Broad&Market

“My name is Marie. I’m thirty-one. I’m from Saugerties, New York.”

“What’s your favorite thing on today?”

“Hmm. I think … I think it’s my lipstick.”

“Oh yeah? What shade is — who makes it?”

“It’s actually Wet N’ Wild, like, natural lip stuff. But I decided I’m going to reclaim the lipstick, so…”

“I like it a lot, with the hat and everything. What else … When you get dressed in the morning and you’re naked in your bed or whatever, what do you think about when you put clothes on? Or like, your goal when you’re about to get dressed, if you have one.”

“I mean, I think it’s a combination of being functional, comfortable, and like, sassy? You know.”

“How sassy?”

“Sassy like depending how much attention I want that day.” (laughs)

“Word. On that tip… What’s your current obsession?”

“Hmm. I dunno. I’ve been listening to An Albatross a lot lately.”

“An Albatross? What kind of music is it?”

“It’s kind of like hardcore metal… punk? It’s like this weird combo. Kind of — it’s like, proggy [progressive], and it’s good. Almost poppy. And I like that.”

“When do you listen to it? Like in the morning when you get up or…”

“All day long. I just got an iPod for the first time in my life.” (laughs)

“What do you think about Philadelphians and their clothes and what they wear?”

“In general? I mean, I think that like the Philadelphian hipster scene is pretty pathetic.”

“Yeah? Tell me how.”

“Uh, it’s just really generic. And I don’t know if this has to do with the times that we live in? (laughs at self for coming out with that phrase) I dunno if it’s like this awkward ech time in the decade, or what… But uh, I mean, I’ve lived in a lot of places. I’ve lived in Olympia, Washington, and Portland, I’ve lived in Austin, I’ve lived in New York… [unintelligable] And Philadelphia’s pretty bad.”

“That’s a general consensus.”

“Yeah. But I think that the style in West Philly is a lot better.”

“Is there anything that you like or enjoy about Philadelphians and what they wear? Like oh, they don’t do that where I’m from, or whatever.”

“Mmm. I haven’t really seen anything particularly unique about Philadelphia fashion. At all, really. Like, I … yeah.”

“Okay. Do you have anything that you wanna say to the city? It doesn’t have to be serious or anything.”

“Umm… yeah, I dunno. I love Philadelphia. I came here, to die. So, as much as I hate on your fashion it’s cool.” (laughs)

“Cool.”

I showed these pictures of Marie to my sometimes contributor homeboy Fred, and he came out with this line talking about how much he just loved women that had these masculine essences. I jumped up and said “masculine essence! It’s perfect!” because, well, check out Marie. I myself have been dressing on a masculine tip lately, and recently a friend wrote me saying,

“your masculine clothes fit your body very well, and I like them for that reason. but also for the suggestion of power.”

And that’s sort of how I feel about this masculine essence thing. Marie’s red lips just make it so much more amazing, right?

So today I ended up having a pretty deep conversation with a stranger about something that’s perpetually been on my mind, concerning this site and street fashion blogs in general. Every few months I end up writing something like this, about how I feel concerning Philadelphia and “fashion” and how that plays out in this fair city, and how I wish I had the time or resources or guts to go out and take some different pictures in neighborhoods outside of where I immediately live and commute…

The other day I was interviewed by the City Paper for its upcoming Style Issue (due out March 25th) about where I (and some other bloggers) see fashion going in the next decade. I was hesitant to do the interview, because I don’t ever think about those things. I’m neither a trend-watcher nor someone that travels around the city enough to see the bigger picture of whatever fashion scene exists here. Additionally, I am not concerned with fashion in the sense of industry and the larger consumer market. I’m more into the sociology aspect; how people choose to adorn and present themselves, and what identities they prefer to adopt and perform through clothing and styling.

That said, this website has always been my excuse to talk to interesting-looking people. Since I started it in 2006, I noticed a huge proliferation of street fashion sites from cities around the world. And as many rightfully lament, regardless of the city, the fashion these websites present are all, by and large, representative of the same “global monoculture” (as Momus likes to say). In other words, you will see skinny jeans in every city; you will see Ray Bans, blazers, designer clutches, and other Anglo-European/American dominated fashion norms. The conversation I ended up having today reinforced how true this all can be.

Regardless of my personal objective to take pictures and talk to people I think might be interesting, when I put all that up on this website, the chance for these pictures and other data to become just more consumer fashion magazine noise is pretty high. I can argue that I do this website strictly for my own pleasure, but being the only blog in Philly doing anything like this on a semi-consistent basis, I become (in some small way) a gatekeeper of local fashion. I think we all know, however, that what you see here is hardly representative of the city as a whole, and there are myriad Philadelphia-based fashion bloggers to read to broaden that scope.

Still, perpetuating the objective that all advertising and other persuasive media attempt to do, for you to be a consumer and go out and buy things to recreate the looks of the people you see in pictures, is something I have long felt uneasy about. It’s going to happen, sure. In fact, looking at websites will almost always deliver some amount of insight and inspiration that one later wishes to recreate or remix in some way. And that is how I think things should be — you look at the world around you and feel creatively reinvigorated. Because the alternative, the authoritative voice of the consumer fashion industry, telling you XYZ is the new black, or that this season layers are in (again), is abhorrent. It is so tiring to be constantly surrounded by images, that don’t represent you, that reinforce fictitious stereotypes about your body shape, your hair and face, for the purpose of ultimately conforming you into something that industry can more easily convince you to buy.

As the stranger I spoke with today expressed, there is something to be said for working with what you have, what you find, and creating something good and exciting for yourself out of that. I guess what I want to say is, I’d like this site to be about more than just presenting “fashionable” people. I’d like it to be about the presentation itself, and for you, the reader, to glean from it what you will, keeping yourself in mind, and not the voice of consumer industry.

Post Script: I’d love to hear what other people think about any/all of this, because on my end it is certainly a very lengthy, unfinished thought.

“My name’s Marty. I’m from Massachusetts, the Springfield area. I’m twenty-one.”

“What’s your favorite thing on right now? Or your favorite aspect about how you look right now.”

“My new hair. About a year and a half ago, I had bright red hair, bright red-pink hair. And now I’m coming back to it a second time and it’s a whole new thing. A new experience, a new angle…”

“A new two-thousand ten –”

“Yeah, two-thousand ten, comin on.”

“Sweet. What is your current obsession right now?”

“Beer? Is that appropriate?”

“Sure!”

“Okay. Natty boh [National Bohemian] usually. Maybe PBR [Pabst Blue Ribbon]…”

“Wait, is this on some like, ‘I’m legally drinking beer’ thing or ?”

“Oh, I’ve been drinking for years. Yeah, no, no I’m kidding. I mean, I do have a drink like every day… Actually, I think most of my new obsession is I just moved into a house, and it’s established already with some very good friends, and I’m cleaning and redoing the whole entire thing. It’s an old Victorian, right across from Clark Park. And that’s a lovely thing …”

“Right. Let’s see what else we got. What do you think about — how long have you been living in Philadelphia for?”

“Since July.”

“Okay. What do you think about Philadelphians or what they wear, or things they do that are oh no! or oh yes!”

“Well, I miss — this is not exactly about Philadelphia but Pittsburgh — I miss yinzers, and there are no yinzers here.”

“What are yinzers?”

“Oh, of course! Yinzers are like, Pittsburgh people — It’s called Pittsburghese, cause they’ll stay in Pittsburgh — and ‘yinz’ means ‘you all.’ Yinz goin to the Pirates game?”

“You know about ‘youse’ right?”

“Youse? I’ve heard youse. Yeah. That’s Philly?”

“Yeah. Anyway, go on.”

“Yeah. But uh, Yinzers. I miss them. I miss Steelers clothing. I miss — all the bums in Pittsburgh are usually decked out head to toe in yinz gear. And I don’t see that here. Which is a bummer.”

“You might just not be in the right places yet… That’s all I have to say.”

“It’s possible, it’s possible, yeah. I’m hangin out in West Philly.”

“Yeah. You need to like, go to Frankford Terminal on the El. Like, up either north or south, I think you may find something like that. But yeah… What’s your goal when you get dressed in the morning? Like, you’re in your bed and you’re like, what do I gotta do now?”

“That’s hard…”

“Or like, what are three directives you always have when you get dressed?”

“Well I like to look fun. I like to look [catching? unintelligable], like strange… And that makes people smile. Things like that. Myself smile. And I like pretty dresses. Yay. That’s all.”

“All right.”

Marty is such a fun name! I thought about asking what it was short for, but didn’t want to ruin the intrigue. I really liked how she wore such vivid colors (red and blue) with the neutral sweater and shoes. Does silver count as neutral in this instance? I feel like it should. Everything is just so simple and nice and bright. It felt appropriate for the sun and warmth of the winter day.

Homegirl Kim and her following interview might prompt me to create such a hall-of-fame style tag. As anyone who reads the site regularly, or just scrolls down this front page, you can see I don’t post more than one or two photos of any one person. But Kim just had so many layers of amazing hand-made, found and altered, long-loved stuff on, I was compelled to post the lot of photos this time.

“Your name, your hometown, and your age.”

“My name is Kim, and I’m from Memphis, Tennessee, and I’m twenty-seven.”

“And what’s the favorite thing that you’re wearing right now?”

“I think probably, well I wanna say the geisha hamster hoodie cause my beautiful amazing talented friend made it. But, I was in Kyoto and I went to this antique store, and I spent like five hours in there one day cause it was seriously … All these people in Kyoto will die, and their families, cause they’re Japanese, will throw out everything out that they have. So there’s this clean-out company that does clean-outs for peoples’ houses, and they also have a front, like a thrift store that sells stuff. It’s all this old kimono and things. I found this beautiful safety pin with a piece of bamboo on it, and I fell so in love with it… I feel like I wear it everyday. I’m obsessed. It is my favorite thing.”

“That’s pretty great.”

“There, I said it.”

“What’s your current obsession?”

“Okay. I just came back to Philly to go to grad school, and I’m kind of, my brain is full of that. And also, I like this boy. And I think about it all the time. He’s a really cute dude. He’s like a sweet little Philly boy. And it’s very exciting. The end.”

  
(Reppin with the Tennessee bag, rocking an strawberry sprinkle-dipped Elite Banana mascot keychain on her phone.)

“Okay. What’s your goal when you get dressed in the morning? Like, what are you thinking about — you wake up and you’re like, I’m naked, and I need to put clothes on.”

“First thing, I am always cold, so I need to wear a lot of layers. And I want my clothes to be as tight as possible. And hopefully not match. And that’s the truth.”

“What do you think about, rather, is there anything that Philadelphians do with their clothes, or whatever, that you’re like what’s goin on…, or that you love, or that you wish you would see?”

“Okay. Because I go to school, there’s this thing that I don’t understand, which is girls wearing things that are not pants these days. And like, okay. Jeans? I don’t really do jeans — I have one pair of pants, and they’re not even full length. But in Philly people will wear, I’m like, girl those are stockings. You’re wearing stockings and Uggs, and like a sweatshirt that says ‘Temple’ on it, and I don’t understand. Like, you need pants. Like, some hot pants, or a skirt. Or even a long shirt? They’re wearing black — what is clearly those black American Apparel, like, leggings that are not fucking pants, ya’ll. They’re not pants, babe. Not pants. You look fucking weird. I can see your panny line — you look totally weird.”

“I’ve seen like thin, sheer, like stockings…”

“I don’t approve.”

“And all these dudes are looking at your junk, like I dunno if you really know about that but…”

“And you probably have a camel toe, even.”

“Oof.”

“Okay, things that I love about Philly is that like, girls will totally wear clothes that are basically disposable, from Rainbow and Daffy’s, and Easy Pickins’ and stuff. And I’m like, you know those are like, that’s like basically you’re wearing a paper napkin. You’re gonna get jizz on it at the club and throw it away…

(me crackin up)

“But you know? Hey, Philly, actually if you compare it to New York has a lot of interesting stuff going on because you can just get away with more. You can wear sweatpants with Crocs, and like, a tank-top and have your underwear hangin out, and you’re wearing like a Phillies… Like, your shit looks so busted but everybody likes it cause you’re wearing a Phillies sweatshirt or something. Anything goes, man. But, Philly, everybody — no matter what your body shape, size, age, whatever? You need your clothes to be tighter. The end.”

“Man… That’s perfect.”

This is one of my favorite interviews in recent memory, maybe even ever. I’d like to take some time to articulate exactly why, but I’ll just say right now that it’s in large part to there being so many on-point observations on overall Philly style and behavior.

“Can you tell me your name, and your hometown, and your age, if you want.”

“Sure. I’m Rebecca, from Buffalo, and I’m thirty-one.”

“What’s your favorite thing on?”

“These two cloth buttons that I got at a craft festival where they were teaching us to make buttons. And so, we just had like, all this material out to sew up. So yeah, that’s my favorite.”

“What’s your goal when you get dressed in the morning?”

“Oh, um…”

“And like, keywords for your personal sense of style or look…”

“I definitely like … carnival-nalia stuff. What else … Something like a little, probably a little sexy, a little BDSM stuff. What else … Probably kind of like exciting and a little, hmm. I like a lot of loud brash colors together. So that’s some of it. And the goal — actually I want to entertain myself, but also entertain other folks. There’s not enough fun entertainment out there with how people get dressed up. So those are my goals. Is that enough?”

“Yeah!”

“Good. Okay.”

“And then… Is there anything that you think about Philadelphia fashion that you see, that you hate or love or don’t get, or you’re like … Philadelphia is nuts… Or, any other commentary you have?”

“Yeah, it’s interesting, cause I just moved here from Brooklyn, so I have all this, like, I’m looking for my other weirdos here! And um, it’s interesting because I feel like the people who are dressing kind of fun and experimental, there are fewer of them here than in Brooklyn. But I also feel like the folks who I do see who are doing something really exciting or dressing kind of like … They’re weirder than what I’ve seen in Brooklyn. They’re a little bit more personal and more, like, chancy? Because I think, well, I really actually believe in Brooklyn folks are wonderfully influence by each other, but there’s sometimes less room for personal expression? So I feel like I’ve seen a lot more riskier, chancier stuff here, even though less frequently. But I also like that people don’t wear like all-black here as much.”

“Oh yeah, yeah…”

“That’s like a big scourge of New York. So…”

“It’s true. When I go visit my friends that live up there … Well, that’s an aside.”

“Yeah.”

“Anyway, is there anything you would like to say to Philadelphia or Philadelphians?”

(gets momentarily stuck)

“Oh man, I dunno what I wanna say to all of you yet! But I wanna make it good! Umm…”

“Any shout-outs?”

“Shout-outs, okay. I saw some incredibly beautiful people who were dressed up at a samba show the other night at the Calvary Church, which broke my heart. That was really… That was a gorgeous experience, like dancing and seeing people from behind, and being like, that piece right there is lovely! Those (something) right there are lovely! That V-line in your back is absurd!! So, that was kind of absurd. I had a lot of beautiful fashion moments in that.”

“In the Calvary Church…”

“In the Calvary Church. Yeah, at the Crossroads show. So that was maybe my shoutout. Is that good? I feel like I’m giving you lame-o answers.”

“No, no, they’re great! And your current obsession is what?”

“Things I’m kind of fussing over… One is eugenics. I’m totally fascinated by eugenics right now and I’m freaked out by how many brilliant people were eugenicists. Totally obsessing over sex and disease. That’s something I’m thinking a lot about.”

“In what capacity?”

“Like people finding sickness sexy, and thinking about where those crossovers are. That’s totally intriguing to me right now, like what I’m studying – I’m a sexologist. And um, actually toxic sites. So like, Chernobyl and Love Canal, things like that. I’ve been reading a lot about that. And an ongoing love of squid…”

“Like, eating squid? Looking at squid? Anything?”

“Ingesting squid feels really exciting to me! But also like, just looking and loving and studying up on more squid. And um… I feel like is there any kind of musical excitement that’s in there right now … Um, the new Flaming Lips album, Embryonic, and their release of The Dark Side of the Moon are the two albums I’ve been walking around and like obsessing over.”

“Whoa.”

“Yeah. It’s good news. I would recommend them highly.”

Rebecca! What excellent answers!! I was a fool not to ask for a peek under her green coat, but some part of me wants to refrain from seeing under-outfits in colder seasons such as these.

So I screwed up a whole interview here with Rhoda and her lovely daughter, Eyrin. I keep opening the record function on my phone, not realizing that I have to press the button a second time to actually record. Dammit.

Rhoda, 32, and Eyrin, 5, are both from West Philly (I think you could safely assume anyone waiting for the trolleys at 30th street would be…). Rhoda thinks that Philadelphia should dress more original. saying people here kinda dress like everybody else and don’t take chances. Her favorite thing on was her BCBG dress because she likes their cuts and their fabrics. Her goal when she gets dressed in the morning is to feel like a diva, to be original, and of course, to look good. Eyrin’s favorite thing on was her skirt because she thinks it’s pretty (sequins!). Rhoda’s current obsession was shoes. The types she likes are stilletos, sexy boots, dramatic stuff like that.

Dramatic is right, because as soon as the two of them walked down the stairs to the trolley platform my head was turning. I’m gonna go ahead and say that you don’t really see all-black ensembles in Philly like this. The picture doesn’t show it too well, but Rhoda paired some wonderfully slouchy, chunky socks with slouch boots. Yeah, I don’t think you see that many textured all-black outfits, certainly not heading out to West. Anyway, Rhoda was definitely projecting a diva feel. When I talked to her she was all slow smiles and soothing attitude. And Eryin was, as you can see, cute as a button. I was reaaaally digging the striped tights with the sequin pattern denim skirt. The Uggs in this case are perfect, if you ask me.

About the title of this post… Usually I ride my bike in the city and refrain from riding SEPTA as much as possible. But I was coming back from the airport this time and had luggage and let me just ask … WHY does it take TWENTY minutes for a single 34 trolley to roll through on a Saturday evening? Tell me that.

Anyone in this town that’s ridden the subway on any given day can probably agree there’s a lot of beards in Philadelphia. A lot. This video is a year old. Where have I been?! (Japan…) Made by a Seattle native, it brings to light some finer details about what my friends and I have referred to as “Philly Beards,” which if you don’t know, is showcased below. Please enjoy.

Phillybeard.com presents: The Sunni Beard from Chikodi Chima on Vimeo.

From Chikodi Chima’s Vimeo page:
Philadelphia is known as “the city of brotherly love” and these brothas’ love their beards.

The Sunni Beard is the story of one such beard, which is worn by many of Philadelphia’s Muslim converts, and is a prominent feature of chins, cheeks, and jowls throughout town.

Thanks for making this, dude! It’s wonderful.

School’s been over for a hot minute and currently I’m in Osaka for two weeks over my winter break. No purpose in mind – I just managed to have enough money for a plane ticket to see friends who I won’t be able to meet for a while after. At any rate, I ran into this guy below and a whole chain of good idea-forming events followed after that. No, he’s not in Philly but well, it’s nice to meet people you admire who enjoy what you put out there. Also, that is me on the right …

(I suppose I should mention that many layers does not equal a chubby man. He is quite slender.)

“Can you tell me your name?”

“Nick Currie, aka Momus.”

“And where are you from originally — give us your hometown and how old you are.”

“I guess my hometown would have to have been Edinburgh, but not for years and years. But I’m forty-nine years old. I must be the oldest person you’ve ever interviewed.”

“That’s not true. What’s the favorite thing you’re wearing today?”

“Um, probably the glasses, which are like optha…malogical glasses from a market in Berlin, customized by Hisae, my girlfriend, with little beads that hold them on so I can just sneeze, and when they fall off…”

“No worries?”

“No worries. But they’re very very cheap. It wouldn’t matter if they got broken anyways.”

“Are they – wait – can you see through them?”

“Yeah, I’m short-sighted, so when I wear them I can see pretty well.”

“Okay, cool. What do you think of when you get dressed in the morning? What’s your goal?”

“Well I dress very quickly, but I do bring some ethics to bear. Usually I’m color coordinated, and well just now I’m living out of a suitcase, so I don’t have much choice, but you know, if I have a blue sweater I’ll pick a blue shirt to go with it… Um, but I think when I’m buying clothes I’m also exercising some kind of policy* as we were saying in the cafe. My policy is probably to evoke some kind of otherness and to refute the global monoculture in some way. Like the global monoculture represented by GAP and UNIQLO and the basic, supposedly supercultural, you know — which usually ends up meaning jeans and a black jacket or whatever, and white shoes, you know, running shoes — this global reductive norm is really my enemy. And I’m struggling against it by using other reductive norms like workwear — that’s a bit of a paradox… So workwear, or like, kabuki clothes or gardener’s clothes or peasant’s clothes, or sportswear like golfing wear. Weird kinds of nerdy sportswear, not advanced, high-tech sportswear. So, yeah, in a way I’m just using a weird kind of cut-and-paste, eclectic version of the same kind of reductive clothing that people are wearing. But hopefully with the effect of one of those children’s games where you sort of flip the card and you get a totally different chest and different legs and different hat.”

“Have you ever been yelled at on the street for anything you’ve worn?”

“Well because I wear an eyepatch I get an awful lot of people yelling ‘pirate’ at me. Or kids pointing and saying ‘look a pirate’.”

“Can you tell me your current obsession? Fashion or non-fashion related.”

“Mai buum wa sou-sou desu.” (Nick is using ‘my boom’ which was a phrase from the 90s used for one’s current obsession. Sou-Sou is an amazing clothing/footwear brand based in Kyoto, which actually can be purchased right in Philly at Omoi!)

“Why is that?”

“Because I just got into Sou-Sou in Tokyo and got excited by a store where you can buy tabi shoes and tabi socks (tabi = split-toe) in various colors and patterns. And we’ve just eaten in a cafe which has Sou-Sou decorations. I’m amazed that such a place exists.”

(Wearing layered, unraveling old sweaters of Hisae’s)

And here, my magnificent Japanese phone ran out of recording space for the interview, so we stopped. Just as well. Nick said volumes in his brief commentary on the ‘global reductive norm.’ Additionally, he keeps an outstanding blog (which he says he’s going to stop come February this year) with all sorts of (head-nodding/mind-blowing) commentary and insight on myriad cultural topics. For me, his observations on fashion are so on point, articulating things I have not yet begun to pound out into solid thoughts (read: awesome). He also makes music and writes for various publications. Ask Wikipedia about “Momus” if you are interested.

* the Japanese use of the English word “policy” (ポリシー or porishii) seems to refer more to an individual’s personal statement or life policy. For example a vegetarian could say that their policy is not to eat meat and to respect animals.

“My name is Andre. Hometown, that’s a bit of a tricky one, but I claim the two-one-fifth. I’m twenty-five, actually. Yes, I’m still a baby.”

“What is the favorite thing you have on right now?”

“My favorite thing? Actually? It’s my underwear. I just got new underwear, and they’re like, if you take tights and just cut em above the legs?”

“Whoa, sounds good. So they’re comfortable?”

“They’re the most comfortable things. Absolutely.”

“Where’d you get them?”

“American Eagle Outfitters! Yes. They are dirt cheap and they’re comfy as fuck.”

“Wow. What about your current obsession right now?”

“Boots.”

“I was gonna say! I was like, this dude has nice boots…”

“Yeah, I started wearing boots again for the first time since I dunno, since high school? And I can’t help it. I gotta get mock-toe ones, I gotta get some suede ones, I just picked up some new desert boots, you know? Something with a good toe, with a good style of heel, hammered heel, so…you know. I am obsessed.”

“Lovely. What do you think when you get dressed in the morning? What’s your goal?”

“My goal is to feel good. Plain and simple. You can look great, but if you don’t feel comfortable, your whole day is shot.”

“It’s true! Do you have anything you wish or need to say about Philadelphians and their style?”

“Try harder. Just try harder. Effort. Be honest, even if you’re not successful – effort. That’s all it takes. Just a little bit of thought and a little bit of tryin.”

“Word. I think that’s all the questions I have. Plus your train’s coming.”

“Yeah my train’s coming.”

Man, so this was one of those situations where you’re checking someone out like they look interesting or cute, and then it turns out to be someone you know but haven’t seen in a while. Nuts, right! Anyway, I’m a chump for not getting a close shot of Andre’s boots. They were tight, and I was really feeling his look, considering Andre dressed a little more street back when I saw him last. Not to say dressing street is bad at all (in fact, I’m on a mission to get more of it), but this American Casual/Workwear thing is my favorite vibe as of late. I think if he didn’t have his glasses or piercings, or the beanie slight off-kilter, it wouldn’t have been as good.