Random Fashion Thoughts (Part 3: Style farmer strikes back) - our general discussion thread

[dieworkwear]

I realize it’s easier through a web shop, but if they can’t get it together to deduct VAT, it’s just not worth it for me.

$450 for a down jacket seems like an incredible deal though? Especially in that style?

 

[thatboyo]

I understand it takes time and money to set up but from my POV if you plan on sticking around long term, it seems like a no brainer, and not just because the world is more digital.

Also, VAT thing is weird since there are a few retailers that blame it on shopify or whatever platform they're on. That said, I would also cop that orange one for $450 if they carried a small.

 

[Alexidb]

I realize it’s easier through a web shop, but if they can’t get it together to deduct VAT, it’s just not worth it for me.

It’s also illegal.

 

[K. Nights]

It’s also illegal.

I don't think it is, actually. The shipper isn't obligated to remove VAT, it just makes their goods more competitive if they do. Quite a few small retailers don't do it because they have to provide documentation to the government showing that the goods were shipped overseas which requires extra labor on their part. If they don't have a lot of international sales, it might not be worth it for them

 

[dieworkwear]

"Yes, officer? I'd like to report a VAT crime"

 

[cyc wid it]

^ is this from Pitti? I'm not sure if I'd be disgusted or impressed if that hat was a detachable part of the varsity.

 

[dieworkwear]

^ is this from Pitti? I'm not sure if I'd be disgusted or impressed if that hat was a detachable part of the varsity.

Actually don't know. Found it through a quick Google search.

 

[double00]

neither here nor there (that hat is great btw) but has anybody else noticed google search isn't as effective as it used to be?

 

[peachfuzzmcgee]

I always wondered if only I was imagining that was the case or not. I feel like whenever I google anything only the first maybe 3 links are relevant. I'm more likely to go to a library pre-covid to get info on something. Although for generic questions and product reviews, I feel it's the same as always.

Since Im having trouble googling it actually, does anyone have any cool recommendations on coffee table books with a lot of pictures that focus on street photography from different decades. Particularly 50 to 90's. It doesn't matter if it is a specific location or subculture. I've been talking to my immigrant parents on the influence tv and radio had on their early fashion and it got me interested in finding stuff like that.

Apparently my no nonsense curmudgeon of a dad was wearing flares and long hair back in the late sixties even in rural central Mexico and it has me curious of people around the world and the effect mass media has had on our "looks".

 

[ultraExtendo]

^^What year is that fit from?

You're not the only one, Google search was great then over the last few years it got worse and worse. Sometimes I'll be really specific with a search and I could get a page full of irrelevant results. God forbid trying to find anything useful on the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th page...

I think part of it has to do with some page rank manipulation along with Google showing you results they want you to see rather than what you actually want to see.

 

[cb200]

I've tried to switch to duck duck go for more searches. Still have the reflex to head to google... duckduckgo seems like a good alternative with a dumb name.

olive green jacket men at DuckDuckGo

duckduckgo.com

 

[blacklight]

This was an interesting read by @dieworkwear

Streetwear From Above — Die, Workwear!

In 1994, advertising executive Donald Rifkin came up with a new installment for Coca-Cola’s “Obey Your Thirst” campaign, designed to promote the company’s sparkling lemon-lime beverage Sprite. In the commercial, a young white teen with an unfortunate center-part haircut wrestles with one of...

dieworkwear.com

I think what all this gets at but doesn't really say is that the notion of "streetwear" is largely a middle/upper-income construction of what we're supposed to look like.

When I was in high school in the early 2010s it wasn't the black kids at my competitive public high school who were the trendsetters as far as "streetwear" went, but the moneyed white kids and enterprising Asian kids who were the most rabid collectors of the sneakers and collabs we weren't aware of or couldn't afford. Wanted to see Supreme? White kids. Yeezy Blinks? Asian kids. And when you think about it, it makes sense. Shit, I had classmates who were deeply racist while being obsessed with stuff like SBs, which makes perfect sense now but didn't as a 13 year old. The comments on articles over at HB are often pretty in line with wealthy liberal/centrist talking points on street culture despite those same people being crazed over stuff street urchins made cool.

What this fostered, I think, and what has never really been critically captured by the likes of Complex is the extent to which the rise of internet streetwear culture created a sort of ouroboros effect in who was copying who. The Asian and white kids were never really copying us, they were copying their favorite rappers, skaters, etc., and we in turn, seeing that we were losing ground as being on the cutting-edge began to copy them when we followed them to Supreme and Icecream after school. When you look at the old Streetsnaps or myriad photobooks focusing on "urban" style, it's never actually images of the people who come to mind when you first think inner-city. It's almost always either peripheral influencer girls in oversized sweats or clean cut guys in their 30s in outfits where everything fits well. This is a large part of why that ALD lookbook of the kids in the puffer jackets was so celebrated, because for the first time many of us could remember there was a brand that was centering in a campaign the kids responsible for the aesthetics they traffic in.

At this point I'd argue that the appeal of streetwear at this point isn't even aligning oneself with those subcultures (this takes time and effort) but aligning oneself with the brands (just takes a credit card.)

 

[zissou]

$450 for a down jacket seems like an incredible deal though? Especially in that style?

Give me a little time to think about how it’s a great repro of the original Kara Koram blah blah blah and the inevitable envy of my fellow outdoor apparel student nerd friends and I’m sure I’ll come around...

Actually don't know. Found it through a quick Google search.

Makes me wonder what on Earth you were searching for to come up with that.

 

[dieworkwear]

This was an interesting read by @dieworkwear

Streetwear From Above — Die, Workwear!

In 1994, advertising executive Donald Rifkin came up with a new installment for Coca-Cola’s “Obey Your Thirst” campaign, designed to promote the company’s sparkling lemon-lime beverage Sprite. In the commercial, a young white teen with an unfortunate center-part haircut wrestles with one of...

dieworkwear.com

I think what all this gets at but doesn't really say is that the notion of "streetwear" is largely a middle/upper-income construction of what we're supposed to look like.

When I was in high school in the early 2010s it wasn't the black kids at my competitive public high school who were the trendsetters as far as "streetwear" went, but the moneyed white kids and enterprising Asian kids who were the most rabid collectors of the sneakers and collabs we weren't aware of or couldn't afford. Wanted to see Supreme? White kids. Yeezy Blinks? Asian kids. And when you think about it, it makes sense. Shit, I had classmates who were deeply racist while being obsessed with stuff like SBs, which makes perfect sense now but didn't as a 13 year old. The comments on articles over at HB are often pretty in line with wealthy liberal/centrist talking points on street culture despite those same people being crazed over stuff street urchins made cool.

What this fostered, I think, and what has never really been critically captured by the likes of Complex is the extent to which the rise of internet streetwear culture created a sort of ouroboros effect in who was copying who. The Asian and white kids were never really copying us, they were copying their favorite rappers, skaters, etc., and we in turn, seeing that we were losing ground as being on the cutting-edge began to copy them when we followed them to Supreme and Icecream after school. When you look at the old Streetsnaps or myriad photobooks focusing on "urban" style, it's never actually images of the people who come to mind when you first think inner-city. It's almost always either peripheral influencer girls in oversized sweats or clean cut guys in their 30s in outfits where everything fits well. This is a large part of why that ALD lookbook of the kids in the puffer jackets was so celebrated, because for the first time many of us could remember there was a brand that was centering in a campaign the kids responsible for the aesthetics they traffic in.

At this point I'd argue that the appeal of streetwear at this point isn't even aligning oneself with those subcultures (this takes time and effort) but aligning oneself with the brands (just takes a credit card.)

Hm, that's a good point. I hadn't thought of that.

I grew up with streetwear in the 90s and I think people still dressed like their favorite rappers and skateboarders. But it was deeply uncool to like something or someone if they were popular (whether because popular music was objectively bad, or because there was social cache in hating something popular, who knows). So you dressed like your favorite figures in the underground cultural scene.

For guys who were obsessive about Polo, at least for the guys I knew, that typically meant dancers in the local club scene. Some guys were just collectors -- like, that's what they did, collect clothes. But most guys were into some kind of activity beyond clothes, and the clothes became cool partly because those guys had cultural capital.

I also remember around that time, it was considered deeply uncool to buy Polo. Buying the stuff suggested that you were wealthy and from the suburbs, which was considered not cool. If you wanted that sort of cultural capital, you had to steal your clothes (along with most other things coveted at the time). Some suburban kids stole stuff, but many purchased stuff. Nearly all the cooler inner-city kids stole their stuff, which again increased their cultural capital in that community.

I remember being surprised in the early aughts when I started to hear about people buying and selling Polo on eBay. I heard some kids in Japan were buying it. It just seemed strange to me, like something that was considered taboo before. Also feel like sneaker culture started to become a standalone thing back then -- like that could be your thing, you just collect sneakers. Maybe that's when money started being more of a leverage for cultural capital in that scene.

 

[cb200]

Nice read DWW. Loved the Stussy Tribe pics.
Wish more rock stars aged like Mick.

I still throw on Big Audio Dynamite albums every now and then.