Phillip D. Johnson feels that the hip-hop scene may be recycling its designs, based on what he saw at NABRU for fall 2003—but even then, there were shining stars

PHOTOGRAPHED BY RICHARD SPIEGEL AND YOHANCE DELOATCH/SILVERPOSES

TOP LEFT AND CENTRE: Pass the Roc. TOP RIGHT: Madsoul. SECOND ROW, LEFT: PNB Nation. SECOND ROW, RIGHT AND ABOVE: Stall and Dean. RIGHT: Davoucci.

HE REALIZATION that the urban, hip-hop fashion genre is at a major creative impasse came to me while I was attending SilverPoses’ NABRU fall 2003 ‘Fashion Experience’ on March 29 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in New York’s Times Square. Hip-hop urban fashion really came into its own in the 1990s, and much like the music, it reflected a certain sensibility that spread to other segments of American society where it found a receptive audience. But it is a fact that of life that, whether it is a clothing line or someone who has been in a professional position for a while, everything and everyone must evolve and change with the times. And unfortunately, based on what I saw at NABRU fall 2003, the majority of the companies showing their wares are either dead in the water or regurgitating their old hits under the heading of “new and improved”.
   And in a somewhat related story in The New York Times, it was reported that mainstream companies such as Juicy Couture have appropriated the signature hip-hip look, the tracksuit, reworked the basic formula (hooded sweatshirt with zippered front, tank top, slouchy trousers slung low on the hips), turning it into ‘upscale workout gear’ with the ‘soft comfort of a bathrobe and making it work for the street.’*
   David Wolfe, creative director of the Doneger Group, nicknamed the look ‘The love child of casual and comfort wear [whose] ubiquity in recent months represents a crescendo in the casuali­zation of the nation’, while others cred­ited its popularity to the California–west coast health and fitness culture. Well, the look came primarily from African–American culture, but it took companies such as (Gela Taylor and Pam Skaist-Levy of) Juicy Couture, Donna Karan Spa, Nike, Yohji Yamamoto for Adidas, Michael Kors, Jean-Paul Gaultier and other high-end designers to turn it, according to Mr Wolfe, into the ‘21st-century version of the housedress’.
   This is just one example of where hip-hop fashion missed the boat and the reason behind my disappointment at the NABRU fashion showcase, but there are so many others.

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At NABRU fall 2003, the majority of the companies showing their wares are either dead in the water or regurgitating their old hits under the heading of “new and improved”

* La Ferla: ‘The Ever-So-Elegant Tracksuit’, The New York Times, Fashion section, April 1, 2003.