Street Culture is alive, is Streetwear dead?
Let's start by saying that street culture and streetwear are two distinctly different propositions. Streetwear is a fashion apparel type of dress inspired by American workwear, Hip Hop culture and sports style. That “uniform” includes bold graphics, hoodies, sneakers, baggie pants, and baseball caps. Streetwear typically elevates casual styles rooted in those spaces with better fabrics, cuts and finishes. Streetwear has been around since the 1980's, with Stussy being one of the first to elevate sports style and Supreme and Bape following.
I worked with Stussy as a photographer and producer for over a decade and watched the evolution. This image is from a shoot I produced in Tokyo with Juergen Teller with clothing designed by Paul Mittleman. Paul was instrumental in connecting surf culture to street culture. He was a graphic designer, clothing designer and DJ at Nells in NYC. He met Shawn Stussy and started bringing Shawn to New York City and London, then starting the now iconic Stussy Tribe.
Paul then went on to be the Creative Director and designer for Stussy for over 15 years before he went to adidas to work with Kanye West and Pharrell Williams on their huge projects. A lot of people don’t realize the intersectionality of street culture to streetwear. Shawn Stussy-Michael Kopelman-James Jebbia-Eddie Cruz-Hiroshi Fujiwara were all connected before through Stussy and continue to be friends. Hiroshi and Michael were DJ’s and cultural figures way before they started working in fashion, at the time, Supreme didn’t exist until 1994 and James owned Union NYC.
Street culture is a global phenomenon that brings like minded, urban dwelling, individuals together around subcultures informed by music, style, design, art and global sports. Street culture thrives underground, it is not commercial. Vivienne Westwood prophetically said, “The moment something becomes mainstream, it’s over for me. I’m always looking for the next thing.” Streetwear has always been male dominated, but Vivienne had a huge influence on fashion, street culture and streetwear and is one of the few women, along with Katherine Hamnett, that had a seat at the table back then.
Her early punk designs and store SEX were revolutionary, connecting to punk music through the Sex Pistols. She is the godmother of streetculture. Street culture legend Hiroshi Fujiwara has one of the biggest Westwood collections of her archive in the world. Jun Takahashi from Undercover and Hiroshi did a book in 2004 called Let it Rock, Sex, and Seditionaries documenting the collection which is now very collectable as there were only 1500 printed. Vivienne was hugely influential in both streetwear and culture.
The last few years streetwear has been scaling becoming one of the biggest global fashion movements. Unfortunately, it got trendy, being embraced by luxury brands and mall consumers leading to oversaturation. That mainstreaming and lack of luxury authenticity has ultimately led to its demise. If there is no story or connection to community, then you will likely fail in culture.
The sneaker and streetwear industry is definately going through a recession. Today The Hundreds announced their store on Fairfax ave in LA will close after 20 years. Supreme left the block a couple of years ago to move into the Tower Records space on Sunset. Nike stock is down 50%, even Hoka which is owned by Deckers and was killing it for a while has reached a plateau. Deckers stock underperformed the market and has fallen over $55 bucks a share in the last 3 months. Adidas is doing pretty good, but the stock has not recovered to its pre-pandemic high of $192 in five years.
Things have changed in the last 5 years, we went through the pandemic, inflation is hurting purchasing power, and a lot of Gen Z and Millennial consumers are underemployed. In addition to that, there are too many choices, too many ads, too many drops. All this led to an unsustainable cycle and lowered demand. Add to that the luxury adoption of streetwear, the main-streamification of streetwear and the grey market all contributed to that. When there is too much, no one wants it.
The good news is that street culture is not going anywhere. Culture continues to push innovation and is happening in youth and subversive communities all over the world as we speak. Youth communities that live in key culture cities like LA, NYC, London, Tokyo are still pushing culture and will continue to do so. That is where street dance & sports, music subgenres, and style culture is happening. Creative people like to make things, and disrupt things. You can see the evolution on social media. Urban sports are being disrupted by influencers and athletes that are pushing boundaries. Look at Nigel Sylvester and Obloxkz, they define what the “cultural” athlete of today is.
An athlete inventing and disrupting sports with massive social followings. They don’t need to stand on a podium to make an impact. They sit front row at fashion weeks and are gifted limited edition products by the likes of LVMH, Nike and Oakley.
In music it is the same. Take the Latin explosion and EDM festival culture for example. EDM music is now the largest genre of music in youth culture, eclipsing hip hop. It has aligned itself with pop music and has the power to make old stars like Stevie Nicks, Tears for Fears and Tori Amos relevant again. Just remix a track with house by Calvin Harris, Kascade, Todd Terry or Martin Garrix and its hot again.
Smart Rappers like Waka Flocka Flame are making EDM rap albums. Social media like Reels and Tik Tok is still driving music virality and trends and will continue to do so for now.
Activism is becoming a bigger part of street culture. Gen Z cares about social justice, the planet and equal rights. The current hard right politcal climate of populism trading on fear and cultural ideaology has spawned cultural stars to take a stand. Bad Bunny has used his platform for his activism to make a political statement to support his country and play in other genres. DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS (I Should Have Taken More Photos) is full of nostalgia.No one thought he could do it, and yet, he’s killing it. Headlining the SNL 50th anniversary along with stars like Sabrina Carpenter and Little Wayne. This is what happens when an artist uses his platform for good, he can make significant change and help his community.
Adidas did good signing someone who has a rising star and will bring the brand with them into their community authentically. Kanye West should take note, don’t bite the hands that feed you and don’t use your platform for darkness. Hate is never in style. Streetwear will continue because it is and always was the uniform of youth. Street culture is all about freedom of expression, creativity and humanity and that will never go out of style.
