The Limitless Land of Streetwear

Streetwear is a movement. 

It is meant to inspire and educate. To teach and circulate. 

When you see a graphic tee or a distressed pair of pants that have been torn in some places, you complacently think out loud, “I can do that too.” Honey, that’s the point of it; you should. Streetwear was started with the mindset of making it accessible. If you cannot buy a skirt from the Unreborn Project, make one! It’s about taking a piece, reworking it, and giving it back. The inception doesn’t have to begin from scratch; you can continue the lineage of an old garment, a fabric, a design you saw on the Internet, anything. When someone puts their prowess on the internet, they are genuinely or indirectly paving the way for everyone who comes across their work to experiment. Consuming content to try to fathom what you see doesn’t come easily to everyone. Juggling the balls quickly to satisfy your brain and get an epiphany that will push you to do something is the end game, I think. 

“Following” streetwear will feed you with multiple iterations of the same concept, which eventually raises the whole argument of “what is original?” I mean, Raf Simons said that Virgil Abloh doesn’t bring anything original to the table and I know a whole cohort of brilliant individuals (I’m first in line) who will strongly disagree with the statement. Streetwear is a huge silver pot in which you can throw in old and new ideas, cheap garments, temporary techniques, basic art supplies, visual information you are fond of, your favortie fonts and colors and just… cook. Calling it ‘easy’ and ‘unnecessarily expensive’ is the highest form of insult. Years of nostalgia, learning, and ambition go into this. Streetwear has networks to it; hip-hop, skateboarding, graffitis, irony, humour, photography, graphic design—these are all paths that will lead you to the world of streetwear. The aim isn’t always to have a newborn idea and create it from scratch, you are allowed to simply take things forward with your concepts. Editing and reconstructing according to your vision by giving an apparel a new mirror to look into is valid. Down the road, your communication matters- bringing in irony, humour, satire and sometimes even propaganda makes you relatable; it helps to form a connection. 

An insanely important motive of streetwear is the youth and their covet to grab everything that infatuates them. It is here to drive and be driven by the youth. In my honestly humble and not-open-to-interpretation opinion, Virgil was the first real voice of Streetwear. He was doing it all for his 17-year-old self, and he knew nothing would make that version of him more proud than stepping into the movement of Streetwear and steering it in the right direction. 

You can do this thing on a laptop. You can do this with a tee from your sibling’s closet from 10 years ago. You can do this thing with a bunch of disposable cans & bottle caps. Or just by having an explicit, blunt, and satirical state of mind like that of Gabriel Whaley of MSCHF. 

The movement has escalated nicely over the years. When it began, it did so because the other genres of fashion were lacking a flag of liberty. In couture, you have to own an atelier; in Athleisure, you have to work with certain fabrics and structures to provide utility; RTW has to be mass produced and in finished condition, available to all. Streetwear is the grass that is always greener because it is, in fact, on the other side. There are barely any guidelines to follow except your gut and creativity. Why else did Gucci team up with Supreme? Or why did the Balenciaga x Kering hoodie blow up? It’s looked upto with aspiration and respect to peak. It’s the perfect amalgamation of all things original and edited.