Interview: Talking the Politics of Hip-Hop Style with the Director of 'Fresh Dressed'

Images via Dogwoof / CNN Films / Mass Appeal

As well as being a visual record, the film really hits the politics of hip-hop style—especially in the 80s, when you show that how you dressed was the only way many less well-off kids had to express themselves…

It was commissioned by CNN, to be aired on there, so I had to make a film that was engaging for people who aren’t in the world of hip-hop. But I don’t think you can tell any kind of hip-hop story without touching on politics. That fashion in the film is a reaction to where folks are in society. If you flash forward to now, you have Kanye and Pharrell—where are these guys in society? Kanye is saying it’s not about race any more, it's about class. I think that’s true for him. He’s transcended so much, he’s battling class issues I’m sure. But the average African American or Latino young person in the inner city, they’re dealing with more than class.

In the second half of the film, you move into telling the stories of Sean John, FUBU, Wu Wear, etc. They faced a lot of issues of not being accepted in the fashion world, in mainstream stores, or ‘urban’ customers being deemed ‘undesirable’, but do you feel at all that with this focus of the business world that they’d lost that connection to the street? 

Again, it’s a reflection of where hip-hop was at that moment. By the time those brands started to happen, it wasn’t just in the streets anymore. Kids in Budapest were wearing Ruff Ryder jeans. Of course I could have stayed on a core hip-hop fashion story, but I felt that whole entrepreneurial side, that movement into fashion, that story hadn’t been told. And it is an important one for folks of colour. There’s a bit where Karl Kani tells the story of talking to Tupac and asking him how much he’s charge him {to model in an advert}, and Tupac says “I won’t charge you, you’re black.” I felt that was a story people needed to hear. You hear so much about how black people aren’t on the same page, they don’t look out for each other, but there was this period with a level of comradery and looking out for one another.

The running time actually splits quite evenly between the 80s and 90s eras…

I wanted it to be chronological, so people saw how it evolved. When you go from slavery to the south Bronx to a gang truce…you can see how it went from {slaves being told} “Sunday best, look good, worship a foreign God”. Then South Bronx, another intense situation. Gang jackets, then Dapper Dan and the crack era, and new money being made. And how the crack dealers and the rappers wanted to be on par with the people who wore Louis, Gucci and Prada. You can see the evolution of hip-hop through the fashion, which is what I wanted to do.

Since you brought it up, what was it like interview Dapper Dan? It seems like a very entertaining guy…

I didn’t know him until we made the film. We spent a couple of days with him, he’s just a really colourful character, he has so much energy and charisma. There’s the moment in the film where he says he “blackenized” {the high end brands}. What do him, or Thirstin Howl, or Daymond John have is common? They’re huge characters. And that is just hip-hop. It’s about being a larger than life figure with opinions and style and personality.

Dapper Dan was taking high end fashion like Gucci and Louis Vuitton and ‘remixing’ it into streetwear—now all those labels are trying to make their own streetwear themselves. He ended up being raided by the authorities and forced to shut down, but why do you think one of them didn’t just hire him to work for them instead? He was so ahead of the curve, it seems like a no-brainer…

Because hip-hop was still scary then. And you’re dealing with older folks from a different era not used to dealing with black people from the ghetto. Then you flash forward to Ricardo Tisci—here’s a guy who grew up with hip-hop. He’s very proud to say he was the first person in Italy to have hip-hop fashion. I don’t even know if it’s true, but here’s this important figure in fashion who’s claiming hip-hop! That’s the difference.

The film ends with two nods to the future: one, that the internet is breaking down style tribes; and the other that the acceptance of homosexuality, both in society in general and in hip-hop in particular, is really going to push the fashion forward.

I think the internet has changed things greatly. In New York, you used to be able to tell whether someone was from the Queens or the Bronx just on the way they were dressed. It’s really had to do that now (and I’m not just saying that because I’m an old guy!). Before, Nike and Puma would release particular colours in the Bronx, and then different ones in Queens. And people didn’t travel as much, so that’s how you knew. But now stuff is available, not just on the internet but generally, sneaker brands have gotten hip. The choices young people have in what they can wear… Technology and access has definitely changed the way people dress. Even if you don’t leave your neighbourhood, you’re still travelling far online.

And then in terms of sexuality, definitely. From what I can see, there all these new definitions of how people want to be categorised sexually, if at all. So with that movement coming up, and hip-hop growing to be more accepting of homosexuality, I think within generations it’ll be a completely different thing.