark subgenre of hiphop. I was like, ‘This is so goth!’ Or, at least, I thought it was just as goth as the type of music being played at the parties I was religiously going to, which only played Joy Division, The Cure and Alien Sex Fiend – bands that are considered to be pioneers of what we’ve come to know as gothic music. I also went to a lot of raves, but they really lacked diversity. We definitely wanted to fuck up the assumption of what goth was but also keep it pretty dark.” Together with House of Ladosha’s Adam Radakovich, Venus hopped around several venues before “Death Wish” would eventually morph into “Ghetto Gothic” (later stylized as GHE20G0TH1K), a night that linked her with other genre-bending DJs and producers such as Kingdom and Total Freedom, forming a niche group that heralded a new type of club music open to experimentation and shifting perceptions. “I think what we mostly wanted was a place to party where all of our cool friends who were listening to a very specific, weird range of music from the internet could come to and hang out in, because we didn’t really have a place to go. You don’t just want to live online like kids nowadays and I think there is a difference between playing shows and really cultivating a space for people to come to regularly.”

TRENCH COAT & BOILER SUIT PLANET X, BOOTS DR. MARTENS, SUNGLASSES L.G.R.

VEST KAMIKAZE, LEATHER SHORTS ALEXANDER WANG,

156

TROUSERS MARCELO BURLON COUNTY OF MILAN, ACCESSORIES CHRIS HABANA

157

TRENCH COAT & BOILER SUIT PLANET X, BOOTS DR. MARTENS, SUNGLASSES L.G.R.

VEST KAMIKAZE, LEATHER SHORTS ALEXANDER WANG,

156

TROUSERS MARCELO BURLON COUNTY OF MILAN, ACCESSORIES CHRIS HABANA

157

The manifestation of a physical space to communicate Venus and company’s culled influences would prove key in establishing GHE20G0TH1K as a full-fledged brand, one synonymous with a lifestyle trademark to New York’s thriving underground scene. Music has and continues to be the party’s biggest pull, but the experiential components derived from its bombastic energy have inspired creative feats from other disciplines as well. Shayne Oliver, an early GHE20G0TH1K affiliate and former resident DJ, used the space to launch nascent designs of his local imprint Hood By Air, which has since become a hallmark to the Big Apple’s fashion and music underworld. Los Angelesbased electronic record label and artist collective Fade To Mind have been one of the platform’s first and most fundamental collaborators. Performance artist Boy Child, ballroom label Qween Beat, AraabMuzik, DJ Rashad, Awful Records, A$AP Nast, Divine Council, Kelela and Arca have all dominated the stage at some point during the party’s run. But while GHE20G0TH1K may be a familial institution deeply rooted in New York-centric subculture, its influence hovers over global audiences, too.

SHIRT DRESS HOOD BY AIR, BOOTS PLANET X

“It’s not my story, it’s our story. It’s our platform to tell our own stories which also shift around. Everyone comes with a different background in music and art and is inspired by where they come from. You can hear that in the sets. Some people play more Baltimore club, some people play more reggae, dancehall, grime, techno, etc. We definitely packed the Berlin Biennale back in June, which was awesome because we had longtime supporters of GHE20G0TH1K from the Berlin art world there. We wouldn’t be where we are now without our worldwide community.” Now in its eighth year, Venus has no plans of shortening GHE20G0TH1K’s legacy, expanding its namesake into a record label, a line of clothing merchandise, a pop-up retail space, and regular showcases all over the world. It’s all pretty impressive for a movement that continues to pride itself on an independent mindset and business model, but like any revolution, the vision’s progression is completely dependent on communal input. “The show that I put together is six hours long and I’m involved in it, but I’m making sure that it happens by bringing new people in all the time to help me produce it. It’s much bigger than me and that makes it important. It’s about a space that we’re trying to make and everyone knows when to fall back and when to fall in and give their part so that we can have a healthy relationship for the work we do. We work very hard, but working together isn’t the hard part; traveling, dealing with bad promoters and getting resources are hard. GHE20G0TH1K is second nature to me as well as all the insane artists who make up its core.”

158

[ZAKMATIC] T-SHIRT GHE20G0TH1K, COAT GUCCI, MESH SLEEVES STYLIST STUDIO, TROUSERS & DOG LEASH NECKLACE MODEL’S OWN, BOOTS HOOD BY AIR, EARRINGS CHRIS HABANA [BRYTANI] CORSET MODEL’S OWN, DRESS NO. 21, BOOTS PLANET X, CHOKER PURPLE PASSION

159

SHIRT DRESS HOOD BY AIR, BOOTS PLANET X

158

159

Yonder Photography Eva Al Desnudo Styling Harry Fisher Hair Chloe Elise using Maria Nila Make-Up Ibi Molnar using MAC Cosmetics Shibari Artist Fred Hatt @ Anatomie Studio Model Sarah Sayuri Hare

T-SHIRT & PANTS XANDER ZHOU

ALL MARTA JAKUBOWSKI

Yonder Photography Eva Al Desnudo Styling Harry Fisher Hair Chloe Elise using Maria Nila Make-Up Ibi Molnar using MAC Cosmetics Shibari Artist Fred Hatt @ Anatomie Studio Model Sarah Sayuri Hare

T-SHIRT & PANTS XANDER ZHOU

ALL MARTA JAKUBOWSKI

T-SHIRT & DRESS ALYX STUDIO

ALL PAULA KNORR

T-SHIRT & DRESS ALYX STUDIO

ALL PAULA KNORR

T-SHIRT MARTINE ROSE, PANTS ARIES

EARRING PIETER

ALL ARIES

T-SHIRT MARTINE ROSE, PANTS ARIES

EARRING PIETER

ALL ARIES

Eagles Become Vultures: Notes on Skateboarding, Metal & Fashion Words Gregk Foley Illustrations Clara Lacy

In the following piece I talk about a number of musical genres and their respective artists in the context of contemporary fashion trends. To categorize and clarify the genre of each artist mentioned would be a complex task worthy of an entirely separate article. Some bands are metal, others are punk, and many others occupy the vast and complex space in between. With this in mind, I use the terms “punk” and “metal” as placeholders for a number of subgenres within a broad and diverse area of music. Toward the end of 2014 I remember reading an interview in Complex with Lev Tanju, founder of cult British skate brand Palace, about his thoughts on the acceptance of skateboarding into fashion, music and mainstream culture. His response was ambivalent, at best: ‘Skating’s blown up in London, definitely, because it’s been so many years since it was not a cool thing to do. Now fucking rappers are doing it, everybody wants to do it. […] It wasn’t cool when I started skating. No one skated in London to be cool; you just got laughed at or bottles thrown at you. Guys outside pubs and stuff. If you got on the train at like 11 o’clock, or walked through Croydon—I got a bottle smashed on my back when I was like 17. The guy was like, “What you doing, you idiot?” […] They didn’t love skaters when I was young.’ From a personal perspective, I can relate. Back in the early 2000s if you wanted to skate in my hometown, you were best off staying at the skate park. Trips into the center to skate street or, god forbid, just buy some lunch, devolved all too often into an obstacle course of kids throwing things under your wheels, “accidentally” knocking you off your board and, of course,

166

shouting the lyrics to “Sk8er Boi” by Avril Lavigne and playing air guitar. The impressive part was how well they knew the lyrics, but I digress. Tanju’s perspective is spot on; while the States had the buffer of a fully-fledged “extreme sports” industry they could retreat to, complete with big name brands, celebrities, national events and the like, the UK scene was still very much on the outside of public acceptance. I don’t think Tanju was necessarily unhappy about him and his mates finally being recognized and celebrated for what they do. In one of the earliest video interviews I saw with him on i-D, he summed up his aspirations with Palace as wanting to make enough money to be able to just pay his friends to skate all day and not have to worry about anything else. Filling the brand rolodex with the likes of adidas Originals, Reebok, Dover Street Market and a slew of Instagram-savvy celebrities can’t have been a bad thing in this regard. But perhaps it just feels strange, having been considered an outcast for so long, to suddenly have guys who wouldn’t have pissed on you if you were on fire in your younger days suddenly coming into your store to buy Tri-Ferg tees and nylon shell-suits. Satisfying, no doubt, but strange nonetheless.

167

Eagles Become Vultures: Notes on Skateboarding, Metal & Fashion Words Gregk Foley Illustrations Clara Lacy

166

167

When I was 14, long before I discovered streetwear forums and a disposable income, I was big into music: death metal, hardcore, grindcore, thrash, mathcore, post-hardcore — any other genre with “core” in its name. If it was loud and angry, I was into it. The scene’s local “hub” was an hour train ride away in Brighton, where I spent most of my weekends and time off school. At the eastern entrance to Churchill Square, the city’s main shopping center, there was a Borders bookshop, known affectionately as the “Borders Lot,” where loads of the metalheads, scene kids, hardcore kids, emos and general misfits would congregate on a near-enough daily basis. I’m not really sure how Borders came to be the place that we hung out — we definitely weren’t there for the books. It was more a central location with all the essentials close by — off-licenses and McDonald’s, mainly. At this time, around 2005, Brighton was a hot spot in the UK metal scene, birthing a number of notable bands such as Architects, Johnny Truant, Dead Swans, The Ghost of a Thousand and Centurion. While the fundamental catalyst of the scene’s growth was obviously the music, a lot of the energy and buzz could arguably be attributed to MySpace, as the at-the-time revolutionary platform offered one of the best ways to discover new music, via the MySpace music player. All of this then fed into a much larger social media network that formed the central hub to most of our daily lives, birthing everything from Big Cartel T-shirt and jewelry stores, to novice web-coding “businesses” that would create custom profiles for a fee, to genuine MySpace celebrities — if you were on MySpace during that time, you knew all about Tila Tequila and Jeffree Star, whether you liked it or not. Thanks to this perfect storm of auditory and social connectivity, Brighton was blessed with a passionate, energized music scene, and an on-and-offline community that was constantly plugged in to what was going on in the local area — because if all your friends were going to the show on Friday, obviously you were going to be there too. Brighton played host to some of the metal scene’s biggest names, performing at comparatively intimate venues like The Freebutt, Engine Rooms and Pressure Point. The largest venue, Concorde 2, dwarfed the other places and was still only around 500 capacity, so these were shows where you could genuinely look the band members in the whites of their eyes. Needless to say, the Borders Lot crowd was always in heavy attendance, as were familiar faces from nearby towns. Each of these towns had their own regional scene as well, so kids from Brighton, Guildford, Worthing, Tunbridge Wells, London and Epsom were constantly connecting through shows, then taking road trips to hang out and so on. Metal has long been considered a scene generally outside of the mainstream, and with good cause. In my experience, our scene was never that interested in acceptance — at least not by the kids playing rugby and wearing Abercrombie & Fitch at the time. And fashion, with its fundamental dichotomies of success

and failure, acceptance and rejection, trendy and dated, is sometimes seen as the antithesis of what the metal/punk scene stands for. The vast majority of us were kids that really didn’t fit in elsewhere: at school, in our local neighborhood, or on the sports teams. When we came together, it was in a collective spirit more of knowing what we weren’t than what we were. How to feel about the developments in music and fashion over the past year, then? Kanye West, Travis Scott, Rihanna, and Justin Bieber all released tour merchandise in 2016 that leaned heavily on classic metal and punk aesthetics. Bieber’s was accompanied by a tour wardrobe designed by Jerry Lorenzo of Fear of God, repurposing (accept the pun) original merchandise by the likes of Marilyn Manson and Metallica with screen-printed overlays of Bieber’s name. Beyond this, Lorenzo released a collaborative collection with U.S. retailer PacSun which riffed heavily on Metallica merchandise and classic metalhead style, while another collaboration with luxury Japanese fashion label mastermind JAPAN offered the very same concept at a much higher price point. The immediate reaction might be one of frustration. Certainly, comment sections across the web have been littered with criticisms of the fashion world stripping assets from yet another subculture in service of a seasonal trend. In Lorenzo’s defense, he did enlist Mark Riddick, one of the underground metal scene’s most respected artists, to assist with creating the Purpose Tour artwork. But it only takes a glance to see that the designs Riddick created for Bieber are severely watered down compared to his work for Morbid Angel or Suicide Silence. And to be frank, when a star as mainstream as Justin Bieber co-opts the identity of Marilyn Manson — a musician whose entire career is characterized by shock, disgust and middle-class outrage — to sell merchandise, it’s hard not to feel your bile rising. After all, Manson’s moniker fuses the name of America’s sweetheart, Marilyn Monroe, with one of the nation’s most notorious murderers, Charles Manson. Comparatively, Bieber is all Marilyn, no Manson. But then again, every time this argument comes up it reinstates a false paradigm of difference — one that places subculture and creativity at one end of the scale and fashion at the other. And while it’s true that metal has always seen itself as outside of the fashion world, anyone who says it has nothing to do with fashion at all is lying to you, or themselves. Back to the Brighton Borders Lot. When we congregated at Churchill Square, there was certainly a dress code. General consensus dictated that you had to get your skinny jeans from the women’s section of any high-street store, as the men’s offering either wasn’t tight enough, or stretched out after a couple of washes. Likewise, everyone agreed the best hoodies came from American Apparel. There was one particular point where every person I knew had the “Salt & Pepper” grey zip-up with the white shoelace. When H&M released their imitation a year later, it was derided as inferior.

168

Then you had camo, a pattern that was originally embraced by the hardcore scene years earlier but trickled down to the metal and emo kids of the era. Dirty Harry down on Sydney Street always had a healthy stock of army surplus cargo shorts for £15, even if the buttons did fall off after three days. Those were your basic style commandments, though there were always seasonal trends, from studded belts and New Era caps to black Vans Authentics and beanies, to City & Colouresque plaid shirts. As is the case with most subcultures, though we might not have always had money, we always looked good. What really separated the wheat from the chaff, though, were the T-shirts. Available in any color you want, as long as it’s black, band T-shirts were the universal signifier in the scene. Internet shopping was still in its infancy, and even then most of us didn’t have access to credit cards — or parents who trusted the concept of buying stuff over the web. If you wanted a particular band’s T-shirt, you waited until they came to town, you went to the show and you bought a T-shirt. Even if that meant forgoing the bottle of Frosty Jack’s you’d normally down 20 minutes beforehand. Long before screen-printing became vogue through the DIY-streetwear brands and metropolitan creatives of the late ’00s, a small group of creatives, including London-based illustrator Dan Mumford, were effectively crafting an entire scene’s design aesthetic with their T-shirts and album cover art. And in the same way the brand names and logos of today each hold a certain position in the hierarchy of street fashion — from the irreverent skate logos of Supreme and Palace to the “upper echelon” graphics of HBA and Vetements — band T-shirts were a big fucking deal. And again, there was a pursuit of bands that were simultaneously big, but niche. In the same way that wearing a particular brand tells people how well-read you are in the world of fashion, band T-shirts carried a weight of semiology about your knowledge of the scene. Of course you had a Suicide Silence T-shirt — everybody did — but what about The Acacia Strain, Despised Icon or Whitechapel? Yes, there were always the few that could order a T-shirt from some American web store and pay the $30 USD shipping and £15 VAT and import duty, but you knew every time they wore it out they lied to you about where they got it. Because who in our scene would genuinely pay £40 for a T-shirt when they were selling at shows for a tenner? When my favorite band Daughters finally played at the Engine Rooms, getting ahold of the merch was a huge deal — so much so that a friend nicked one of the screen-printed posters in the venue window and gave it to me at a later date. What I’m trying to say, or at least figure out from my own experience, is that the “metal” scene I grew up in always had elements of fashion and style close to its heart. In a recent

interview, I asked Jammer of Boy Better Know how it felt to see grime being embraced by fashion, and his reply was perfect: they were always one and the same. Everybody in the grime scene had to look good or people wouldn’t pay attention. Fuck what the people outside the scene think; in your clique, you have to look authentic, whatever that might mean. The reason grime is so distinctive now, both in style and sound, is because the guys creating it never moved too far from their roots. They always knew they looked good — the rest of us just caught up. This sentiment also sheds light on a certain aspect of culture that’s easy to forget; it’s intangible. Though we talk about genres of music or subcultural cliques in a very personal way, practically cradling them in our arms and trying to protect them from the questionable intentions of outsiders, we both forget and reveal the essential nature of how these things work. Every culture, be it metal, skateboarding, hip-hop, country music, graffiti or whatever else, is carried by the people who live and breathe it every day. Though each might have its particular tropes and signifiers to communicate an identity to both insiders and outsiders, it’s always the act itself that keeps these cultures moving. And it’s the commitment to a culture’s authenticity that eventually creates a legend. Skateboarding has been a really admirable example in this regard; no matter how holier-than-thou people act about nonskaters wearing Supreme, most genuine skaters couldn’t really give a shit. Because being a skater has nothing to do with wearing Supreme. It’s about skating. Do you skate? No? Then you’re not a skater, so enjoy your box logo hoodie, but kindly fuck off. That congruence between image and act is as important in the metal scene as it is anywhere else. A band like Slipknot, starting from a corny premise of masks, jumpsuits and numbers, can sell millions of records, go on numerous world tours, and do all that other “big band” stuff while still being respected by the core of their scene because they back it up with insane live shows that validate the raw, brutal, rage-filled aesthetic those costumes imply. Maybe this explains the problem that insiders feel when they see some aspect of their culture appropriated by an outsider. The act itself reveals the inauthenticity by inherently lifting the aesthetic without any supportive action. When Supreme announced their collaboration with Black Sabbath, or Slayer, or Raymond Pettibon, it energized me to go back and listen to my favorite records. There’s some touch of authenticity, and there are credible connections between metal and skateboarding culture. When I look at Jerry Lorenzo’s appropriation of classic band T-shirts, or Justin Bieber’s faux-metal merch, I don’t really feel anything at all. There’s no soul, no substance, no energy. I get the impression that if I were to touch it, it would just burst like a balloon. All aesthetic, no action.

170

When you’ve thrown yourself around dirty basement venues week after week until your clothes are dripping with sweat and your ears are relentlessly ringing, a slightly modified, severely overpriced band T-shirt presented as “fashion” just feels wrong. Once I’d had that feeling, I felt a wave of understanding about the countless other subcultures, groups and people that have felt the same thing, often for much more significant reasons than “but that’s my favorite band.” As we grow up, our interests expand and we leave some of the tribalism of our teenage years behind. But when it comes to identity, respect for the identity of others is often just as important as the protection of your own. When people discover a new genre of music or style and immerse themselves in it, take the time to educate themselves, and commit even a small amount of energy to authentic understanding — it’s great. But hollow, superficial consumption that feeds nothing but the self? It never plays out well, whether you notice it or not. Metal was, and still is, a movement that was driven by the outcasts — people who didn’t fit in elsewhere, validating and celebrating themselves. Even if you go back and watch Jeff Krulik and John Heyn’s 1986 documentary, Heavy Metal Parking Lot, it’s abundantly clear that hanging out, being together and looking good has always been as much a part of metal as it has any other movement. That the metal scene has a love-hate relationship with fashion is a different argument. Still, I imagine if you told any of the headbangers from Krulik and Heyn’s film that their look would become a mainstream fashion trend three decades later, they’d likely think you were out of your mind (and then not so kindly, tell you to fuck off). Returning to Palace Skateboards, I sometimes wonder if there wasn’t something very clever about what Lev Tanju did in pushing such a raw, unfiltered, British skateboarding style with his brand, as the problem with the outsider’s view of skateboarding in the UK was that it stereotypically erased the complexities and nuances of the scene. For example, Lev and his mates grew up wearing tracksuits and Nike trainers like the other kids, but the British mainstream completely ignored the idea that poor kids from estates could be skateboarding in “road” looks, viewing the scene through tired, clichés of baggy jeans, World Industries hoodies, long hair, wallet chains and whatever else. When the UK finally wanted to buy into skateboarding, Lev said, “Fine, but you buy our skateboarding, the way we really do it.” To me it feels like there’s something quite subversive about a group of skaters selling tracksuits and Reebok Classics to consumers who probably always thought of that style as their own. The greatest styles and subcultures are so often born out of adversity and struggle, and though Palace is certainly a driving

force in contemporary streetwear right now, it’s also firmly rooted in an original style that was there simply because it was. Maybe the metal scene needs something similar. Someone who gets the culture and remembers our stories, and can use that knowledge to create an authentic and credible retelling of that particular point in time. I never thought I’d find myself writing about the Borders Lot in print, but when I told a couple of old friends that I was writing an article about the Engine Rooms and MySpace, they all had a story to tell. Likewise, every time I write something about one of my old favorite bands, dozens of designers and stylists appear out of nowhere to tell me how they used to love that band too. Yet for one reason or another, so many of us seem to hide that love once we grow up — and start listening to minimal house and drinking flat whites and talking about Jamie xx’s latest album.

“There was such a strict dress code for what made you legit back then, and it couldn’t be faked… You either knew or you didn’t, which made the whole thing that little bit more authentic.” But why? Of course our teenage years were sometimes cringe-worthy. That’s what being a teenager is all about! I might not wear women’s jeans and extra-small clothes anymore, but to act like I didn’t walk around back then thinking I was the coolest guy out there? No. We always had style. It was weird, fucked up and completely our own. And as for separating the real from the fakes, I’ll paraphrase a friend of mine in a recent conversation: “There was a fine balance of looking like you tried too hard with all the merch, but keeping it natural. You had to own the Dead Swans hoodie, but not the reprint. The original, faded version. You had a black snapback, but it was either a vintage one from To Be Worn Again or an American Nightmare one you copped on eBay. There was such a strict dress code for what made you legit back then, and it couldn’t be faked. You couldn’t join a Facebook group or look it up on Google. You either knew or you didn’t, which made the whole thing that little bit more authentic.” Jerry Lorenzo can go ahead and charge $500 for an original Nirvana T-shirt with a superfluous print over the top. We’ll still be at the actual Converge and Kowloon Walled City shows paying £20. And we’ll be fine.

171

170

171

Why MACHINE - A Is London’s Riskiest Retailer Stavros Karelis Words Nico Amarca Photography Eva Al Desnudo Special Thanks SHOWStudio

Nestled between a hair salon and holistic wellness shop on Brewer Street in London’s Soho district is a 600-square-foot boutique called MACHINE-A, a space anchored by some of the most established designers in the industry, along with brands whose names have only thus far been uttered within the confines of a university design studio. Launched in 2009 by a man, Stavros Karelis, whose thirst for outré fashion would far outgrow the small Greek island of Crete he formerly called home, MACHINE-A, at the time, embarked on a concept that no other London retailer even dared to consider.

172

173

Why MACHINE - A Is London’s Riskiest Retailer Stavros Karelis Words Nico Amarca Photography Eva Al Desnudo Special Thanks SHOWStudio

172

173

By tapping into the British capital’s renowned yet seldom-supported pool of emerging design talent, Stavros, with the help of stylist Anna Trevelyan, created an institution that eager-eyed graduate students could flock to with hopes of stocking their collections next to iconic names like Margiela, Raf Simons or Yohji Yamamoto. It’s with this very democratic approach, tied with a shrewdness for predicting the designers of tomorrow, that MACHINE-A has been able to provide a much-needed jolt of creative energy to London’s city center, making it one of the most respected and important independent retailers in the world. I spoke with Stavros to find out more about how the store has been able to maintain its success, what risks are involved with supporting young brands, and how London’s current sociopolitical climate will affect the city’s creative landscape. How did you come up with the name, MACHINE-A? I’ve always been in love with Bauhaus and I was reading quite a lot about various art movements and how they influenced all different generations of people. I eventually came across a movement called “Machine Aesthetics,” and the word “machine” really struck me as something very strong and it also fit with my working ethos – always being on a constant drive to create and make things happen. Then I started thinking about the alphabet and the letter “A” came to me because it’s the beginning of it all; it really tied with our whole practice of welcoming new designers who are, in a sense, beginning their careers with us. What gap were you looking to fill in London’s retail landscape when you first opened MACHINE-A? A few years ago, no retailers were paying much attention to graduate or emerging designers; the bigger stores didn’t think they were important enough to focus on and there weren’t so many independent boutiques around either. There was a big void in the market, I thought. We created MACHINE-A as a space where all of these young creatives could express themselves, show their collections to other people, and have the opportunity to sell their designs. From the beginning, my intention with the store was for people to discover these new designers next to really big ones. Obviously the lesserknown brands are thrilled to have their stuff shown next to guys like Raf Simons and Rick Owens, but the big guys were really keen on the idea as well. It’s all about everyone supporting one another in the end. Why do you think many retailers are hesitant to bring on new brands? When you think about it financially, it’s a big risk to take on someone who’s at such an elementary level because they have little familiarity with production, facilities, delivery times, fabrics, etc. I’ve seen many cases where extremely talented designers have all the potential to become successful with their brands, but because they’ve never sold anything, they struggle with the business side of things and unfortunately crash because they cannot deliver to the stores. Also, when you’re a buyer with a fixed budget, you have certain commitments to make with brands you’ve already been working with, so altering your budget to take on brands that no one’s ever heard of isn’t something many retailers are willing to do. I think things are changing nowadays because customers are looking more and more into brands that are different from what’s already big in the market, but it was definitely a big deal for us to do this back then. What do you generally look for when you bring on new talent into the MACHINE-A family? We like fashion that is different and unique, but we also value a good work ethic. Whenever I’m interested in a collection, I always meet with the designer so that I can decipher whether or not they’re capable of producing and fulfilling orders with delivery times and such. I understand the challenges and try to work with them as much as possible to make sure they’re able to fulfill their requirements. I can usually sense from the beginning when the relationship is right and we’ve been fortunate enough to work with designers who’ve gone on to become really successful. When it comes to fashion design, many people argue that the role of university is obsolete. Do you think that degrees still matter in a time when many designers are finding success through DIY methods? For me, what’s most important about pursuing a degree is the discipline it gives you. It’s not just about skills, because those can be learned anywhere, but what university does is prepare you for what you’ll encounter once you’re doing it on your own. It places that pressure to deliver under strict deadlines, which is the reality once you graduate.

174

175

174

175

What traits define a typical MACHINE-A customer? I think the traits vary. At the moment we have over 40 brands in stock and there aren’t really any specific categories we can put our customers in. We have brands like Gosha Rubchinskiy, Cottweiler and Martine Rose which generally attract the more streetwear-minded customers, but then we have designers like Raf Simons and Craig Green which the more avant-garde dressers (as well as the streetwear ones) like to buy. I do think that our customers have a really sharp understanding of trend behavior and know what’s cool now. They have a really good eye. Though it does have a very global appeal, the vibe of MACHINE-A when you walk in is still very London. How much of the store mirrors the city’s style DNA? I’m really glad you said that because I always get asked if I would ever consider opening MACHINE-A in another country, but I always say that the store has a very London character, so it wouldn’t really be MACHINE-A if were located somewhere else! The way that the store is set up, from the brand selection to the presentation, is very London. It’s because we all live in London and we try to capture the best parts of the city through the store. The ratio between British and international brands at MACHINE-A is actually very balanced, but the selection is what makes it representative of the London market. Has the store been affected by the city’s growing political and social shift? I’ve lived in London for 10 years now and of course I’ve noticed a difference, but the changes haven’t affected us too much. It’s definitely more difficult for young creatives to survive in London because of how expensive it is, so I totally understand why people are leaving to do their work in cheaper cities. But London has always been an extremely important place for people to create, so, in that sense, the market hasn’t changed too much. The whole idea of being in London along with the city’s renowned universities is a big pull for many, and it’s still a great place to be. Of course Brexit is a very scary thing and I hope it doesn’t have a dramatic effect on other people’s ability to move or stay here, because that would be a terrible loss. I’m a member of few committees, including NEWGEN with the British Fashion Council, and we’re always trying to find new ways to make it affordable for these young creatives to pursue their dreams in London and be able to stay. The city wouldn’t be anything without its creative energy! London has been the birthplace for many influential subcultures, many of whose style elements can be found in a number of brands stocked at MACHINE-A. Do you think that genuine subcultural movements are still happening? I think that different subcultures have been happening throughout the years, but they don’t really have much longevity; they tend to die once they become too popular. But that’s just how society works now! If you bring it back to what we do in terms of fashion, designers are constantly getting inspired by subcultures and sometimes they begin from there. Today, because many new subcultures are so small, we don’t really pay attention to them or even know they exist. But eventually word gets out and all it takes is for one big brand or influencer to discover it and then it becomes commercialized. From a buyer’s perspective, what still needs improvement in the fashion industry? This is a bit of a contradiction on my part, but I wish things would slow down a bit so that we could enjoy and appreciate the product and idea a bit longer. I think that we’re moving at an extremely fast rate where things don’t really sink in fully, so many amazing collections and concepts are given very brief attention before we all move on to the next thing. I’d also like for things to be a tad less consumerist. I’m a strong believer in buying less in exchange for quality and for people to think a bit more about what they want to wear and build a connection with fashion instead of disposable purchasing. What’s the biggest satisfaction you get having created MACHINE-A? I’ve been fortunate in being able to work with some truly amazing people, from Nick Knight and SHOWstudio to Slam Jam and my team at the store. We dealt with a lot of criticism when we first started because many people thought that the idea was too niche to be successful. So with experience, we’ve learned how to make everything work in a way where everyone is happy in the end. It’s so rewarding when you see a designer that you’ve supported since graduate school achieve great success, because that’s really what it’s about when it comes down to it. We should all be supportive of each other no matter what field we work in.

176

177

176

177

S/S

Ottolinger

ASH Photography Stephanie Pfaender Styling Dogukan Nesanir Hair Joe Burwin Make-Up Susanna Jonas Styling Assistant Jeanne-Agne Wagne Production Fania Folaji Model Magali Rau @ Girls Club Management

2017

S/S

Ottolinger

ASH Photography Stephanie Pfaender Styling Dogukan Nesanir Hair Joe Burwin Make-Up Susanna Jonas Styling Assistant Jeanne-Agne Wagne Production Fania Folaji Model Magali Rau @ Girls Club Management

2017

The Hunger Steady Grows — Big Sean Words Stephanie Smith-Strickland

Photography Assistant Bryan Luna

Photography Thomas Welch

Styling Assistant Rashied Black

Styling Jenny Haapala

Special Thanks Opening Ceremony & Gentry

BUTTON-UP DSQUARED2 HOODIE & PANTS AIMÉ LEON DORE JEWELRY TALENT’S OWN

The Hunger Steady Grows — Big Sean Words Stephanie Smith-Strickland

Photography Assistant Bryan Luna

Photography Thomas Welch

Styling Assistant Rashied Black

Styling Jenny Haapala

Special Thanks Opening Ceremony & Gentry

BUTTON-UP DSQUARED2 HOODIE & PANTS AIMÉ LEON DORE JEWELRY TALENT’S OWN

BUTTON-UP DSQUARED2 HOODIE & PANTS AIMÉ LEON DORE SOCKS SUPREME SHOES CASBIA JEWELRY TALENT’S OWN

The conquering underdog archetype is tailored to hip-hop’s visceral emotional range with the same precision as a madeto-measure Savile Row suit destined for a James Bond film. “You counted me out and I came back better than ever” is a recurring sentiment that is older than the genesis of hip-hop itself, though contemporary rappers seem to have perfected the “started from the bottom, now we’re here” narrative. Few recent projects have channeled an attitude of righteous reprisal and ultimate triumph in as vehement a manner as Big Sean’s fourth studio album, I Decided. It’s another step in the evolution of the Detroit talent — a definitive statement from a relatable dark horse who has finally won the race. “I try to meditate on a daily basis. Sometimes I don’t get a chance because I’m running as soon as I wake up but it’s definitely a way I lift my mood and stay connected to my spiritual self,” says Big Sean with no trace of pretension. The practice isn’t driven by New Age mysticism or the modern appropriation of some obscure ancient religion turned West Coast fad, or even legal complications that miraculously led to a flashbang moment of clarity, as fellow celebrities like Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and others have conveniently experienced. For Sean, the goal is to momentarily mute the demands of a fast-paced life and find a fleeting sliver of normality. Home — a familiar bed worn in from nightly use, the monotony of a daily routine, even a scant few moments of personal time — has become a foreign concept for Sean ever since he catapulted from voraciously determined Detroit teen to finally famous; the upgraded state of being the rapper joyfully reveled in on his debut studio album of the same name. Sacrifice and feeling underestimated, on the other hand, have become habitual, almost even ritualistic in their correlation with Sean’s success. Both are themes he’s revisited often, communicating the relationship between sacrifice, success and loss in lyrics that chart the spectrum of human emotion. In “Once Bitten Twice Shy” he laments that life has become too hectic to visit his beloved grandmother, stating, “Man I miss my grandma, she ain’t passed away or nothin’ I’m just busy on camera / I love her, I love her, I should call her up and tell her.” While it’s a simple enough admission, crafted into a rudimentary enough verse, there’s a naked sensitivity that’s a departure from the braggadocio and pageantry of today’s popular rap music. Similarly, “Blessings” revisits the recurring idea that fame seems to find a way to insidiously fracture even the most intimate relationships. “This is that late night working after three, man / This is why my old girl was mad at me / This is why I’m your majesty, man,” Sean raps before revealing, “My grandma just died, I’m the man of the house / So every morning I’m up because I can’t let them down, down.” The overarching theme of divine favoritism tempers the song’s mercurial production while the lyrics embody the kind of difficult but ultimately relatable decisions that make Sean accessible to such a diverse fanbase. “I pledged to put my life experiences, my successes and ‘quote, unquote’ failures, and just anything I’m going through, on the line. That’s what people relate to and I feel like. I hope it helps them out. I hope they can listen to my music and take something from it in times where inspiration is needed,” says Sean.

BUTTON-UP DSQUARED2 HOODIE & PANTS AIMÉ LEON DORE SOCKS SUPREME SHOES CASBIA JEWELRY TALENT’S OWN

TRACKSUIT SWEATER PERRY ELLIS PUFFER SCARF OPENING CEREMONY GLASSES RETROSUPERFUTURE

Big Sean’s music doesn’t necessarily offer the kind of complex metaphor and meticulous storytelling of Kendrick Lamar, or the irresistible, trap-centric pull of 808s, snares and energetic ad libs that Migos have made their own. Instead it hits a more universal note — that of the regular guy who finally made good. There’s certainly still a healthy dose of the standard flexing, but that’s to be expected. Mentions of gluteally blessed women, expensive jewelry, designer clothing and taking care of the day-one crew are as standard as avocado toast is to a Williamsburg brunch menu. Despite buying into more than a few common rap tropes, Sean still manages to maintain a down-to-earthness and affable quality that is reachable. “I got the streets and I don’t got no felonies,” he peacocks on “Sacrifices,” casually offering an alternative to the presiding narrative of rappers engaging with the streets in the context of survival, violence, respect, money, power, or a conflation of all of those things. This ability to channel popular ideas in what mainstream America often still refers to as “urban” music, and repackage them in a way that doesn’t feel too niche, or make protective suburban mothers feel leery, is a skill that many of his peers simply don’t possess. When Sean discusses heartbreak, or working more than he sleeps, or even missing his family, it feels a bit banal in its normality. Yet that is what makes his role as a self-proclaimed underdog feel so universal. He didn’t segue from starring on a major television show straight into the rap business like Drake. He didn’t get shot nine times and then drive himself to a hospital, forever cementing his street credibility and fearlessness like 50 Cent. Instead, he was just a normal, hard-working, clever teenager from Detroit, who, through equal parts determination and luck, caught the eye of a music mogul. We’d all like to think that could happen to anyone, and therein lies Big Sean’s appeal. Sean Michael Leonard Anderson was born March 25, 1988, in Santa Monica, California to James Leonard and Myra Anderson. When he was only two months old, his family relocated to Detroit, Michigan, a city that would shape the young performer’s worldview and eventually put him in front of his future mentor, Kanye West. Raised by his schoolteacher mother and grandmother, on the city’s beleaguered West Side, Sean’s childhood was underpinned by a familial commitment to education. From kindergarten through eighth grade he attended Detroit Waldorf, one of the best schools in the city, and the only remaining independently private academy left in Detroit today. He then went on to enroll in Cass Technical High School where he graduated with a 3.7 GPA. Like many college prep academies, Cass offered a strenuous, personalized curriculum and an admission system predicated on test scores and grades, rather than neighborhood stratification. Perhaps a testament to the success of the high school’s music program is that Sean is only one of many notable alumnus — Diana Ross, Alice Coltrane, Lily Tomlin and Jack White were all Cass students. Still, when it comes to musicians, artists and others of the creative ilk, there’s often a perception that their minds are so unique, sensitive or misaligned with reality that traditional learning environments are destined to fail them. It’s a mythology that further removes the creators from the non-creators, and implies that your favorite artist occupies a special world that others cannot access. Kanye West’s now-iconic debut album, The College Dropout flirts with these themes, something that stands in stark opposition to Sean’s own ethos — he has credited much of his success to educational opportunities. That he was specifically educated in Detroit’s school system only adds another layer of relatability to the image he’s developed as the inoffensive but scrappy everyman who knew he was destined for greatness. For years the city’s highly publicized struggles with violent crime, under-served public schools, racial tensions, and a crumbling infrastructure have been headline news and fodder for idealistic politicians, as well as informing the music of high school dropout Detroit rappers like Eminem and Danny Brown. Sean’s quiet investment in Detroit, through his eponymous nonprofit which seeks to directly help the city’s education system, is just the kind of thing people want to see from their entertainment idols. It’s a reminder that he too came from humble circumstances, and that he hasn’t forgotten the people who are still there.

TRACKSUIT SWEATER PERRY ELLIS PUFFER SCARF OPENING CEREMONY GLASSES RETROSUPERFUTURE

“The story is kind of a narrative for me; it’s about how I feel and a lot of the things I’ve gone through. A lot of times I do feel like the older me is guiding me. I think that wisdom really helps me progress.”

“Your hometown influences who you are. I feel like Detroit is a city that has been overlooked. It’s a city where people have really had to struggle, but it’s also a city that has seen a lot of success; it’s a place where people are just thankful to get by. Being from Detroit and being black — those two things were big odds for me,” Sean says. “I mean you look at statistics or even what people tell you — it’s like you’re supposed to do one thing or you’re destined to wind up in jail. I remember the first day of school in the assembly they said, ‘Take a look at the person to the left of you, now take a look at the person to the right of you; there’s a 50 percent chance that they won’t be here when you graduate.’” Granted, a doomsday prophecy is not what hundreds of young minds existing in a city that is consistently portrayed as embroiled in crisis need. Still, the memory empowered Sean to consciously make the choice not to be relegated to a mere statistic in the eyes of those around him. He kept busy by securing a position as the host of a hip-hop show on the now-defunct local station WHTD. The job also gave Sean an opportunity to participate in local showcases and battle rap sessions that helped him hone and nimble the one-word punchline style of rap, coined “Supa Dupa” flow, that he has been credited with pioneering. Years later, friendly interactions with Drake and the popularity of the Canadian rapper’s single, “Forever,” (which features a very similar rhyme scheme) lead to much debate about who actually bit whose flow. Ultimately, Drake credited Sean for being one of the first to utilize the “Supa Dupa” style. In a 2010 interview with AllHipHop he said, “To be honest, that flow, you can trace it back to like… I trace it back to Big Sean. That’s the first guy I heard utilize that flow throughout the duration of a verse. I’ll give him that credit. I think Kanye got it from him.” In 2005, only a year after establishing the G.O.O.D. Music label, West made an appearance at 102.7 radio in Detroit. Sean was working in telemarketing at the time but was alerted to West’s presence by friends. He immediately went straight to the station, hoping for a chance to meet one of his favorite rappers. After working up his nerve, Sean says he approached West and asked him to listen to an impromptu freestyle. At first the famously moody “Famous” rapper refused, but eventually he acquiesced and a terrified Sean began to rap, directly to the floor. West would later explain that he wasn’t signing new acts at the time but felt impressed enough with Sean’s raw talent that he accepted his demo tapes, and the two kept in contact. Two years later, in 2007, Sean finally signed to G.O.O.D. Music, joining a roster that was much more robust and less curated than it is today. Though acts like Common, Mr. Hudson, Mos Def, Cyhi the Prynce, John Legend, and Consequence have come and gone, Sean has remained. Since then, the 28-year-old’s career has treated him to more ups and downs than the city of Detroit itself. And all of it has been recorded in the verses of song. Celebrations, deaths, failures, breakups and makeups comprise Sean’s output. So much so, his music tends to hint at, and perhaps sometimes even foreshadow, events in his real life. Finally Famous was a buoyant reflection on making it in the industry after years of hard work and uncertainty. Dark Sky Paradise surprisingly revealed a more acrimonious side of the rapper. Songs like “I Don’t Fuck With You” seemingly took aim at his former fiancee actress Naya Rivera. Similarly, “All Your Fault” references the mediocre performance of his sophomore album, Hall of Fame, the disappointment perhaps being compounded by his breakup with Rivera. “We done made it through hell and disaster / my crib done got bigger / my woman got badder,” gloats a Sean who has returned to confidence and to the dating scene — at the time he had started a new relationship with pop star Ariana Grande.

It’s only natural that I Decided. would bring listeners into another chapter of Sean’s life, one that is no less relatable than what he’s revealed in the past. The album does feel a bit like a final metamorphosis; the last leg of an odyssey where the hero has finally learned to work with the pull of fate rather than against it. Last year, Sean co-founded alt-R&B duo TWENTY88 with his current girlfriend, singer Jhene Aiko. The two worked together on prior projects dating back to Sean’s sophomore album, Hall of Fame. When TWENTY88 was formed, Aiko was still married to producer Dot Da Genius, but after their relationship soured, rumors began to circulate that she and Sean were dating. The resulting social media commotion — tweets and Instagram posts were fired off by both Dot and Aiko — led to accusations of infidelity on both sides. Eventually the drama reached Sean, who had a rather public falling out with former G.O.O.D. Music signee, Kid Cudi, after the Cleveland rapper took to social media to defend longtime friend and collaborator Dot.

“One of the biggest things I’ve learned in life is forgiveness.” The personalized vitriol of Sean’s popular single, “I Don’t Fuck With You,” might lead one to expect some form of retaliation against Cudi; if not for pride reasons, at the very least for the publicity a diss track would undoubtedly garner. However, the markedly more Zen iteration of Sean that appears on I Decided. is at peace with the reality that some relationships are unsalvageable and some rumors just aren’t worth addressing. “One of the biggest things I’ve learned in life is forgiveness,” Sean explains. “Forgiving yourself, forgiving others and not holding on to grudges. It takes energy to hold a grudge, it’s almost like paying a fee for something you don’t really need every month. I also recently read that anything you consider a mistake or a failure is just an opportunity to turn things into something greater. No pun intended but it’s an opportunity to bounce back. That’s one of the themes of the album, even though it did take a while to realize that, and come to the point of looking at everything I’ve done in life, that I thought was a mistake, as a lesson that made me a better person. After I did that my life did adjust for the better though. I was no longer spending valued energy on things that didn’t matter.” “No More Interviews,” a standalone single released in October 2016 seems to be Sean’s last cathartic swipe back at the naysayers, former friends and gossips. “This is my last time putting my ex in a song even though the last one went triple platinum,” raps Sean in reference to singer Ariana Grande whom he dated prior to his relationship with Aiko. He addresses his falling out with Kid Cudi much less dismissively, stating, “What happened to our family ways, though? / When I had put you on that song with Nas, you had told me you was forever grateful / And that we was brothers, so it hurt to hit the internet to find out that me and you don’t fuck with each other / Over a miscommunication that probably could be fixed with a five minute conversation.” “I definitely learned about patience with this album,” Sean says, reflecting on what a life of constant public exposure and feeling underestimated has taught him. “Going through the things that inspired a lot of it, whether it was current, ideas from the past, or things I hadn’t really touched on all the way… I tried to incorporate all of those things. This is my first time making a project with a story, so it’s my first concept album. The story is kind of a narrative for me; it’s about how I feel and a lot of the things I’ve gone through. A lot of times I do feel like the older me is guiding me. I think that wisdom really helps me progress.”

TRACKSUIT SWEATER PERRY ELLIS PUFFER SCARF OPENING CEREMONY WATCH ROLEX

HOODIE OPENING CEREMONY COAT DSQUARED2 JEWELRY TALENT’S OWN

TRACKSUIT SWEATER PERRY ELLIS PUFFER SCARF OPENING CEREMONY WATCH ROLEX

HOODIE OPENING CEREMONY COAT DSQUARED2 JEWELRY TALENT’S OWN

TRACKSUIT SWEATER PERRY ELLIS JACKET AROUND THE WAIST OPENING CEREMONY JEANS DRESS DOWN DAY SHOES AIMÉ LEON DORE PUFFER SCARF OPENING CEREMONY GLASSES RETROSUPERFUTURE

Sean also found that the nomadic lifestyle of touring and back-to-back media appearances could actually have a positive effect on his creative process. “I recorded Dark Sky Paradise in one place but I recorded about 35 to 45 percent of the new album on the road. I think that gave it a different feel and made me approach the songs in a different way. I recorded most of it in Europe, specifically, so being overseas was a different experience for me than recording in America. It was great though. We were in a little eightby-eight room — I’m talking super small to where only about two people could fit in there and you couldn’t even stand straight. We were in the back of the tour bus in this little section we turned into a studio. That’s where I recorded songs like ‘Move’ and worked on ‘Bounce Back,’ ‘Oh Me’ and ‘Inspire Me.’ A lot of the major songs on I Decided. were recorded on the road and I think it made a major difference.” The album is also broken up into four acts. Combined, they tell a complete story of a wasted life, death, rebirth and second chances. “You get the first part of the album with ‘Light’ and ‘Bounce Back’ and ‘No Favors.’ ‘Light’ is when you realize that all you ever needed is inside you. Once you get it right on the inside that’s when everything on the outside starts changing and brightening up too. Then you have ‘Bounce Back’ and it’s like you’re picking yourself up from your losses, and then ‘No Favors’ is when you’re all the way charged up. The next act is more about relationships. It’s like you’re going after the person you think is your one true love and things end differently than what you thought. The third act is a little darker because it’s way more themed around depression, maybe there’s even suicide on your mind. Then when you get to the last act it’s like God and family pulling you out of the rut and helping you realize that what you’re going through is bigger than you.” Sean’s polished explanation is so neatly packaged it’s press release worthy, nevertheless you can’t accuse him of being disingenuous. I Decided. isn’t trying to win listeners over with subtle metaphor or deep existential questions. The concept of the underdog somehow getting a second chance to finally be the person they’ve always dreamed of being is easily discernible because Sean’s music tends to be like an all-access, all-ages concert — there’s something for everyone. Even the album’s last four songs — “Sunday Morning Jetpack,” “Inspire Me,” “Sacrifices” and “Bigger Than Me” — seem laser-focused to this purpose. Not only do the titles read like chapters in a 90-day self-help book, they bring the story arc to the satisfying kind of happy ending we expect from our favorite feelgood movies.

“Maybe there is no such thing as right or wrong, but maybe it’s just what you choose, you know? Whatever you do choose puts you on the trajectory towards your end point in life.” The story makes sense for an artist like Big Sean, whose platinum-selling projects have always found that happy place between popular music and niche hip-hop. I Decided. doesn’t depart from the approach that seems to work, Sean is simply more confident in himself and more centered than before. “Everything ties back to this idea of being certain about yourself and making a declaration about your life,” he explains. “That’s where I feel like I’m at now. I think that it’s something I had to work hard to find. It’s not easy to be secure with yourself, to be definitive and to know what you want. You have to go through a lot of life experiences… and hopefully mine inspire people. Life is about the choices you make so you have to make definitive choices at the very least. Maybe there is no such thing as right or wrong, but maybe it’s just what you choose, you know? Whatever you do choose puts you on the trajectory towards your end point in life, and that’s something I believe we can all apply to how we view the world.” Whatever end point Sean envisions, it seems likely that he will act as his own seventh trumpet, proclaiming his fate in universally relatable songs, long before that end actually arrives.

TRACKSUIT SWEATER PERRY ELLIS JACKET AROUND THE WAIST OPENING CEREMONY JEANS DRESS DOWN DAY SHOES AIMÉ LEON DORE PUFFER SCARF OPENING CEREMONY GLASSES RETROSUPERFUTURE

In a few short years, Matthew Williams has transitioned from a behind-the-scenes figure working with the likes of Kanye West, Lady Gaga and Alexander McQueen into one of the most exciting designers at the minute. With multiple collections of high-octane, cool-as-fuck fashion and a nomination for the LVMH Prize under his belt, it looks like we’ll be seeing a lot more of his Alyx Studio label in coming seasons.

Love, Hate & Rollercoasters ALYX Studio Words Alec Leach Photography Nick Thompson Styling Atip W Hair Terri Capon using Kiehl’s Make-Up Andjelka using Bobbi Brown Photography Assistant Allesandro Tranchini Styling Assistant Sophie Casha Set Designer Josh Stovell Model Amba Baker @ The Hive Models Special Thanks Action 99 Cars

Remember Been Trill? Back in 2013, Virgil Abloh, Heron Preston, Justin Saunders (aka JJJJound), Matthew Williams, and Florencia G terrorized the internet with their hashtag-splattered mixtapes and T-shirts. A crew of DJs, designers, creative directors and influencer types, the five worked for Kanye West’s DONDA collective in various capacities and leveraged their insider connections to get Been Trill all over the internet. As the unofficially official sixth member of Been Trill, Kanye was regularly seen in their gear, and actually included the brand in his first A.P.C. collab. Beyonce even wore it on occasion. Been Trill’s clothing was basic, but often expensive — at the height of the madness, they even made $100 shoelaces — and the group gave very little impression that they took things too seriously. The entire operation seemed like a publicity stunt, or an experiment to see how much money you could make just by having famous friends. Unsurprisingly, controversy and comment wars followed Been Trill everywhere they went, but that didn’t stop trend-hungry streetwear fiends from throwing their entire bank accounts at the brand. Looking back at it, Been Trill was sort of like a proto-Vetements. The jokes didn’t last forever: Been Trill was essentially sold off to PacSun — the “mall brand” retailer is the last remaining point of purchase for the label today — while the crew have taken the profits to bankroll new ventures. Virgil Abloh started OFF-WHITE and, with the backing of some Italian clothing tycoons, turned it into a highly lucrative label that’s stocked in basically every luxury department store on the planet. Heron Preston launched the HPC Trading Co. web store, and recently debuted his own namesake label at Paris Fashion Week. Saunders, aka JJJJound, still works for Kanye and produces his own products every now and then. Florencia G, meanwhile, is a fitness guru and adidas ambassador. OFF-WHITE may show in Paris and have multiple flagship stores, but its collections are still very much a work in progress, with gratuitous branding and a vision that is not yet fully formed, as Virgil would attest. Heron’s debut isn’t even available to buy yet, and JJJJound basically makes branded novelties. Where his former Been Trill compatriots are still taking arguable baby steps, Matthew Williams — who was always one of the more low-key members of the crew — has emerged from the ashes of Been Trill with a fully-fledged fashion brand that looks set to become a household name in the not-so-distant future. ALYX Studio makes clothes for people who love fashion. They’re bold and daring, without being wacky or unwearable. There are leather trousers and chunky hiking boots, oversized tailoring, patent leather, PVC and lots of dazzling bejeweled chains. The brand is dying to be seen on a runway, worn by a squad of models stomping up and down some poorly-lit industrial space to a deafening soundtrack of grinding noise. Matthew’s clearly a big fan of Helmut Lang and Raf Simons, two icons of design, whose work — much like his own — deftly tiptoes around subcultures and aesthetics, remixing them in ways that feel fresh, modern and now. And just like Helmut and Raf, Williams’s clothes would feel relevant in any decade from the 1990s to the 2090s. For Pre-Spring 2017, ALYX clashes fetishistic themes with high-performance biker gear, while previous seasons have referenced skate culture, fine pinstriped tailoring and corpse-painted black metallers. It’s a million miles away from the cheap novelties Been Trill spat out.

199

Williams spent years working behind the scenes in the fashion industry before launching his own label a few years ago, which now has the backing of Italian streetwear institution Slam Jam. He flew around the world doing creative direction for Kanye and Lady Gaga, and spent time in London assisting legendary fashion photographer Nick Knight, who he still works with on ALYX’s campaigns, catalogs and videos. He’s a polite, humble guy with a lazy West Coast drawl and easygoing demeanor. Speaking to him, you’d never guess that he made costumes for Lady Gaga before she got signed, designed the jacket Kanye wore onstage with Daft Punk at the Grammys, and worked on ball gowns with Alexander McQueen shortly before his untimely death. ALYX is predominantly a womenswear operation, but it has plenty of unisex appeal and many pieces are available in men’s sizes. Williams recently hooked up with Japanese streetwear legend and fragment design founder Hiroshi Fujiwara for a menswear capsule collection, and tells me that more expansive forays into guys’ clothing are on the way. His label is an intimate, family-run operation, named after one of Matthew’s children. His wife, Jennifer, runs the sales side to the business, and her cousin is Matthew’s design assistant. They divide their time between New York and Ferrara, where Slam Jam is based. I gave Matthew a call from Highsnobiety’s office in Berlin to talk subcultures, life in Italy, fetish gear and those old skate shoes that looked like marshmallows on your feet. Hi Matt, where abouts are you at the minute? I’m in Italy, working on production for next season, and then I’m flying back to New York tomorrow morning. Nice, what’s Ferrara like? It’s beautiful! It’s a really old city. A lot of the crusades were launched from here, it has a beautiful medieval castle; the whole city has a wall around it. It’s really beautiful. Really foggy as well, right? Yes, lots of fog! It’s really foggy right now. The city is below sea level. Actually a hundred years ago people used to go around on boats here — it’s really close to Venice, too. Sounds kind of inspiring. Yes, it’s really beautiful. A lot of artists actually lived here, like De Chirico. Andy Warhol had an exhibition here in the ’70s. There’s actually an exhibition right now in Milan about Basquiat and his work, and his relationship with Italy. I think he lived in Italy for a bit, too. I was just thinking about the collection. This collection is called “Love Chaos,” right? What’s the story behind the name? Well, ALYX is a brand, it’s one continuous idea, and the collection names are like song titles. Things that I’m thinking about at the time. That particular one came about for two reasons. One, I work a lot with NoLife, he’s a noise artist from New York. He has two songs, one is called “Curate Love” and one’s called “Curate Chaos.” Then also around that time there was a bomb that went off in New York on 23rd Street, which is only two avenues away from where my place is. So it’s this idea of loving the city you’re from, observing the chaos, and seeing how everything is not necessarily good in the world. And what’s the one continuous idea of ALYX? The brand is like my personal monologue. It has hints of things I hate or love, sadness or happiness I feel. They’re just like places of inspiration for me, and it’s down to people to find what they find in it or what it means to them. What it really comes down to is for everybody to just be who they are. Be you, you know what I mean? The clothing is really something that you feel the most like yourself when you’re wearing it. It’s about being you. Come as you are. You put things that you hate in there? Oh yeah! What sort of stuff? I have a shirt that says “Anti Racist Action” coming next season. I hate racism.

200

How did the whole fetish stuff come about? I was first exposed to it looking at photographs of bondage. Like Araki, with whom I was fortunate enough to work with many years ago. We did a shoot together for Gaga, I think it was in 2009. I think it’s a beautiful art by itself, I just love how it looks visually. Wow. How was it working with him? He was really amazing, he kind of makes love to the camera as he’s shooting. He has a person that does a special art of rope tying for him, like special knots. He was really, really free, he was shooting beautiful Polaroids. We all went to his bar after and got drunk with him. He did these amazing paintings while we were at his bar, with the classic Japanese calligraphy pen, and he dipped the brush in whiskey and then in ink, and did some portraits. And then the pictures that he took, he ended up painting over them, which was really beautiful. What about this biker thing you guys have got going on? My dad rode motorcycles my whole life, that’s just something I’ve grown up with. [Biker jackets have been en vogue since forever, but rather than doing the same-old Perfecto jacket and leather boots, ALYX has linked with Italian label Spidi to take the speed demon vibes next level. Spidi specializes in high-performance moto-gear that’s been precision-engineered for people who like to go a million miles an hour down perilous, winding roads. The collab is packed with high-tech detailing and looks like the sort of thing Darth Vader would wear on his days off. There are fashioned-up versions of Spidi’s moto jackets, pants, gloves and jumpsuits, as well as some absolutely wild boots that look like Matthew has chopped the leg off a cyborg. His team even teched-out some patent leather pumps with what Spidi calls Force Tech Armor. The collab is an explosion of tech details, reinforced body armor and Matrix-meets-Margiela aesthetics. It’s nuts.] You guys are four collections deep now, right? Five now, actually. Maybe we’ve done five and we’re on our sixth. Can you just check and quote me? (Laughs) It all becomes a blur, because I’m working on the production of our last collection, and at the same time I’m developing a new one, and sometimes I’m shooting with Nick for a collection that’s already out in the stores. It all merges into one for me.

200

Do you feel like fashion is moving too fast now? The world is very fast. Before, people didn’t know what was going on everywhere, at every moment. You would buy an object, an item of clothing, and it would be interesting to you for longer because you wouldn’t see everyone else who owned it. You would shop and then go somewhere, to a club, a museum opening, a concert, to actually have an experience of other like-minded people. You would have to speak to them in real life, you would wear your clothes and that’s how you would project yourself in that place. I guess things had longer longevity before people got tired of them. But now, people don’t have to go to actual events to feel engaged in culture, and there are less places where they need to dress up to go somewhere. People get tired of something quicker if they see it all over Instagram. A hundred photos of an item on Instagram feels a lot bigger than if a hundred people just owned it 10 years ago. If it would be like that, things would remain cooler for longer. Did you see clothes in that show? Oh no, you weren’t physically there, so you would never experience them until they went into a store. People were so excited to get out of their house and go look at clothing, because that was the only way they could see it. I think that’s all gone. It’s radically changed how people shop, how people consume information, know what they need and what they don’t need. [What Matthew says reminds me of something Niels, the founder of Belgian concept store Hunting & Collecting, told me. He noticed that whenever he put up a photo of a product on his store’s Instagram, the more likes it got, the less people bought it. Simply double-tapping something on a screen gives you a sense of satisfaction, just like walking out of a store with a bag full of new stuff. Once you’ve told the internet that you like something, the need to spend money on it isn’t as strong. You don’t need to be shopping to have that sort of relationship with a piece of clothing anymore.] There’s also not a big reason for people to buy stuff at full price anymore, because they just wait for it to go on sale. All manufacturers make you meet minimums, so a lot of the time, especially big brands, they’re overproducing because they have to meet a factory minimum, or they have to keep up with their quota. You end up with so much clothing that people don’t need, but there’s no other way to work in this system. That’s something I think about too: how much of what I’m making is needed and necessary? Am I making things in an ethical way? What’s the procedure, what materials are used? I’m looking a lot into sustainable fabrics and sustainable supply chains. Not as a poster boy for sustainability or the environment, but as a conscious human being. It’s hard to ignore that there’s loads of shit being made, and people that are just being mindless consumers. I don’t want to be a brand that’s into that. So, the theme of the magazine is subcultures. What were the subcultures that you experienced when you were younger? I was growing up in California. At that time skateboarding was a huge subculture. Everybody who was a skater at my school, people looked at them like they were going to steal something when they went into a store. Other kids’ parents didn’t want them to hang out with us. I think there’s a Santa Cruz shirt that says “Skateboarding is not a crime.” I’m not sure if it was Santa Cruz or not, but it was a real saying. If you were skating a ledge or a loading dock, some rent-a-cop would hassle you, kick you out of the spot. People were so worried about their concrete curbs, and their parking bumpers at gas stations — it was ridiculous! The designs of the skate shoes, then, it was like the Wild West. Sole Technologies and eS were making wild things; Koston had stuff that looked like Kobe Bryant basketball shoes. Then there were the Osiris D3s that were like chunky marshmallows on your feet. Everybody was much more experimental, because there was no proven technology that said this kind of shoe or clothing was better to skate in, so it gave people room for creativity. Now skate shoes pretty much look the same — everybody does a version of the Janoski. How do you feel about subcultures now, in 2017? I think that subcultures still exist now, but in different ways. I’m sure they exist online — like there are kids in Japan that are super into something that someone in Scandinavia is also into, and they talk online and maybe meet up. I’m sure subcultures are around still, like in Berlin. Don’t you see it sometimes? I’m sure there’s a lot of stuff going on in Berlin.

204

Yeah, Berghain’s got its own culture to it, definitely. You see a lot of that. Everyone’s wearing black the whole time, loads of 2000s-era sportswear. It does feel more like cultural remixing though — it doesn’t feel as intense as it was. I think Berlin is still a cool place where that exists. That’s why I love Berlin so much. It reminds me of New York when I first went there. You can still exist there without a job. There’s freedom there. When I did my 032c project, they put up posters all around the city to tell Berlin that it was happening! And that was a really viable way of communicating in 2016! [Laughs] I don’t know anywhere else where that works. I know friends who put on parties and it’s like, if they want to do a party somewhere, they actually have to go to the venue and meet them. You can’t email someone until you’ve met them face-to-face. It’s so old school. I love that — the city’s kept its charm. In Berghain they don’t allow photos inside, so people have to physically get off their asses and go somewhere to experience it. On a larger level, food culture is sort of like a subculture — people have to travel to go to a restaurant that just sources food from a 10km radius. You have to go to experience it in a small venue. I read that from Hiroshi, in that cool interview... With SSENSE, right? Yeah, and also Dries Van Noten, he was just talking about that as well, and when they both said that I was like “You know what? You’re actually right.” How was it working with Hiroshi? Oh, really, really cool. I mean, he’s a legend. He’s so talented. It’s so amazing what he’s given to culture over the decades, and how relevant his work has remained. Even now he’s releasing product that’s some of the coolest stuff that comes out. I traveled to Tokyo and sat with him, and we went over the collection, he was just really amazing, talented and had great ideas. He has a great knowledge of so many specific things in fashion and music that he was telling me about, like old stores that existed on St. Mark’s Place, right where my studio was. He was telling me about these old skate brands like Jimmy Z, which had this really cool Velcro waistband. It was like a belt attached to a waistband of a chino that you could, like, Velcro off from the pocket; they were really cool. Something I’ve never heard of, even though they were from California. He was just amazing. [The Rollercoaster belt is just a small part of ALYX’s collection, but it’s an important one. Matthew took the safety buckle from a rollercoaster and put it on a regular nylon strap, so you can wear it around your jeans. It’s a regular feature in ALYX collections, has been spotted on A$AP Rocky on multiple occasions, and sells out in a heartbeat every time it drops. It hits the magic formula for a banging statement piece — it looks weird but at the same time familiar, it’s got a dope concept behind it, and it’s easy to wear. It’s one of those key pieces that personify ALYX’s aesthetic.] How did the Rollercoaster belt come about? I was just taking my kids to Six Flags Magic Mountain, and we were just going on a roller coaster ride, and I looked at the belt that I was strapped in to. I was like “this thing is fucking cool!” I contacted the brand and asked if they would like to work with me to brand some of the hardware that they make, and that I wanted to use it in fashion. They were open to it, so that’s basically it. It’s not made by a fashion company, so it has a soul to it. It wasn’t created to be used on a garment. That’s why uniforms are so beautiful. Uniforms are such a huge source of inspiration. They are clothing, but they’re also created for utilitarian purpose. Like the Rollercoaster belt’s buckle. That thing has to hold you in when you’re going a hundred miles an hour upside down, when there’s crazy g-force, so it’s got a mechanism that won’t unlock upside down or when it’s being pulled apart — so people don’t fall out of a roller coaster! It’s way over-designed for a simple belt. It has all that detail that you’d never see or know about with your naked eye. It gives it something. It’s like when Stanley Kubrick used to fill all the cupboards and dressers in his films with clothes, in the scenes when people never opened them. He saw that it actually does give something to the scene that’s being shot. I really believe that. I believe in all those details that I do for myself that nobody will ever know, except for me and my team, and even my team might not know some of them. You need that amount of detail when you’re trying to give soul to a product.

207

The Good Company Grows Up on Its Own Terms Words Naavin Karimbux Photography Esteban Scott

At just over four years old, the shop has become an invaluable part of New York City’s world-renowned downtown creative scene. Tucked away on Allen Street in Downtown Manhattan, it is easy to walk past The Good Company’s facade without noticing it. Located just below Delancey, the shop is lower, and more east, than the bustling sidewalks of SoHo where many who visit New York City know to go to seek out some of the most famous streetwear flagships in the world. The Good Company’s neighbors are not boutiques or internationally renowned fashion houses, but rather more utilitarian businesses: wholesalers, specializing in everything from knitwear to stainless steel, line the block bearing signage in both Chinese and English. Around the corner, Vanessa’s serves chive and pork dumplings at a rate of $1.75 for four. The only other trace of streetwear influence on Allen Street comes by way of an old aNYthing marquee, leftover from the storefront industry veteran Aaron Bondaroff and his old brand used to inhabit, a couple spaces north of where The Good Company stands today. The distance between The Good Company and the parts of lower Manhattan where other streetwear stores are clustered together can be misleading to those not versed in downtown culture; but for those who know, the shop is the authentic, beating heart of New York’s up and coming creative scene. The space is a breeding ground where artistically-inclined youth go to learn, practice and execute their craft — and for many of the kids who hang around the shop, The Good Company is a second home. Classifying The Good Company as solely a retail space is a gross oversimplification. The store’s interior is so meticulously

208

curated by Quinn Arneson and Kumasi Sadiki, who own and operate the shop, that it often feels like a gallery. At the time of writing, an Eric Shaw painting is hung next to throw ups by the writers MKUE and WANT246, below which sits a shelf holding a Polo Sport cassette player and VHS titled Ultimate Adventure, a basketball made of blue Louis Vuitton denim, and Slick Rick’s The Art of Storytelling on tape. Previously the shop’s inside has featured installations from young artists such as Aaron Kai and Devin Troy. On some nights The Good Company transforms into a venue of sorts, hosting a diverse range of events from radio show broadcasts to live music sets. The most important function that The Good Company performs, however, is acting as a clubhouse for creatively disposed kids in the city. Throughout the conversations that I have had with Quinn and Kumasi since the shop opened more than four years ago, the notion that The Good Company should exist primarily as an example for the youth that hang out there is constantly mentioned. “I’ve seen a lot of these kids literally grow up in here,” says Kumasi. “From 18 when they were fresh out here and now they’re 23 and they’ve started to pursue their passions because they realize that they can do it too.” That the kids who frequent The Good Company speak more excitedly about the shop and its success than either of its owners is proof that Quinn and Kumasi are succeeding in providing young creatives a space where they can feel comfortable, learn and work.

209

The Good Company Grows Up on Its Own Terms Words Naavin Karimbux Photography Esteban Scott

208

209

The Good Company’s location, in a part of Lower Manhattan that has not completely succumbed to gentrification yet, is essential to the brand’s identity. But the exact site where the shop stands was not so much a conscious choice by The Good Company’s owners as it was a practical one. “We were looking on Craigslist,” explains Quinn. “It’s super crazy to think we nearly did this in Brooklyn, and that was a thought in our heads, but we found a place that we could afford in Manhattan.” Canal Street is a five-minute walk from the shop, and with it, Chinatown visibly spills into the neighborhood. But the creative vitality for which the Lower East Side is globally known also crackles through the area; every building is tagged up with graffiti, and a few blocks east, on Orchard and Ludlow Streets, is a smattering of galleries. The neighborhood is the anchor and has come to inform several facets of The Good Company. Whereas other brands scour the internet searching for graphics, Quinn and Kumasi, who handle the bulk of The Good Company’s design themselves, are influenced by their environment. “For inspiration it’s literally everything down here, it’s all around,” says Quinn. “Once you really get interested in this stuff you’re constantly seeing everything in graphics, just walking down the street.” The aesthetic that Chinatown has imparted on The Good Company is directly visible in the brand’s product. “The ‘We Buy Gold Tee’ is Chinatown, even the shop tee — its big letters, like the signs down here, it’s all Chinatown,” Kumasi tells me. The city serves as much more than just visual inspiration for The Good Company, however. “New York has this organic energy that you can’t replicate anywhere else,” Kumasi continues. “We’re really blessed and I’m really thankful to New York because I’m not from here, but the city has embraced us and shown us mad love. New Yorkers are really critical, and they’ll be the first to say ‘fuck that, that shit’s corny, I’m not fucking with it,’ but they’ve shown us nothing but love — from a lot of people, from Wiki, to Procell, to even graffiti kids and skaters. It’s been open arms, and we’ve reciprocated that.” The spirit of the city is soaked into the DNA of The Good Company, exemplified by the flow of people in and out of the shop over the course of a day, which is in itself a uniquely New York phenomena. Skateboarders pull up outside, friends of Quinn and Kumasi’s who happen to be walking by stop in, and random passersby wander through the door. “Whenever I’m in the area to do something, I always go to Good Co. first,” Eric Look, an art student who lives in the city and has been around the shop since its genesis, tells me. “Even if I’m not buying anything or even if I’m not kicking it there for that long, it’s still really tight to have a place to go and say, ‘What’s up,’ and have positive energy all

around. Maybe Quinn and ‘Masi will show me a design or two, maybe we’ll talk, maybe it’ll just be ‘what’s up’ and go.” The casual accessibility of The Good Company is an essential and intrinsic component in the shop’s character, and one that would not naturally occur the same way in any other city. In an age where more and more connections are made through the internet, there is a distinctly offline aura about The Good Company, typified in how they approach collaborations with other brands and artists. “All of our collaborations so far have been really organic. It’s mostly the homies,” says Kumasi. “I think that’s the most fun part of this whole thing — you get to sit down with your friends and work on something.” Recent Good Company collaborations include a collection with Connecticutbased brand dertbag, a range of one-of-one chain stitch embroidered crewnecks designed by Posh God, and a capsule with the photo magazine HAMBURGER EYES. All of the shop’s collaborations happen with entities that Quinn and Kumasi have concrete years of history with, and the conceptualization and design for the projects happens in real life. “We sit down with everyone we work with. We like to get together, have a beer, and there’s a lot of back and forth. What came out isn’t where we started, it’s a bunch of trial and error,” explains Kumasi. The events that are hosted in The Good Company are also innately imbued with New York flavor. Know Wave, Aaron Bondaroff’s internet radio platform and brand, broadcasts a curated selection of downtown culture live from the shop. Onyx Collective, a jazz ensemble whose members are all in their early twenties, and were classically trained in the city’s conservatories before dropping out and breaking the traditional rules, played a set out of The Good Company over the summer. Wiki, one half of NYC hip-hop group Ratking, collaborated with the shop on a collection of T-shirts and hoodies to coincide with the release of his 2015 mixtape Lil Me, and then played parts of the tape on a Know Wave show hosted at the shop. The events that The Good Company facilitates are often run by individuals who are born and bred New Yorkers, but the shop has only been in the city for four years, and neither Quinn nor Kumasi are originally from New York. That they have been so accepted is a testament to their lack of ulterior motives outside of promoting what they perceive to be genuine art. “We try to see what kind of effect something is going to have on the culture, if it’s someone trying to vulture or exploit, or if it’s someone who is going to be here for a while and actually contribute something,” says Kumasi. “With Know Wave, 8 Ball, Letter Racer, those people are consistently pushing culture forward.”

210

211

210

211

Quinn, who is 29 years old, grew up in Los Angeles, and Kumasi, 31, in Portland. The two met roughly 10 years ago in San Francisco, where they struck up a friendship through mutual friends, running in similar creative circles, and partying. Quinn was studying fine art in school, and Kumasi graphic design, before dropping out. Kumasi was heading the now defunct brand Freedminds, one of the frontrunners in the wave of DIY streetwear companies such as Stray Rats, dertbag and The Divinities that hit in the early 2010s. The idea for The Good Company came about in a casual and uncontrived manner, indicative of how the brand would conduct itself after coming to fruition. “I had moved out here and Kumasi visited me,” says Quinn. “We just decided that we wanted to do something with the energy we had, and this was the place to do it. New York felt like the center of the universe — they say if you can make it here you can make it anywhere.” While the shop is a fluid and changing space that plays host to a multitude of art and events, The Good Company has always had its feet firmly planted in the independent streetwear world. Initially the store’s only in-house product was the shop tee. Most of The Good Company’s business came from the DIY brands that it carried, which when the shop first opened were sold online and could not be found in brick and mortar stores. “We know a lot of talented people who do really cool things,” says Kumasi. “At the time when we started the store they weren’t getting the attention we felt they deserved, so we wanted to provide a platform for people to go to interact with them outside of the internet. From dertbag, to Stray Rats, to Carrots, and even the newer people we have in here, like Avi Gold and Have A Good Time, there were these brands that were really good but weren’t getting seen.” Quinn and Kumasi, who were both in their mid-twenties when they started The Good Company, realized that the streetwear behemoths of the time were falling out of touch with the youth, and that a platform to elevate fresh, more relevant work was needed. “It was never about us, it was always about showcasing the talent that makes up the culture today,” says Kumasi. “I felt like the bigger brands were on a downward shift — they weren’t connected to what was going on with the kids.” At a time when streetwear is bigger, and more monetized than ever, The Good Company is an important stake of authenticity. It is abundantly clear that Quinn and Kumasi have a bona fide love for their craft, and that forces which are often coercive in the world of streetwear such as money and popularity hold no sway over The Good Company’s owners.

212

The tangibility of The Good Company has always been its strongest suit; when the shop first opened, the community around many of the brands that they carried lived in Instagram comments. The store provided an important physical space for people to come together, and in doing so it brought a culture off of screens and into reality. The palpable nature of The Good Company separates the store from the thousands of other brands that have sprung into existence on the internet over the past decade. “Now it’s possible to just make something and put it out there,” says Kumasi. “When we started Freedminds there was no Instagram — getting a following was a little more difficult. Now you can easily put your shit on Instagram and everyone can see it. But authenticity will always be a thing; it doesn’t matter if there are more brands, there will always be ones that stand out for the right reasons. I think these days people get lost in the internet and just want the instant gratification of selling a million T-shirts without even really thinking about why they’re doing it, or what their reason for starting a brand is. I feel like a lot of kids don’t want to put the time, energy and effort into building it, they just want it to pop off immediately.” A hallmark of the stereotypical ‘streetwear store’ is the inhospitable disposition that the employees in the shop sport. Cool-guy attitudes prevail, with customers experiencing either disregard from workers or flat out hostility. That tenor is one that Quinn and Kumasi deliberately avoided at The Good Company, and was a decision that organically led to the tight-knit community that exists around the shop. “I was reading an article that called The Good Company ‘post-Supreme,’” says Eric Look, referring to a recent The New York Times piece. “But I don’t think Supreme was ever like this — in terms of the level of openness, the love. I’m not throwing shade at Supreme at all, but they’re definitely more on some exclusive shit whereas Good Co. is a place that anyone can pull up to and hang out at, as long as you’re a nice person.” The vibe that exists on the sales floor at a streetwear giant like Supreme was something that Quinn and Kumasi took into account when they started The Good Company. “I think any good business is a response to something,” Kumasi tells me. “The Good Company was a response to these others that don’t really have an atmosphere, where the workers are assholes, and there’s no real connection with the customer past… they just went there to buy something. This was our response to that, and then it grew into kids coming here and being able to chill.”

213

212

213

The community was not a set objective that Quinn and Kumasi made when they opened The Good Company, but a natural result of the way that they ran the shop. “Leading by example was always the idea we were going for. Pursuing what’s true to you, and it’s not guaranteed — because this still isn’t guaranteed for us — but I think you’ll ultimately be happier, especially when you’re young, if you try doing what you love and seeing if it works,” says Kumasi. Once it became clear that The Good Company was becoming an important place for creative youth in the city, Quinn and Kumasi actively fostered the growth of the young burgeoning community. “You walk in here with a certain talent, and they want to see how you can get involved with what they do, and what they can do to help you,” Chris X, a guitarist in the hardcore band Liberty, and a skilled illustrator, tells me. From doing friends and family T-shirts to having kids shoot lookbooks or pack orders, The Good Company’s owners make sure that everyone is included, involved, and therein learning. “Just seeing the way that they do business has been really tight,” Esteban Scott, who interns at the shop, tells me. “I’m just taking notes, soaking up game.” When I ask Jason Fox, an art student at SUNY Purchase who has been hanging around since The Good Company first opened, to try and put a label to The Good Company he describes it as, “A clubhouse, a workshop, a constant brainstorm — for and by people who care about and have a genuine passion for whatever it is that they do.” One of the more practical services that The Good Company provides the kids who are regular patrons is a site where they can present work and receive feedback. “You can come here and show ideas, and get some constructive criticism,” Chris X tells me. “If I have an idea for a comic or a drawing, I’ll come in here and show Kumasi and Quinn, just to see their perspective, because I trust their opinions. And to hear what people that you respect have to say about your work — it’s almost like a nod, it’s inspiring.” Talking to anyone who consistently sticks around the shop reveals that every individual who is a part of The Good Company’s community has their own creative projects and ambitions. The store is a place where everyone can come together and discover where their artistic energy crosses over. “It’s like a farm system,” Biscuit, a 22-year-old from Queens who runs his own brand called Authentic, explains. “Good Co. is like the Yankees and they got the crazy farm system, in the sense that they’re flowing people up through the minors. Like my homie Mel, he’s shooting for A$AP Rocky and a bunch of other people now, but if you trace Mel back two years ago he was only shooting for Good Co. They were the first real platform he was on.” But even more valuable than the knowledge that Quinn and Kumasi disseminate to those who hang around the shop is the sense that The Good Company is a safe house, a place where those who feel ostracized or disconnected can go to be accepted

without compromising who they are. An old Freedminds T-shirt, printed before The Good Company was even an idea in the minds of its creators, features a small hit on its back that reads “A rest haven for lost souls. Rebels on the rise,” a description that feels accurate, and like a precursor, to what The Good Company would come to signify to its loyal clique. “It’s like our own Dover Street Market,” Biscuit tells me at the shop. “Except when I’m in Dover it isn’t really my forte and I feel uncomfortable, but when I walk in here it’s just like, ‘‘Sup bros?’ People here aren’t like, ‘I’m wearing this brand and I’m better than you because I have on a $700 sweatshirt.’ In here we all look each other in the eye when we speak to one another.” Over the course of my conversations with the kids who form The Good Company’s community, it becomes evident that the role the shop plays in each of their lives is genuinely familial. “It’s where I met most of the people who are now my best friends in the world,” says Jason. “The Good Company has become my home away from home. Chill vibes always, constantly learning about new shit, good conversations no matter the topic: design, music, life. The shop’s just such an organically constructive and positive place.” As the internet becomes increasingly integrated into daily life, the value of a physical space like The Good Company is immeasurable. Existing as part of a subculture that the internet is rapidly transforming (and in many ways decaying), The Good Company is an important outpost that maintains and teaches values that are universally applicable. Beyond streetwear, there are lessons in the way that Quinn and Kumasi have done business and raised a community that are pertinent to life in a broader sense. The store has had an enormous impact on what would be an otherwise disenfranchised niche of youth in New York, and The Good Company’s distinctive communal experience is one that Quinn and Kumasi talk of one day bringing to other cities by opening more shops. Through its willingness to allow its environment to inform the brand, rather than resisting its surroundings, The Good Company has become a veritable thread in the fabric of the Lower East Side. The love that they have shown is requited by the city, and it is difficult to imagine a future where Quinn and Kumasi are no longer on Allen Street. When I ask Kumasi if he has any parting wisdom, his answer is characteristically sage. “Just do your fucking thing. Most people are going to say you can’t do this and you can’t do that, or call you crazy. I might be a little crazy, but I think that’s a good thing. You have to be willing to take a chance and go for yours. It’s no guarantees, but you’re guaranteed to not get shit if you don’t try. Get your vision together, get a team and start executing. If you put in the effort you’re only going to get better. Ten-thousand hours. Better than yesterday.”

214

215

214

215

The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton area of Northeastern, Pennsylvania exists in relative anonymity. Wilkes-Barre’s population is now roughly half that of its coal boom-era heights, and Scranton only registers in popular culture as home to the fictional Dunder Mifflin from the American version of The Office. Between the two cities, Moosic hosts a Yankees minor league affiliate each summer and the town of Old Forge claims status as “Pizza Capital of the World.” “I’m a bit biased, but that area has better pizza than any other region,” says Nick Wojciechowski, designer and co-founder of cult brand, Nervous Juvenile. “Old Forge style is great but my favorite, by far, is a place called Nardozzo’s in a small town called Nanticoke. It only has pizza, pierogis and potato pancakes.”

The Sum of Its Parts: Inside Nervous Juvenile Words Nick Schonberger Photography Scott Howe

Those narrow offerings add to a slightly narrow regional mindset. Growing up Wojciechowski suffered homophobic slurs simply for being a skateboarder — “I was bullied and threatened on the regular.” Rather than discourage him, the experience opened a path to subcultural music scenes. Wojciechoski’s joined a now globally recognized hardcore band. Simultaneously, he dug deep into the anime, DJ and sneaker scenes. These activities combine, in part, to inform the backbone of the Nervous Juvenile brand. Sold through Beams and its own e-commerce platform, Nervous Juvenile delivers a back-to-basics, idiosyncratic version of streetwear. Each graphic, sentiment, and cut reflects the sensibilities of Wojciechowski and his partners, Garrett Gutierrez and Eric Becker. Gutierrez works with bands. For high-profile U.S.-based acts, he functions as something as a broker to the Japanese market; and vice versa for Japanese artists like Kyary Pamyu Pamyu. Additionally, he’s become a liaison between cult LA streetwear brands — including Anti Social Social Club and Babylon — and renowned Tokyo retailer, Beams. “It’s rare to find someone who has an appreciation for all of those things, so I knew I had to work with Garrett in some capacity,” notes Wojciechowski. Meanwhile, Becker brings invaluable experience and expertise in high fashion, having served, for a time, as creative director of Philadelphia’s Erdon — which stocks the likes of Dries Van Noten, Sofie D’Hoore and Maison Martin Margiela. Collectively, the trio doesn’t seek to invite the mainstream in, nor do they discourage it. It’s more a “if you know, you know” deal — one that functions as a lens into a host of niche, almost unimaginable connections. One of those is with Beams itself: “Garrett has worked with Beams before, with other ventures, and has a great relationship with that crew,” Wojciechowski explains. “We’re not the type of characters who take advantage and pressure all of our connects for our benefit. I think they found out that he was involved and were like ‘why didn’t you tell us you had a brand?!’” Over an email exchange, Wojciechowski unpacked the rest of the brand’s connections. He’s as versed in hardcore as he is in grime, and in anime as deeply as the subtleties of The Smiths’ lyrics. And in that, possesses the foundational, near encyclopedic knowledge that allows his brand to move comfortably between, and find footing within, a variety of subcultures. In an era when it’s typical to reach straight for the mall, Wojciechoski’s authenticity is nothing short of refreshing.

216

217

The Sum of Its Parts: Inside Nervous Juvenile Words Nick Schonberger Photography Scott Howe

216

217

Describe the scene you came of age in. Our local scene was based in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, and it was your average DIY hardcore/punk scene of the era. The mid/late ’90s was very politically charged — a lot of bleached bowl cuts, horn-rimmed glasses and work shirts. Bands would have long emotional speeches in between songs and all that stuff. Then when my generation kind of took over the scene, we gravitated toward the ‘80s sound and style. When did you really develop a passion for that scene and its nuances? I spent most of my formative years alone with my skateboard or watching MTV. I was different to most of my friends, so when I found punk rock (and underground music in general) it was like how someone describes finding religion. The difference is, punk empowers you in every way. Religion and a lot of other subcultures stagnate and make you complacent. Punk gives you an ethos you can apply to your whole life. What did you learn about style when you first got into the underground music scene, what did you gravitate towards? I was getting into punk at the same time that I was learning to spin. DJ culture at the time was pretty broad and very British. So not only was I inspired by ’90s hip-hop style, the drum ‘n’ bass scene was huge at the time and UK garage was kicking off. I was also very into a lot of stuff that I’ll broadly classify as Britpop (Morrissey, Blur, Stone Roses, Pulp, etc.). The thing about all of this music is that the U.S. press ignored it, so to study up on it I would have to buy a lot of UK magazines. I would see that an artist or DJ that I liked was in an issue of The Face, so I would buy it for that and coincidentally be exposed to fashion that I didn’t know I was interested in yet. Hardcore/punk is largely anti-fashion, so my interests in both were mostly separate. There are tons of extremely fashionable punk bands, but they usually aren’t aware of it. Every once in a while you’d see a weird crossover, like when Kim Jones would use a Bold shirt in a shoot, and it would be like an Easter egg for anyone in the know. Or at least, that’s how I would perceive it. The straight edge “Youth Crew” revival scene in the late ’90s was pretty fashion-oriented in the sense that everyone had clean fades, cuffed raw denim with retro Nike or New Balance so I naturally gravitated toward that for a while. Afterward I sort of did my own thing. Your interest in British music and DJ culture seems in slight opposition to participation in your local punk scene. However, there are those similarities in style — the retro shoes, haircuts, denim — that link the aesthetics. How did you reconcile your interests? And then, what do you think accounts to that gravitational pull to style? Well, for the most part getting into DJing was solo. I had a couple friends who I’d spin hip-hop with on the local college radio station from time to time but as for UK dance stuff, I was in my own world. I think, on the surface, punk and DJ culture are worlds apart, but it’s not that hard to connect the dots between the two… especially in the UK. There’s a direct lineage from the ’77 punk scene to post-punk/goth to acid house and on to stuff like Stone Roses. For instance, I remember listening to a Fabio & Grooverider RinseFM set earlier this year and I believe it was Grooverider who said he was a full-on punk as a youth. That was so cool to find out. Why are certain shoes given iconic status within the late ‘90s punk scene? I’m always interested in why certain Jordans or Air Maxes have the appeal. It was just another thing for nerdy dudes to obsess over, like record collecting. That was the first time that a large part of the hardcore scene was unabashedly worshipping the ’80s era to the point where they wanted to dress like them. Different regions’ iconic bands were known for wearing specific sneakers. The NYHC guys wore a lot of adidas high tops like Forums and Rivalrys. The clean-cut Connecticut straight edge youth crew guys (who would eventually invade NY) were known for jumping super high on stage with Jordan 1’s and Air Revolutions. The early Boston guys wore head-to-toe denim with white Blazers. So we were hung up on these vintage styles but at the same time, who could ignore the Air Maxes coming out at the time? The ’95 was cemented as an official straight edge sneaker when a specific compilation LP came out in 1999 with a guy doing a massive stage dive in a pair. The record wasn’t good for the most part, but the sneakers were.

218

219

218

219

It’s interesting to think about how a single image can immortalize a shoe in a scene. I wonder, too, why certain Jordans have relevance. I think the IV was the cutoff for Jordans in the scene for the most part. Then the V and the following models didn’t become popular in the scene until later on in the retro craze. Cleveland bands like Integrity and Confront kept going with the Jordans into the early/mid ‘90s after all the straight edge bands went post-hardcore or Hare Krishna. I think hardcore and punk was always ahead of the curve for having a vintage, utilitarian aesthetic. Because above all, Vans and boots are more related to the scene than anything. How did your interest in Japan blossom, and then how did it manifest in formation of creative friendships/partnerships? I had an interest in anime growing up so it probably started there. Akira and Macross were popular and skaters like Jeremy Klein were using Japanese imagery on their product. When I got into sneakers, the only information available was from Japanese sites like TomahawkChop and magazines like SNEAKER JACK or smart. Japanese streetwear stuff was very mysterious at the time. You’d see DJs and musicians come back with BAPE shirts and be intrigued. Eventually I got super into Japanese hardcore punk, not really knowing that it was all connected. Years later I would have one of the coolest experiences of my life, looking through a binder of live pics of bands like The Execute and Swankys with Sk8thing [of BAPE and C.E] and Hikaru [of Bounty Hunter]. Those guys grew up in that scene, so it’s like all of the coolest shit coming full circle. Did you go to school for design? No, I didn’t go to school at all. My band used to have a reputation for having sought-after merch (I hope we were known for having good music as well!), which I was behind. We’d have new shirt designs for every show and make as little as possible, which at the time was the opposite of what everyone was doing. A few years ago I had to move to Boston and my homie Rhett [Richardson] brought me in at Concepts and showed me the ropes. I owe a lot to him and still have a ton to learn. When did Nervous Juvenile launch? Who is involved? We started the brand around a year ago. It started with Garrett Gutierrez and I. When my band played LA years ago, I made a friends-only run of Kyary Pamyu Pamyu shirts and he was psyched on it so we started a friendship based on our Japanese obsessions. He actually had a foot in that world, which was crazy to me, so he was the first person I thought of when I decided I wanted to start my own brand. After that we got Eric Becker involved. He was one of the guys I knew who was really into sneakers and gear in the Philly scene in the early 2000s. He managed a high-end store for years so he has a good mind for dealing with retailers and how to satisfy customers. How did you come up with the name? It’s from a Morrissey lyric. I thought it was good because I wanted to connect with the person who’s into clothing because he or she is different, not the kid who’s keeping up with the Joneses. I feel like if that’s inside of you then the name might connect with you. It was also important to me that the name wasn’t gender-specific. What was the initial intent? I don’t know that we had a specific mission. Working for Concepts is sick but a lot of ideas don’t fit with that identity. I wanted to make bum flap pants that had a baggy/tapered fit but a Concepts consumer is not buying butt flap pants. I also wanted to make sure there was a brand doing punk-inspired stuff that consists of people who ACTUALLY came from and care about that world. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not the angry punk who’s disgruntled because Kim Kardashian wears a Disclose leather jacket. I actually think it’s super interesting because it’s so bizarre. What’s the deal with Kate Bush? I don’t know, she’s ill. Other than loving her music, she’s interesting to me because she’s a household name in the UK and very niche in the States. There’s always something extra appealing about fairly prolific artists who don’t milk the touring thing through their whole career.

220

221

220

221

Mark Riddick’s signature style – grim, morbid, black and white pen and ink work – is instantly recognizable, whether you know the name or not. His graphic work has essentially defined the look of underground metal. And, as is the case with many subcultures today, the world of mainstream pop culture is looking to grab a bit of that edge.

Black & White Mark Riddick

There was a noticeable changing of the tides over the past year. Previously niche subcultures and their associated imagery crossed over into fashion and pop in unprecedented ways. Thrasher merch transcended its skate culture roots appearing en Vogue, both literally and figuratively as a wardrobe staple for off-duty models, rappers, pop stars and anyone else looking for a little “edge.” Jake Phelps, prototypical West Coast skate rat and editor-in-chief of the legendary skateboard magazine was not pleased, stating “we don’t send boxes to Justin Bieber or Rihanna or those fucking clowns. The pavement is where the real shit is. Blood and scabs, does it get realer than that?”

scene when I purchased a demo tape from a local band named Arghoslent. After exchanging some letters with the band, I started writing to other bands and fanzines. Ever since then I’ve stayed connected to the underground metal scene and still maintain some of the connections I had from the early ‘90s.

When it comes to metal graphics, it doesn’t get realer than Mark Riddick. And we’re not talking Metallica or Slayer: Riddick’s black and white illustrations are the gruesome, confrontational stuff of nightmares. Providing artwork for hundreds of underground metal bands since the early ‘90s, including Arch Enemy, Autopsy, Dethklok, Exodus, Morbid Angel, Skull Fist, Suffocation, Suicidal Angels, The Black Dahlia Murder, and Varathron, Riddick is one of the most respected, well-known and frequently copied black metal and death metal artists of all time. He’s also released books with titles like Compendium of Death, Logos From Hell and Morbid Visions. And he recently worked with both Justin Bieber and Rihanna. The former on the massively popular Purpose world tour gear, created alongside Jerry Lorenzo of Fear of God, and the latter on death metal graphics worn by RiRi’s stage dancers during her performance at the 2016 MTV Video Music Awards.

This aside, I developed an appreciation for music that pushed the boundaries of conventions and explored unchartered territories. To participate in the evolution of a music genre since its genesis has been a very rewarding experience on various creative levels.

Highsnobiety caught up with Riddick to talk about his journey from the dark corners of the underground to the bright spotlight of pop, and why he feels he’s stayed true to the extreme underground metal scene through it all.

I was a teenager at the time and was grateful to be part of something unique and utterly occult. Having access to music that was shunned by the mainstream gave me a sense of exclusivity, acceptance and belonging: the essentials for any young and impressionable teenager.

On heavy metal: the voice (and aesthetic) of suffering The aesthetic of heavy metal culture has been an infatuation of mine since I first saw an Iron Maiden album cover on a record store shelf in 1982. Heavy metal aesthetics are a driving force behind the music, imposing its aggression, rebellious attitude, nonconformity and willingness to draw attention to extreme aspects of the human condition. One of the reasons I believe heavy metal music has existed on the fringe is due to its bold exploration of themes that aren’t typically exposed by other genres of music. Touching on sensitive topics such as death, disease, war, horror, religious intolerance, mental affliction, political disdain, and the occult is not the formula for a chart-topping hit.

On discovering underground death metal Words Steven Fröhlich Photography Mark Routt

I can recall my parents listening to bands like Genesis, Asia, Fleetwood Mac, Styx, Africa and others throughout the early-tomid ‘80s, exposing my twin brother and I to the major artists of that era. When I was 10 years old I discovered hard rock music and began listening to bands like Ratt, Keel, Def Leppard, Cinderella and White Lion. Soon after I began pursuing heavier bands and quickly graduated to thrash metal acts like Metallica, Slayer, Demolition Hammer, Vio-Lence, Sepultura, Devastation, Cryptic Slaughter and Forbidden. My infatuation with thrash metal quickly evolved to death metal. I began engaging with bands like Pestilence, Malevolent Creation, Massacre, Death, Gorguts, Deicide and Deceased. In 1991, I discovered the underground death metal music

These aspects of the human condition are part of our experience on this planet. While it may appear negative on the surface, I do believe that music is a creative and healthy vehicle for expressing these themes. Most metal fans would be in agreement that their appreciation for extreme music is partly a coping mechanism for them, and likewise part of the solace found within this subculture. The first truth in Buddhism acknowledges that all life is suffering… heavy metal is the voice of that suffering. I’ve been very fortunate for my circumstance in life. My greatest challenge has involved being the parent of a child with autism. While it can be extremely tiring at times, it has simultaneously been an enlightening and maturing experience.

223

Black & White Mark Riddick

On discovering underground death metal Words Steven Fröhlich Photography Mark Routt

223

On the underground metal scene: then and now The underground metal music scene in the early ‘90s thrived on a culture of networking through postal mail. Upon my introduction to the underground, I began corresponding through the mail with several bands, record labels, fanzines, and tape traders domestically and overseas. It mimicked the do-it-yourself attitude of the punk scene yet the music was more extreme. In terms of underground metal as a subculture, I still perceive it in the same way — a group of individuals with a common preference for something that is generally unconventional by popular standards — the only major difference is that it is less visceral than it was in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. The internet changed how personable the underground metal scene once was: email versus handwritten letters, computerdriven layout versus cut-and-paste, digital home studios versus analog four-track recorders, illegal downloads versus tape trading, etc. Despite the internet and other technological advancements, a sense of community still resonates strongly throughout the underground metal scene. On becoming an illustrator and brand I had an interest in drawing since my youth — drawing things that most boys would find appealing: epic space battles, dinosaurs, robots and medieval knights — but it wasn’t until my early teens that I realized my discovery of the underground metal music scene was the perfect way to channel my creativity. My first assignment was in 1991. One of my illustrations was prominently featured on the cover of an underground photocopied fanzine called Scavenger. To see my art published for the first time was an overwhelming experience, especially alongside wellrespected metal bands like Cannibal Corpse, Napalm Death and Assück, whose logos adorned the cover. My interest in music became a vehicle for my artwork and I haven’t stopped since. I began viewing my work as a brand in 2006 when I launched my website. Making my work more accessible on the internet meant that I had to be even more consistent and protective of how I visually presented my work. The most important hallmark of my brand is my medium — dominated by pen and ink, and my black and white color palette — which is a holdover from the underground days when everything was reproduced on a blackand-white photocopier. And lastly, the “Riddickart” moniker — which has been in use for a decade. Although I do view my art as a profession, I have a full-time day job as a graphic designer, so my illustration work comes after my obligations as a parent and husband. My freelance illustration work started to become more demanding in the past decade due

to my presence on the internet and social media. Requests arrive almost daily now so I have to use more discretion about what kind of assignments I choose to work on. On subcultural double-standards Although I’ve now skimmed the surface of pop culture, I still consider myself to be an underground metal illustrator. My process and clients have not changed, nor has my obsession and passion for metal music. Those who follow my artwork on social media had a mixed reaction in regard to the Bieber logo I illustrated. I do believe that people who belong to a subculture, such as extreme underground music, have a sense of ownership of it. In turn, I believe fans of my artwork feel they have some ownership of what I do and because I went against the grain of the subculture, some took offense. Whether you declare allegiance to a subculture or not, art and creativity should not be held back by boundaries or by any form of censorship. Anyone should be free to enjoy a work of art or music no matter the genre, style or subculture. In short, all art is free for all to appreciate; taste and preference are the bulk of what makes art palatable, the remainder is left to the objective principles of good design. From my vantage point, heavy metal has an underlying double-standard in that it is an exclusive club for the outsider. If those who endorse heavy metal held true to this ideal it would have ceased to exist a long time ago on account of its own exclusivity. I used to have this mentality myself and it wasn’t until I matured that I arrived at the realization that anyone can choose to appreciate and enjoy whatever they like and partake to whatever degree they wish. Anyone can pass judgment, whether good or bad, but to be an active contributor and creator is where the action takes place, just as Thrasher Editor-in-Chief Jake Phelps expressed in his comment referencing the act of skateboarding rather than everything that surrounds it (e.g. advertising, merchandise, brand names, publications). Those who take action are the individuals who move a subculture forward and essentially work to keep it alive, whether behind the scenes or in the foreground. In the words of Aleister Crowley, “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law,” and in the words of Joseph Campbell, “Follow your bliss.” These are two expressions that resonate deeply with me. In short, do as you wish so long as your wish begets joy.

224

On Justin Bieber and Jerry Lorenzo When I received the very straightforward request from Jerry Lorenzo to work on some logo concepts for Justin Bieber’s Purpose Tour, my very first gut reaction was to laugh and say, “What the fuck?” I was initially very confused about why I would be asked to handle this assignment but I saw it as an incredibly challenging opportunity. Illustrating for a pop star with a predominantly female fan base was a far cry from my comfort zone: illustrating for a male-dominant aggressive form of music — death metal. I was very curious where this challenge would take me and whether or not my concepts would even be used. After considering it for a few days I decided to accept the challenge. Since its inception, heavy metal visuals have adopted the use of extreme imagery; on album covers, merchandise and through stage antics. Shock value has always been an asset to heavy metal, especially in the extreme underground metal scene. Having been in the business of illustrating for the genre for 25 years, one becomes quite numb to the shocking nature of the music and art. Illustrating a logo for Justin Bieber was a unique way to bring back the shock value aspect associated with my work because it completely undercut all expectations. One of the several functions of art is the ability to elicit a reaction and I trust that was achieved on this assignment. Jerry had a very unique vision for Justin’s visuals. After several rounds of logo sketches we finally came to a consensus on one of the tamest variations of the “Bieber” logo. It was legible but still had enough heavy metal influence in it to give it a slight edge, reflecting Justin’s growth as a musician. Another reason for taking on the Bieber logo assignment was because I viewed it as an opportunity to build my network, extend my reach as an artist, and to act as a liaison for underground

metal music. Working with Jerry and others within his network has broadened my connections and has already opened doors for other very unique and exciting assignments. Furthermore, the press that followed the reveal of the Bieber logo has given me an opportunity to be a representative of the underground metal community in publications that normally overlook the importance and value this genre of music brings to the table. Being a voice for a style of music I’m passionate about, and have been such an integral part of for the past few decades, has been an honor for me. On selling out My understanding of the phrase “sellout” refers to someone who says he or she will do one thing and then does another for monetary gain. The dilemma of “selling out” is that it infers an invisible contract between an individual and those who support that individual or their shared interest. People mature or grow out of the things that they once claimed allegiance to, or perhaps they take on new responsibilities that require monetary dependency. One must weigh the importance of integrity toward a shared interest or those of self-preservation or responsibility to other new or required goals. The idea of “selling out” is not one that I adhere to because I believe in free will and accept that people can follow their desires in spite of what others think. The true creative path is one uninhibited and void of external opinions. The true, or “real,” artist carves his own path, not the path others feel he should carve. I don’t believe I “sold out” when I was asked to work on a logo for Bieber. I was asked to illustrate a heavy metal-inspired logo — no different from any other logo I’ve been asked to create. My process was exactly the same as with any other client. In addition, the fee was the same as with any other client. The only difference in having Bieber as a client is that his music isn’t metal and the logo reaches a wider audience. Meanwhile, I grew and developed my skills and knowledge.

227

Isaiah Toothtaker and the Art of Authenticity Words Nick Schonberger Photography Christopher Loa

Rapping and tattooing. At first glance, the two have very little in common. But on closer inspection, similarities become apparent — both crafts attract larger-than-life personalities and require mastery of the fundamentals before transformative stylistic shifts can occur. Born and raised in Tucson, Arizona, Isaiah Toothtaker embodies this overlap, well versed in both rapping and tattooing. “I had been getting tattooed since age 13, and from 15 in shops,” he recalls. “It was illegal, and people were really reluctant to tattoo someone under the age. I had a lot of resistance.” Since that initial, contentious start, Toothtaker’s found notable embrace from vaunted members of the tattoo community. He’s been tattooing for roughly 15 years and his shop, Staring Without Caring, is celebrating its 10th year of operation. When not in Tucson, he holds guest spots at grime’s venerable Skull & Sword in San Francisco, with Scott Campbell in Los Angeles and with Mark Cross at Rose Tattoo in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. All three are testaments to an idiosyncratic style rooted in American tattoo traditions but with a boundless graphic vision. As an MC, Toothtaker also profits from an eccentric approach. Over the past 13 years, he’s released a string of solo projects with backing from pioneering weirdo rap label Anticon. Through these efforts, Toothtaker worked with Sixtoo and Harry Fraud, founded the Machina Muerte collective (with Mestizo), and veered further left for collaborations with Max B and Gunplay. “I came into Max B a little late, when he’d already linked with French Montana. I’m a huge French fan… I think he’s the best,” Toothtaker explains of 2012’s Toothy Wavy. “To me it was something that might be musically different and we could possibly overlap in that sense but it could also be complementary. Two things that can mix well but seem very distant. If you hold my

230

activity in the streets up, there are very similar parallels. Any music I could have made work. But those identifiers, those were the strongest components. That’s what made it unique outright.” Furthermore, the record was released with artwork by New York City graffiti legend Doze Green and a stamp of approval from streetwear label Mishka. More intertwined connections of eras, scenes and sounds might be impossible to find. Add to that the distant tuning of Max B’s voice through prison phone lines, and the whole project realizes a near sublime melding of underground movements. “It’s always the people who seem the most extreme,” notes Toothtaker of his attraction to certain rap styles. “Same with the Gunplay thing, that’s the strongest component — these extreme people. There are surprising epiphanies when you actually take time to see who these people are. There is a deep knowledge of the fundamentals and it is expanded in a very authentic way. It’s from the core, combined with other pieces of that person.” That notion cleanly articulates Toothtaker’s own trajectory. After submerging himself in the depths of his chosen passions, he’s emerged with virtuoso talents in each. For Highsnobiety, Toothtaker addresses his background and connection to hip-hop and tattooing. What unfolds is an unfiltered view tinted by a peculiar local, and a clear intermingling of the formative interests that have materialized in the form of a distinct artistic identity.

231

Isaiah Toothtaker and the Art of Authenticity Words Nick Schonberger Photography Christopher Loa

230

231

On tattooing in Tucson When I started getting into tattooing it didn’t really seem like there was a large historical interest within Tucson’s local tattoo culture. Allegedly the first tattoo shop in Tucson was a work shed at the swap meet here in town. The guy had a work shed at this place, on the south side of town. It was close to I-10. His name was something like Scuzz or Fuzz. He was just a biker type, though I don’t think he ran any colors. Most of the other shops that developed later had a biker aesthetic — a bike was positioned up front in the lobby, and the designs were dictated by that style. However, Tucson has probably a 50/50 population of white and Mexican. A lot of the neighborhoods have a similar sort of Chicano heritage and the tattoos reflect this with the colors black and grey. The style was adjacent to fine line (the style commonly connected to Southern California), but was interwoven with biker and Chicano styles. The look seemed to revolve around a jail or slightly gang-oriented aesthetic, whether biker or Cholo, and involved skulls or religion or script.

The guy who worked for my boss, who taught me fundamentals (like making needles and breaking down machines) and was a secondary mentor and underboss, was trying to enforce the traditional shit and I was able to connect the references by reading about legendary tattooers like Burt Grimm and Bob Shaw. On learning to tattoo Mackay ended up becoming president of the Tucson chapter of the Hell’s Angels. When I started apprenticing, he was interested in us (my friends and I being “hang around,” prospect-type guys). Back then I was pretty violent, I think I attracted that sort of thing but really didn’t have anything to do with biker culture or have any affinity for it — I wasn’t drawn to that prospect or to that possibility. Because Mackay and I had such a good relationship, he invited me to come hang around the shop. At first he’d tattoo me here and there, and I then organically entered into the apprenticeship.

When I started tattooing, it was really hard to convince someone to get traditional tattoos. The style of the time, in magazines or elsewhere was black and grey, fantasy or bikerstyle stuff. People referred to the traditional as “old sailor shit,” and a lot of people thought bad tattoos, technically executed tattoos, were synonymous with sailors. They were contrasting traditional with a lot of Japanese pieces.

When I was there officially, it was for 50 hours a week. There were very stark and dramatic guidelines. Ten hours of that week was devoted to just making needles. You’d solder the needles together — group a small number of needles, solder those and put them on a bar. It took forever.

While most of the places in Tuscon were individual shops, there were a few places with a couple of locations. If there wasn’t a biker owner — meaning they weren’t in a club or with a denomination — the owners were still biker-style guys.

During my apprenticeship, there were six tattooers. Every so often a new one might come and another might go. Just covering their needles and tubes was a lot of actual manual labor. The experience wasn’t simply hovering over people, being a fly on the wall and soaking things up. You had to actually put some grime on your fingers.

There were some people with broader connections to the tattoo world. Dennis Dwyer, who owns a shop called Ancient Art, after J.D. Crow’s Ancient Art in Virginia Beach, worked on some of the early national tattoo conventions. He also had a distribution company. That stimulated the scene in Tucson and helped promote different designs and flash.

It was a huge shop with constant traffic since it was near a lot of bars and open late, and close to the bus station in town. Most of the tattoo designs were picked off the wall, which was covered in Cherry Creek Flash.

My mentor, R.S. Mackay, learned some of the tricks of the trade from Roy Boy, famed for his gregarious personality and video documentation of tattoo culture, and ran with him. He ultimately worked at Prairie Tattoo in Chicago, and shared some of the stories from that time — things done or witnessed in those areas.

The environment itself had an atmosphere of danger. The friends who would hang around had tons of biker attitude, meaning it was brash, crass and had a very machismo attitude and approach to things. The vibe was all about getting it done, working 50 hours — no bullshit kind of stuff. If you weren’t willing to say you’d work 50 hours, you’d be cussed out in a violent way. You had to have very thick bark to exist in that jungle.

232

233

232

233

On balancing hip-hop and tattooing

On embracing hip-hop

When I started getting tattooed, the things I was getting weren’t like a microphone or some sort of bomb piece. I was getting typical tattoos, it wasn’t with the necessity of embodying anything; I liked tattoos, so I wanted tattoos. I didn’t want to bring some element that was not part of that culture.

I grew up in a punk rock household. My father was very involved in the scene here locally. I didn’t want to participate to the same capacity my father did: To be someone singing or playing in a band. I was in it young, at parties until 3 or 4 a.m. at 6 years old, and saw my dad passed out in the corner and had to ask some stranger or friend to help wake him up and take us home. I was repulsed by that community and culture. So I took to rap.

When I started apprenticing, there were also practical reasons to learn to tattoo. I’d done enough work to know I didn’t want to wash dishes forever or work in a kitchen. I didn’t go through school in any traditional way and I didn’t know if I’d have the finances to attend college. I wasn’t allowed to bullshit tattooing. It had to be done correctly. My perspective was that if I wasn’t happy, then it wasn’t worth it. I enjoyed the shop, the people, getting tattooed, learning new things, reading different books by Ed Hardy, or other tattoorelated information. It was a real passion for me.

Rap was something that seemed very intellectual. It was interesting to hear people talk about things artfully and skillfully. I took to it. I wanted to be skillful and the craft became a passion. I didn’t want to be a biker because I thought there would be some irony — and I was in a very hypocritical position — to try and make rap music while being in a club that excludes certain people. I also had no strong interest in the look and fashion of the community.

That passion didn’t exclude my love of music either. In the shop we could listen to whatever the fuck we wanted. If anything, the thing that was freakish about me was that I was an outcast amongst other freaks who were unique in their own ways. I was allowed to thrive in these elements. At the beginning of my apprenticeship, tattooers didn’t follow some sort of a cookie-cutter look or style or persona or attitude. The identity and persona of a tattooer wasn’t really as established as it is now. It attracted, more or less, just subculture types — people with more interests than just wearing a button-up shirt, tucked-in, to a job. It was a little bit blue collar, but alternative in many ways. I wanted to just tattoo right and make the people who were surrounding me, doing tattooing before me, stoked that I was involved in it. For years afterwards, I never prioritized having an identity as a tattooer. This was a job and a way to apply art. The talent was only as useful as being able to profit from it. I wanted to be more known for rapping. I wanted to be known for making good music. It was always on the back burner, it was just a different sense of caring. Tattooing was my welfare but not my love.

234

235

On balancing hip-hop and tattooing

On embracing hip-hop

234

235

On discovering alternative hip-hop I was interested in what would be classified now as New York underground: Smif-N-Wessun, Black Moon, stuff that was very sonically New York. That was criticized here.

After tapes, it was all about collecting CD-Rs. You’d be lucky to get an Aesop Rock CD-R. Anticon stuff was really big for me too — it was really verbose rap but also retardedly strange. My familiarity and my knowledge of punk and other music in my purview made it more exciting to hear stuff like that.

Tucson has a very underdog demeanor. We are in the shadow of Phoenix, and when I was growing up we had this local conflict against people from there. Plus, a lot of our neighborhoods were against each other. Growing up, Tucson was a very fistfightoriented city.

In order to find more, I started seeking things out really early on the internet. You would go to a website, this place sandboxautomatic.com, that was the number one place, write down what you wanted and send it to them with a money order… and just hope you might get some stuff two to three months later.

The competitive nature of the city made everyone very critical of anything that was too different. Bone Thugs was popular here. Gangsta rap was popular, because we are close to the West. Things that were easily accepted that I loved included UGK and OutKast. My cousins and friends were OK with those groups, but I liked them a little more because they seemed more musical; more like the East Coast stuff I was into.

My aim was to become an aficionado with all this digging. I wanted to be really well-skilled and really well-rounded as an MC and as a listener. It was a personal addiction: knowing the most, geeking the most, hearing all the different songs.

Beyond that, the punk rock community liked the things that were packaged or sold to them — Public Enemy and N.W.A were similar to some shit a Suicidal Tendencies fan would listen to. It’s more their vernacular. Feeling like an outcast and isolated made me comfortable with exploring more. There were not a lot of people performing here. It was a very contrived local scene with a very “big fish in a small town” mentality for the early crowd. You couldn’t just go to an open mic and rap. You would be ridiculed or not allowed to do it. One positive was that graffiti culture was strong in Tucson. There were so many different unique, very active participants. The fortunate thing about the big graffiti scene was that you had a “four elements of hip-hop” mentality on the fringes — including breakdancing, DJing, and a lot of freestyle battling. I’d ride the bus and anyone who had baggy jeans or clean sneakers or some other shit — like a tag on their backpack — you’d ask if they rap or battle. I was constantly trying to challenge or battle people on the buses. Whenever any events or venues would host shows, there would always be a b-boy battle, graffiti battle or symposium thing, DJ showcase, and then rap battles. It was always off the top. When I started to really participate, the West Coast underground tape movement was really popular. It was about trying to get a hold of Telegraph Ave or finding the Mystic Journeymen tapes, looking for Living Legends or Coup stuff from the Bay, and then Freestyle Fellowship joints from LA. The Project Blowed and the Goodlife Café scene became attractive.

On adopting (and being wary of) internet culture I found through searching for music that I had a vocabulary for the internet. I knew the steps to acquire stuff; a sort of internal search engine optimization. You wouldn’t have the liner notes or the back of a record or CD sleeve, you wouldn’t have the access to see a show flyer to see who is opening, so you wouldn’t have access to an apparent network. And as such, if you had an additional 30 bucks to buy an additional CD or video, you really had to squeeze the blood from that rock. When I started packaging music, I had ideas about how to distribute or have access, how you would create a back and forth. The DIY was figuring out how to get a hold of manufacturers and how to get on blogs. It was about knowing how to do a marketing campaign but in a very unintended, unassuming way. To succeed today, you use the tenets of the technology in some ways. You know what hashtags are. You know what @ing does or starting a live stream. You know the lexicon and how to speak these things. I am still cautious because I do not want to do something that has a hype mentality. I don’t want to see my influences change because I’m affected by the marketing and conditioning. I’m hyperconscious of my internet usage. How do you exist being a rap dude and being underneath the watchful eye of the president of the Hell’s Angels? Being hyper analytical about myself helps. I don’t want to fall victim to my own ego and accomplishments. I want to evolve and adapt, never be too engineered.

236

237

236

237

When Barack Obama was elected President of the United States in 2008, many saw it as the dawning of a new post-racial era in American history. It was conclusive proof that a nation hypocritically founded upon the principles of democracy and equality by slave owners could finally look at itself in the mirror while invading sovereign states and deposing fairly elected foreign leaders because it had proven to itself that anyone, regardless of color or creed, could ascend to the highest office in the land.

Cape Town’s Finest Words Aleks Eror Photography Vitali Gelwich Styling Fatima Arendse Make-Up Anne Timper Assistant Simon Schreiner Production Klaudia Podsiadlo

Apartheid may be consigned to history, but South Africa is still a nation that carries the scars of its past. Life is hard, but out of struggle inevitably comes creative expression. We traveled to Cape Town to meet the local youth who are turning their daily battles into uplifting creation.

238

Racism, some would have you believe, was over. With hip-hop becoming the new pop, and black people occupying all sorts of positions of influence across society, it appeared that the white power brokers that had ruled supreme over every other ethnic group since the founding of America had finally overcome their bigoted tendencies and learned to tolerate the nation’s pluralistic reality. But then, a mere eight years on, some 60-odd million Americans – some of whom had voted for Obama at least once, sometimes twice – cast their ballots for the unabashedly racist campaign of Donald J. Trump. Just as African Americans didn’t instantaneously achieve the constitutionally-enshrined “equality and justice for all” with the end of slavery, the Obama years didn’t suddenly undo the old hatreds that scar U.S. history. Human beings often confuse landmark achievements with officiality, but even law and legislation sometimes has little bearing on reality because it can’t touch the invisible power structures that shape our world and define our lives. South Africa experienced its own Obama moment back in 1991. The abolishment of apartheid was supposed to mark the beginning of a renaissance for the Rainbow Nation, and although the institutionalized white supremacy that it imposed may have been dismantled, the social disparity and ethnic divisions that it fostered quietly endure. They might not exist in legislature, but they remain rooted in people’s minds and their habits, which inevitably leads to their manifestation in reality. Things are better, but life in South Africa is viciously oppressive for those that aren’t born into white skin and the privilege that usually comes with it. Yet out of hardship inevitably comes inspiration, as it always has throughout time and across borders. When young people don’t have material distractions, they tend to show a greater urgency to create, expressing all their pent-up frustrations in creative forms. South Africa’s youth are no different. Berlin-based photographer, Vitali Gelwich, traveled to Cape Town to peer into the lives of the kids who call it home and turn unforgiving circumstances into creative expression. That expression manifests in various forms: from fashion and music to art and skateboarding, and the intersections where multiple crafts blur into one. South Africa’s tortured history and troubled context has given its youth a unique creative identity. Here they explain in their own words how it has shaped them.

239

Cape Town’s Finest Words Aleks Eror Photography Vitali Gelwich Styling Fatima Arendse Make-Up Anne Timper Assistant Simon Schreiner Production Klaudia Podsiadlo

238

239

Unathi Mkonto - Artist “It instilled a lot of fear in me growing up. Violence somehow does that but somehow this turned around. My art-making process is concerned with the built environment and people. I am always studying and looking at processes to humanize this apartheid-inspired environment. This led to a body of work which explores these buildings, structures, forms and materials.”

Shuaib Philander Founder of Skate Crew 20sk8t “What drives me? The look of pain every day in my people’s eyes begging for money from foreign people in order to go feed whatever it is they be feeding; be it their family, alcohol or drug addiction. I don’t feel any of them have to be in that position in life. The people forming gangs and selling narcotics in order to make a living are keeping our people enslaved. I want to consciously awaken our people and reclaim their space and what is rightfully theirs.”

240

Fatima Arendse - Stylist “Because I’m coloured and not as privileged as most white people, my parents didn’t have a chance to follow their dreams because they were too busy trying to put food on the table. Growing up after apartheid I was introduced to what people of color know best: style. My parents didn’t have a lot of money to buy fresh shit so they were forced to be creative and play around with a sewing machine and make their own shit. That’s how I fell in love with fashion and styling when I was young: I wanted to create and transform that culture that they tried to take away from us.”

242

243

242

243

Ethnique - Singer “I was born in 1995 a year after apartheid ended in our country. I remember people being joyful... together and one with all. The beauty of being able to call anyone from any skin color or social “class” a friend. A lover. A brother or sister. I was young but the ripple effects still caught up to us. Today we see many individuals blaming the harsh rulings of apartheid on their current situations. It was a setback but I believe anyone can find something they love and continue to mold themselves or their talents. I only wish to spread love and light through my craft.”

Quaid aka Queezy - Queer Artist “With the fall of apartheid we were promised a free and equal society. Freedom and equality was meant to be experienced by all. In addition to combating racial segregation, it was also meant to sever oppression based on gender, class, sexuality and religion. In other words, a life free from persecution based on race, gender, sexuality and religion was enshrined in our constitution. This may have changed the law of the land but this has yet to manifest in the hearts and minds of the people who oppress.”

244

245

244

245

HANEEM CHRISTIAN, SANELE XABA, ALESSIA RAMAZZOTTI, ANELE MAROMELA, BANGY, HANA JAYNE, IMRAAN CHRISTIAN, CONWAY OCTOBER

Imraan Christian Artist, Photographer & Videographer “In South Africa, 20 years after apartheid, they call us “Born Frees.” But this term, like the illusion of the Rainbow Nation, has come crumbling in the wake of student uprising, resistance and protest that has firmly placed Generation Z as the real leaders of this country. This Rainbow Nation South Africa is merely apartheid with a facelift — and we will not stand for it, because this is our home, and we have memories of life beyond colonialism. For me, growing up in the hood has taught me many things. Most importantly, the Cape Flats allowed me to appreciate the beauty of struggle; poorer people don’t only suffer, they also create and love and dance and rejoice.”

246

247

HANEEM CHRISTIAN, SANELE XABA, ALESSIA RAMAZZOTTI, ANELE MAROMELA, BANGY, HANA JAYNE, IMRAAN CHRISTIAN, CONWAY OCTOBER

246

247

My first exposure to the musician known as GIRLI was a music video for a song titled “Girl I Met on the Internet.” It depicted a chaotic house party, one that I learned beforehand was entirely real, in which our vociferously talented vocalist acts as tour guide to this raucous festivity in the hopes of meeting her virtual crush IRL. And she is of course, pink. All pink. Pink to her shoes to her nails to her dyed eyebrows. Calling GIRLI striking is a laughable understatement. The artist born as Milly Toomey is like a living, breathing Lisa Frank sticker, but only in the realms of aesthetics. Born, raised, and still-located in North West London, her attitude is one that befits the rich cultural heritage of the area: which is namely, pure unbridled punk rock, punctuated by her own preternatural confidence and open-hearted honesty. No doubt this potent cocktail has something to do with her remarkably young age, one that belies her levelheaded wisdom beyond her 19 years. In a lifetime that has only very recently become “legal,” GIRLI has done more than most people would in decades. She had a foray into political activism, which resulted in her being named the Youth MP, replete with a speech in front of Parliament. She excelled in an enviously high-caliber education system and she is, of course, in the midst of a rapidly ascending career as a formidable pop star.

Girl Talk With GIRLI Words Jake Boyer Photography Vicky Grout

And what a career it is shaping up to be. GIRLI first caught the attention of music bloggers around the world with her debut single “ASBoys,” a track that utilizes the abrasive yet sugary-sweet electronic soundscapes popularized by British label PC Music and describes the utter stupidity of GIRLI’s male peer group. It also lays the groundwork for her entire sound, one that has permeated the aforementioned “Girl I Met on the Internet” and the hyper-self-aware “So You Think You Can Fuck Me With Do Ya.” GIRLI’s latest EP, Feel OK, takes things to a new level with production from the likes of King Henry (Major Lazer, Beyonce), Diztortion and Dimitri Tikovoi, alongside vocals from grime legend Lethal Bizzle. There are a multitude of young women making their way through the music scene, but few have the ability to juggle the aesthetic qualities and thematic concepts that GIRLI seems to have been born with. In combining her queer identity, her role as a young woman in the 21st century, and her politicized status as an artist, she has effectively created a dream-like ideal of the next generation pop star. And the world should best hope it is ready. So I won’t mince words, you’re pretty young. And I understand you live with your parents? I lived with my parents, then I lived in my own flat which was very much my summer of independence. Back with the parents now which isn’t great, but I don’t have to worry about my heating bills now. And they’re okay with the pop star lifestyle? My parents are really cool about those factors; they know what it’s like too. But when I first started going into this world they were quite against it. They wanted me to be safe and be an accountant or something. So it took a bit of convincing, but it’s all good now. Was there a particular moment where you realized that the pop star life was the one for you? I remember being about 14 and I went to this Tegan and Sara concert; it was one of my first gigs. I became so obsessed with them. To me they are the ultimate babes. I told my dad to drop me off at the venue at 8 a.m. so I could get closest to the front. And when they came on it was like I had entered heaven. The audience felt so happy and I was like “aw I want to do that! I want to make people feel this fun.” That was the moment.

Girl Talk With GIRLI Words Jake Boyer Photography Vicky Grout

Do you ever see your young age as a hindrance? Or perhaps an advantage? It’s funny, I think I definitely see it both ways. Obviously people are going to have a hard time treating a girl decked out in pink as seriously as her male counterparts, but that’s just as much of a sexist issue than an age one. But I think my age also gives me an advantage. I feel like I’m able to get away with more — it’s the silver lining of not being taken seriously. I understand that you have some past experience in politics. Do you feel a responsibility to incorporate that into your work? Even if it’s not in the content of my songs I’m always going to be a political person. But I try to ensure that my shows will be somewhat political. I played a show in November where I arranged for a Donald Trump piñata. The thing is: you have a responsibility with your platform. And it can be scary and some people choose not to use it. What’s an issue you care deeply about? With Trump getting into power, the way Americans (and here in the UK too) are viewing immigrants is something that has been on my radar. LGBT rights. I think the fact that Trump was elected has brought everything way, way more into the foreground. Are you worried about the future? I definitely am, it’s scary. But really the only thing we can be is optimistic. Being a young woman with a quickly expanding platform, is there something in particular you’d like to convey to the young women of the world? It would have to be that I am against slut shaming. You have to be confident with who you are, which means wearing what you want and going out and acting like how boys are allowed to act. It really gets on my tits that women aren’t “allowed” to have as many lovers as men or have standards about what they want to wear. Why is it okay for the boys to pull that shit and expect us to be nice about it? Tell me a bit about your creative process. Well I write lyrics all the time, on my notes or on my phone. I like making things but I’m terrible at finishing things. A lot of the time I’ll get really inspired working with other producers. I love nothing more than going into the studio with people I like and we immediately start writing over beats. Even if I’m feeling a bit dry I’ll always write something. It’s like a muscle you have to exercise. Even if you write something that’s a bit shit at least you’ve said something or made something. My first impression on hearing “Girl I Met on the Internet” was that this is coming from a very genuine place of romantic longing. Would you say you long for romance? I’m a very romantic person; I’m a bit of a hopeless romantic actually. I’m the kind of person who is always going to be a victim to people fucking me over. You could say I’m not a very good player — Tinder always weirds me out for instance. So you haven’t had much luck with Tinder dates? I’ve never been on a Tinder date, I never want to either. It literally scares the shit out of me. But I have seen someone online and thought “ooh they’re too beautiful!” It’s a sad little distant love.

I see. So a proper “girl you met on the internet?” Yes, exactly! That song is exactly that feeling. I just find I’m a bit too much. I’ve got too much social anxiety to be proper dating people. And then to have to meet someone just from how they look in a few pictures would actually make me explode with awkwardness. I’m a pretty confident person but absolutely not in that area. Tell me about the music video for that song. I understand that was a real party you threw? I remember thinking that I wanted to have a video with my friends in it, and I wanted it to be a video that’s not the cliche Americanized polished music video party. It had to be like what my friends’ parties are actually like, a squat party. That was what we would do over the summer, throw squat parties where we would switch hands over who would host. So in the video everyone is a friend of mine, none of them are extras. We had a loose narrative going, and the director and I came up with this idea of walking through the party and seeing everything that’s going on. It was a lot of fun but it was crazy; I was the only one who was sober. I had to be a professional while all my friends who signed up for the video shoot got fucking wasted. There were a few casualties who had to be assisted because they were just gone. A few people passed out. And all the parents of your friends haven’t seen this I assume? They’ve seen all the videos actually, they love it. They’ve been sharing it all over their Facebook! They just think, “Ooh great acting.” What’s your idea of the perfect party? A good party just needs really good people. You think it’s going to be great because it’s a big house or there’s loads of alcohol but it’s actually all about the people. My dream party would be one where my friends and I find some massive abandoned mansion and just fuck it up. London’s declining nightlife is a topic you read a lot about these days. What has your experience with it been like? A lot of places getting shut down, it’s tragic. More and more of our nightlife is becoming too banker-friendly. Teenagers are broke and can’t afford it. Even gigs are getting a bit too clean and a bit too nice. I used to go out a lot when I had a fake ID, and all my friends would have to buy me drinks. That was how I was able to play gigs when I was younger. At this point I’d rather just go to a mate’s house and go by our own rules. Wait I’m sorry. You needed a fake ID to play your first gigs? Where did you get it? My mum. Your mum?! Oh yeah, Mama GIRLI bought it for me. She’s a legend. I managed to convince her because I needed it for most of the venues I was playing. I was such a manipulative little shit. So this may seem contrite but why pink? People ask me this all the time but I don’t have an interesting answer. I got really into ‘90s pop music and girl bands and Japanese kawaii fashion. And I started buying things that were pink and started collecting decorations. And then it escalated to dyeing my hair and my eyebrows. Yeah, the eyebrows are striking. Well my hair was pink and my eyebrows were brown and I thought “fuck that.” If you could change one thing about society what would it be? Well it’s a very broad thing to say but I just want everyone to accept each other! I think that would be fucking great! I just don’t understand the “anti” mindset. It amazes me how scared people are of differences. If we could accept that we’re all different and be enthralled in each other’s differences that would really end most of our problems, right? [Editor’s Note: In the weeks following this interview GIRLI moved out on her own again.]

252

Words Anya Firestone

Illustration Clara Lacy

Damaged Goods: The Draw of the [ High-Brand × Street Artist ] Collaboration As graffiti tags mark up handbags and ballgowns, the liaison between luxury labels and street artists marks a critical shift in both fashion and art history. We used an art-theoretical lens to see how a runaway on the runway may paradoxically resurrect, or else bury alive, the heritage of both high and low cultures. 254

If history repeats itself, then art history has painted the same picture time and again: an artist invites in a muse to inspire and elevate his work; Jeff Koons got Lady Gaga just like Vermeer got his girl with a pearl earring. Today, the artist has also become contemporary culture’s own muse, being summoned by fashion and lifestyle brands seeking to enhance their image through his artful input. Some results have been museum- and CFDA Award-worthy: Cindy Sherman extended the eccentricities of COMME des Garçons, Richard Prince’s painted nurses morphed into models giving life to Louis Vuitton, and French conceptual artist Daniel Buren illuminated the house of Hermès with his silky light installations. Yet we find ourselves at a runway crossroads when faced with the most recent expression of the trending [brand x artist] collaboration formula: namely, when a high-end brand turns not to high art, but rather to the street artist, as its collaborative muse. Since the early 2000s, we have seen and felt the rebellious itch scratched onto upscale surfaces: Stephen Sprouse spray-tagged Louis Vuitton’s classic monogram, KONGO’s bubble letters bombed Hermès silk the next decade, GucciGhost haunted Gucci with sardonic graffiti last season, and soon RETNA’s glyphic markings will cover a limited edition cashmere blanket by Hale Harden in the fall of 2017. Few can deny that there is something inherently unsettling, something overtly faux pas, when an old-age institution steeped in glamour and tradition invites in a notorious vandal whose values and aesthetic lie far outside the realm of luxury; quite literally outside. A renegade marking his space with tag and spray seems a world away from a couturier whose tag reads MADE IN ITALY, and whose spray exists only in the form of eau de parfum. If we are to excuse the fashion world for simply following suit with the ebb and flow of the art world, then we might come to terms with one reason why brands pursue street artists more and more. Since the turn of the 21st century, the genre’s domination of visual media has risen both in the institutional and financial sectors; this is evidenced by exhibitions such as the groundbreaking show on the history of graffiti at MoCA in 2011, as well as by six-figure sale points at fairs and auctions worldwide. The same year that Jeff Koon’s Balloon Dog (Orange) sold for a record-breaking $58.4 million at Christie’s New York, the elusive British Street artist Banksy was believed to already have a net worth of $20 million in sales. London gallerist Steven Lazarides, who helped catapult Banksy’s career, notes the genre’s distinctive state today: “I can walk into collectors’ houses and see a Francis Bacon, an Anish Kapoor and a piece of street art.” On behalf of our sanity, and art, we have every right to question when a wheat-paste sticker is peeled off a brick wall, taken to auction, and ends up hanging on a Park Avenue mantlepiece. Even graffiti artists ask the same thing: the day after three of Banksy’s works sold at Sotheby’s London, the artist released

a print drawing depicting a room full of bidders, before a picture that reads I Can’t Believe You Morons Actually Buy This Shit (needless to say, that print later went for sale at Sotheby’s, too). While street art under curation may seem dubious, the oxymoron only intensifies when it comes under collaboration. First, because the artist himself is always an active participant, and secondly, because there exists a brand at the receiving end of that gesture who incorporates the image as part of its own. It is logical that a company with similar roots in genres like hip-hop or a subculture like skateboarding would invite a graffiti artist to design its products. The STASH x Nike Air Force 1s or the Skateroom x ROA decks are just two of countless examples of balanced street-for-street liaisons. Yet in the same 2017 season that DJ Steve Aoki debuted his streetwear line in New York, with pieces by graffitist David Choe (whose “bullet wounded” trenchcoat was worn by skaters, not models), Paris showed us a more questionable rendering of runaway-meets-runway at the house of Dior. Located at the elegant Musée Rodin, and exactly sixty years since Christian Dior debuted his iconic New Look, we encountered a very new look for his brand: A$AP Rocky, the New York hip-hop powerhouse as its newly-enlisted face, donning the house’s latest collaboration of a head-to-toe “Mosh Pit” motif of layered, sweaty bodies by street-artist Dan Witz. Beside him stands creative director Kris Van Assche, who has just posted a Dior skate deck on his Instagram, with a new trending hashtag, #HARDIOR. We pause to deeply consider, like Rodin’s Thinker sculpture in the museum’s garden, the physical, or rather, metaphysical impact of this [brand x art] moment: What results when two disparate entities, with polar opposite energies, originating from fundamentally opposing origins, magnetize towards one another at a prolific rate, and then, poised and ready to collide, explode at Fashion Week, shred the runway, and land next to Anna Wintour’s bob as it nods to the beat of Fashion Killa? It goes without saying that Dior has reigned as one of the most proactive fashion houses of art patronage. In the 1920s, long before his days as a couturier, young Dior was a passionate gallerist who sold works by the likes of Giacometti and Magritte, and was the first to exhibit Dalí’s famous painting of melting clocks, The Persistence of Memory, in 1931. When Dior moved from high art to high-fashion over a decade later, he still turned to the great painters for inspiration, designing looks named for Matisse and Braque in 1947. Since then, the house has maintained a tradition with art on the runway and in its stores: from Raf Simons’ ready-to-wear and haute couture collections featuring Andy Warhol and Sterling Ruby respectively, to the new London flagship by architect Peter Marino, decked with as much contemporary art as merchandise.

255

Words Anya Firestone

Illustration Clara Lacy

255

A renegade marking his space with tag and spray seems a world away from a couturier whose tag reads MADE IN ITALY, and whose spray exists only in the form of eau de parfum. Graffiti. Gangsta. Hip-hop. Street. New York. Why does the French house align itself today with such a radical ethos? Do brands like Dior really need a level of street cred in order to get by, and be bought, in contemporary culture? According to Dior Homme’s artistic director, cultural adaptation is part of the house’s necessary evolutionary process: “Fashion isn’t about taking codes or ideas and simply putting it on today’s stage,” van Assche explains, “it’s about taking them and reinventing them, re-purposing them for today.” To do so, he designed the collection with a heavy lineup of streetart graphics, including paint-splattered sneakers, pieces “embroidered with scars,” “daubed with white paint” and Witz’s work, then enlisted A$AP Rocky to put it all on, emphasizing what the brand notes as the “collection’s rebellious spirit.” Rebellion can be sexy, like Sandra D at the end of Grease. It is also a force that keeps the art world spinning. Many of art history’s most beloved painters began their careers as rule-breakers. El Greco dismissed Michelangelo’s modes of representation and got backlash from Rome just as the 19th century Impressionists revolted against the French Académie des Beaux-Arts: Monet was shamed. Degas was denigrated. Seurat was rejected from the Paris Salon. And in the 20th century, after Dadaists like Duchamp rebelled against art practice by simply exhibiting everyday “Readymade” objects, the second half of the century birthed groups like Minimalists and Post-minimalists, who rebelled not only against previous forms of representation, but forms altogether. Street art takes rebellion even further. Rather than operating against a previous space in art history, it rebels against space itself: the street, sidewalk, subway; the un-institutionalized open road. Since the late sixties, while the genre typically, but not always, manifested a somewhat aggressive aesthetic, it was the art practice itself, the act of making it and putting it down illegally — therein lies the aggression that comes to define the genre. In other words, its ontological existence, what it is to be “street art,” is based less on its content than on its context. The street artist known as “Space Invader,” as its species’ nomenclature, would sum it up. As street art takes shelter, moving inwards into luxury handbags and filtered with hashtags, how can the disruptive genre persist within the determinants of its own existence if its public reception takes place neither on the street nor illicitly? Banksy reasons, “For the sake of keeping all street art where it belongs, I’d encourage people not to buy anything by anybody.” Yet there is something inherently ironic about Banksy’s statement: the notion of “where it belongs.” In fact, the very concept runs

contrary to the sentiments of a true street artist, whose work is most often made under the supposition that it inherently does not belong. While Banksy suggests street art should remain in the spaces it intervenes, can it not, and should it not, intervene in other spaces?

look at it with an art theoretical lens. Namely, it is not just the brand’s declaration that its aura is REAL, but in fact, the artist’s. GucciGhost is actually carrying out the street artist’s mission: to mark territory, to mock culture, to occupy space, to vandalize, as the model carries that gesture down the runway.

The question is phenomenological. And the answer goes beyond a marketing expert’s idea of “authenticity.” Rather, it involves the art-theoretical notion of “the aura,” a concept coined by Walter Benjamin in his seminal essay of 1935, The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. The aura

“A true writer, a true vandal, is going to think that way,” says Will Atkinson, a former street-art gallerist and current director of a high-end design gallery, Maison Gerard. “At the core of street art, it’s the goal to take space in new areas.” Extending this notion, Maison Gerard recently invited Faust to graffiti

helps us to understand why the Mona Lisa is the most famous painting in the entire world, why no copy of it can ever possess the same magnitude: because of the painting’s unique existence in context — who made it, owned it, stole it, saw it, and hung it up. A bootleg Birkin or a forged Basquiat — strap for strap, stroke for stroke — will never be as valuable as the original because it lacks its true circumstance and history, its “aura”; what Benjamin explains as the artwork’s “presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be.”

a twenty-one foot long wall as the backdrop of its art fair booth in the venerable Winter Antiques Show, a prestigious art, antiques, and design fair held in New York City’s posh Park Avenue Armory.

For the street artist, context is everything. “Doing graffiti on a canvas is like domesticating a wild animal” says artist Faust, known for his illicit letters in urban spaces. Yet if the doors a graffitist tagged swing open to an atelier in Paris, why should he not walk in like Alec Monopoly and graffiti his shtick all over the Birkin inside? And if he does, would that aggressive mark on a handbag or even an entire fashion collection, in an ironic twist of events, be the street artist’s greatest bombing? If so, do we deem the brand just ‘a rebel with a KAWS?’ Simply put, the moment the brand gets graffitied in the attempt to be edgy and cool, is it really just getting Punk’d by its edgier, cooler, cultural nemesis? Gucci’s recent 2016 collection consciously, unabashedly and very sarcastically took this moment as momentum. In one of the most clever collaborations between a high-end fashion house and a street artist, its creative director Alessandro Michele tapped ex-Olympic snowboarder Trevor “Trouble” Andrew, AKA GucciGhost, to vandalize the collection with his cartoonish Gucci skulls, ghosts, and fried eggs across furs, sweatshirts, and even the windows of the New York flagship. The collection can be summarized by one piece: a leather tote bag, embossed with the Gucci logo, upon which dripping painted letters intervene, spelling “REAL.” While we can read the “REAL,” most obviously, as the brand’s clever nod to its own history and tumult in a world that has copied and proliferated its logo to exhaustion (fake ‘Guchi’ can be found on the corner of 57th, two blocks away), something else takes place if we

258

“I saw it as an opportunity to turn heads and make an impact in the stodgy setting,” explains Faust on his reason for doing the piece. Choosing “a more nuanced palette” of silvers and grays as opposed to his typical black and white high-contrast works made for the streets, Faust nonetheless guarded the wild spirit of his practice in this collaboration. While his curvaceous dripping letters glimmered and dripped beautifully behind the gallery’s deco pieces, they simultaneously, and cunningly, intervened in their context. Faust explains, “I revisited a piece I originally did on the street in downtown Brooklyn that said It seemed like a good idea at the time in response to the financial crisis of 2008, this time corresponding to the inauguration of Trump.” Appropriately, the fair opened on inauguration day, a few blocks north of Trump Tower; as the Muffys, Vanderbilts, and sable-clad shoppers walked by Ming Dynasty relics and Chippendale mirrors, Faust’s piece perfectly intervened it all. The joke was not on the artist. It was on the space. As we admire the elegance of Faust’s letters shining on the Upper East Side, perhaps we can also rejoice how highend lifestyle, even if being influenced by street, influences the street back. When it comes to quality, a handful of brands are applying the most refined forms of craftsmanship to streetwear and sneakers. KOIO Collective, a newer company to the footwear scene, makes their buttery leather high and low tops in the same Italian factory as Chanel, with a quest to “make a shoe that merged the finest old world craftsmanship with the aesthetic of young New York.” As such, while they elevate the sneaker on a pedestal, quite literally, in their retail space they call a Sneaker Gallery, KOIO will add an artistic edginess in their first upcoming collaboration with tattoo artist JonBoy.

only the highest grade of cashmere yarn, sourced in Italy by its founder Hale Hines. For his first collaboration, Hines tapped his neighbor, graffiti artist RETNA, who previously created pieces for brands like Louis Vuitton, to put his iconic glyphic marks on a cashmere blanket. Positioning the blankets as “tagged and touchable artworks,” only ten will be made, each with a different color palette (and with a high-art five-digit price tag). Hines, with a rebellious grin, notes, “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wanted to touch the art on the walls of museums just because I’m not supposed to.” And now we are here. Standing behind a sign that reads DO NOT TOUCH at the MoMA, next to Dali’s The Persistence of Memory, first exhibited by that young gallerist named Dior. As its melting clocks and herds of ants suggest the passing of time, and with it, decay, we look down to our graffiti splashed sneakers and wonder: how much of Dior’s memory really persists? Is it inevitable that this is where it ends up? What would the ghost of Dior say as his brand lives on without him? Did he smile back at the Mona Lisa while watching Simons’ fifth Dior womenswear runway held at the Musée du Louvre? Perhaps he might even love Dior Homme’s Spring/Summer 2017 collab with Japanese artist Toru Kamei, where blossoming flowers with eyeballs look back at us like Lisa, and even like Dali’s fantastical creatures. Accordingly, he might praise Van Assche today for the Surrealist aspect of the Dan Witz collaboration, too. If so, does this mean that Kanye West really is a divine prophet like he thinks, having chanted Christian Dior Denim Flow years ago? Yet if we take GucciGhost’s skull and crossbones doodle as a greater sign of luxury’s REAL cultural demise, its Fashion Killa proper, how would Saint Laurent react as his house shifts from shift dress by Mondrian to skateboard by Slimane? Would the spirit of Balmain condemn his eponymous brand for keeping up with the Kardashians instead of with his own artistic vision? And what of Monsieur Vuitton, the canvas-trunk maker who worked when Napoleon III reigned supreme: does he roll over in his grave as his monogrammed casket becomes the new canvas for Supreme? And who gets the last laugh? Barbara Kruger? As we exit the MoMA in our $800 high-tops, wondering if we were in fact the morons for actually buying this shit, we can at least go home and sleep well, tucked under a RETNA, knowing that It seemed like a good idea at the time.

Similarly capitalizing on the street-elite fusion, LA brand Hale Harden creates hoodies, T-shirts and beanies entirely from

259

258

Similarly capitalizing on the street-elite fusion, LA brand Hale Harden creates hoodies, T-shirts and beanies entirely from

259

Masthead Issue 14 Publisher

Photographers

Italian Brand Partnerships

David Fischer

Alexander Bortz, Julien Boudet,

Francesca Fregosi, Georgia Gay

Hayley Louisa Brown, Editor-in-Chief

Chris Danforth, Eva Al Desnudo,

Distribution

Pete Williams

Damien Fry, Amber Grace Dixon,

Tabitha Tan

Lydia Garnett, Vitali Gelwich, Executive Editor

Vicky Grout, Thai Hibbert,

Special Thanks

Jeff Carvalho

Scott Howe, Christopher Loa,

ANCHORET, Jordan Boothe,

Dogukan Nesanir,

James Cunningham, Brigette Elder,

Creative Director

Takanori Okuwaki,

Noah Friedman, Tanya Keogh,

Edward Chiu

James Pearson-Howes, Piczo,

Bianca Richter, Guillaume Salmon,

Benjamin Robinson,

Scott A. Sant’Angelo, SHOWStudio,

Art Direction & Design

Mark Routt, Esteban Scott,

Tinder, Gary Warnett

Son Mok

Timothy Schaumburg,

Fashion Director

Nick Thompson, CG Watkins,

Printing

Gavin Watson, Thomas Welch

Feindruckerei

Atip W

feindruckerei.de Head of Production

Managing Editor

Klaudia Podsiadlo

Brock Cardiner

magazine@highsnobiety.com advertising@highsnobiety.com

Producer Editors

Contact

Ufuk Inci

Nico Amarca, Jake Boyer,

HQ Address

Chris Danforth, Jack Drummond,

Head of Brand Partnerships,

Titel Media GmbH

Maddie Holden, Alec Leach,

Europe

Highsnobiety Magazine

Stephanie Smith-Strickland

Ben Hakki

Ritterstrasse 9, 10969 Berlin Germany

Copy Editor

Head of Brand Partnerships,

Peter Suh

North America

Website

Rob Miller

highsnobiety.com

Contributors Aleks Eror, Anya Firestone,

Brand Partnerships Team

Gregk Foley, Steven Fröhlich,

Lindsay Blue, John Flood,

Teddy Kang, Naavin Karimbux,

Caitlin LeRoux, Angus MacEwan,

Clara Lacy, Nick Schonberger,

Tiffany Macquet, Emily Owens,

Rachael J Vick

Kristina Truong

Highsnobiety is a trademark under license from Titel Media GmbH. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is strictly prohibited. All prices and credits are accurate at time of going to press but are subject to change. Manuscripts, photos, drawings and other materials submitted must be accompanied by a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Highsnobiety Magazine cannot be held responsible for any solicited material.

272

273

Masthead Issue 14 Publisher

Photographers

Italian Brand Partnerships

David Fischer

Alexander Bortz, Julien Boudet,

Francesca Fregosi, Georgia Gay

Hayley Louisa Brown, Editor-in-Chief

Chris Danforth, Eva Al Desnudo,

Distribution

Pete Williams

Damien Fry, Amber Grace Dixon,

Tabitha Tan

Lydia Garnett, Vitali Gelwich, Executive Editor

Vicky Grout, Thai Hibbert,

Special Thanks

Jeff Carvalho

Scott Howe, Christopher Loa,

ANCHORET, Jordan Boothe,

Dogukan Nesanir,

James Cunningham, Brigette Elder,

Creative Director

Takanori Okuwaki,

Noah Friedman, Tanya Keogh,

Edward Chiu

James Pearson-Howes, Piczo,

Bianca Richter, Guillaume Salmon,

Benjamin Robinson,

Scott A. Sant’Angelo, SHOWStudio,

Art Direction & Design

Mark Routt, Esteban Scott,

Tinder, Gary Warnett

Son Mok

Timothy Schaumburg,

Fashion Director

Nick Thompson, CG Watkins,

Printing

Gavin Watson, Thomas Welch

Feindruckerei

Atip W

feindruckerei.de Head of Production

Managing Editor

Klaudia Podsiadlo

Brock Cardiner

magazine@highsnobiety.com advertising@highsnobiety.com

Producer Editors

Contact

Ufuk Inci

Nico Amarca, Jake Boyer,

HQ Address

Chris Danforth, Jack Drummond,

Head of Brand Partnerships,

Titel Media GmbH

Maddie Holden, Alec Leach,

Europe

Highsnobiety Magazine

Stephanie Smith-Strickland

Ben Hakki

Ritterstrasse 9, 10969 Berlin Germany

Copy Editor

Head of Brand Partnerships,

Peter Suh

North America

Website

Rob Miller

highsnobiety.com

Contributors Aleks Eror, Anya Firestone,

Brand Partnerships Team

Gregk Foley, Steven Fröhlich,

Lindsay Blue, John Flood,

Teddy Kang, Naavin Karimbux,

Caitlin LeRoux, Angus MacEwan,

Clara Lacy, Nick Schonberger,

Tiffany Macquet, Emily Owens,

Rachael J Vick

Kristina Truong

272

273

*With Apple devices; Requires iCloud account and macOS Sierra, iOS10 or watchOS 3.