Iconic brands are made through, like explained by Holt, sponsorships and cultural icons. Nike for instance, became an iconic brand for being cool sporty and successful, by sponsoring football, nba teams and rappers. All these values are now embedded in the iconic swoosh inspired the greek Goddess. Authors like Naomi Klein outlined many ethical problems embedded in this capitalistic trend. However since the 90’s sportwear’s growing interest in putting logos everywhere, brands from alternative movement ideologically closer to Klein than Nike understood how to play with the notions described by Holt.
HBA for instance, acronym for Hood By Air, is a streetwear/designer brand created by Shayne Oliver in New York around 2006. Oliver, who grew up being as a black gay man in minessota, is representative of the struggles met by plenty Americans that led to the most importants forms of underground cultures. After dropping out of school he started making t-shirts for his friends in new-york to raise some money. Friends which include some of today’s most influential and innovative acts in electronic club music. Artists like Venus X, organiser of the Ghetto Gothik parties, a place where vogue meets sm culture mixed to southern hip-hop. Along with Arca and the label Fade To Mind, their interest for hart-hitting beats and strong patterns and aesthetics all extanded the scheme of the gay underground culture, pushing it beyond outdated flashy clichés like 90’s house parties where everyone is wearing tiny fluoshirts shaking it to happy music, with the aim to “make it normal to be abnormal”.
The brand started to impose itself with oversized t shirts and frontlegs-covered shorts, using androgyn aesthetics into something that looks more like if early 2000’s baggydressed gangsters lived in a apocalyptic close future. Interestingly, rappers openly adopted these new aesthetics. At the end of 2011, A$AP Rocky brought a new interest in high end fashion in hip-hop, with an interest in creators like Raf Simons or Rick Owens rather than Gucci or Louis Vuitton. He was one of the first to wear the brand in his videos which highly participated in the establishment of the new leading hip-hop aesthetics. Another key influence for the establishment of the aesthetic started by Oliver and his friends was the Kanye West’s video of Mercy featuring Pusha-T, 2 Chainz, Kid Cudi and Big Sean. All the artists are in an all white sci-fi influenced room next to a black Lamborghini wearing layed black on black clothes and drapes. Brands like Been Trill or Pyrex (now OFF/WHITE), launched by Virgil Abloh, one of Kanye West’s creative director, followed their oversized aesthetics and abusive use of logos. Since last year, H&M is selling its most classic pieces in long and oversized cuts in addition to the regular one, the “street” division of the brand DIVIDED has many t-shirts and sweaters copying the use of logos as patterns which I am about to explain. What has been very influencial for the streetwear culture beyond the way HBA cutted their clothes is their use of the Logo. Three capitol letters in a simple corporate font. In its most simple form, the logo is used in the middle of a large rectangle (usually a white rectangle over black shirt or the contrary). The logo is used abbundantly and in unusual spots: two on the sleeves, on the bottom or very top of the chest, or even around the chest in full letters. For the pants, just over the foot and for the shorts, all over the top front or just over the knees. By doing so, this underground brand pushes further the use of the logo in the streetwear culture and takes a stand on the propaganda of advertisements globalisation brought to our eyes in every occidental city. They pushed the concept further by hijacking international industries logos into their own, some kind on cultural branding / propaganda 2.0. No advertisements or sponsorships were made for the establishment of HBA: the sponsorship aspect came from artists influential for the underground culture sharing the same mentality than Shayne; those artists would be seen wearing them online by the underground community. The propaganda aspect came from the abusive effect of repetition and modification of existing logos, where the logo becomes the pattern/graphic of the piece itself and the receiver is forced to recognize existing logos all along making the distinction.
HBA shirt containing hijacked logos, for instance Paramount Pictures and Dolby Digital, among many others (all familiar to the receiver even when he doesn’t know what it is supposed to be).
And pushed it even further by applying the logo to underground cultural icons ifluential for their disturbing sounds and aesthetics like Marylin Manson and Aphex Twin. Rather than seeking for sponsoring, endorsement, or making an artist’s official merchandising, they used the artist’s faces as representative of the alternative identity they want to promote.Shayne Oliver is keeping things going, after establishing the brand with the means he had at the time, he is now organising runway shows around the globe for the biggest fashion weeks, trying to push the boundaries in high-end fashion to a new level like he did with streetwear. For instance, the brand started as a male only targeted audience before creating clothes for women but maintaining their spirit and aesthetic approach, redifining the concept of androgyny. Underground gay culture is now joining high-end fashion and extending its social attributes with, for instance, s-m inspired jewelry male models wore with skirts at their last runway in paris.
Bibliography:
Holt, D. B. (2004). How Brands become Icons. The Principles of Cultural Branding. Cambridge Mass.: Harvard Business School Press. (Chapters 1 and 2) (SB HF 5415.153/ SW HF 5415.153)
Klein, N. (1999). No Logo: no space, no choice, no jobs: taking aim at the brand bullies. New York: Picador. (Chapter 1 and 2) (SB HF 5415.152/ SB HF 5415.152, see also https://www.nytimes.com/books/first/k/klein-logo.html)