Identifying where streetwear started is an easy task to achieve. Trace the origins of the biggest brands across the East Coast, West Coast, and Japan, and you’ll find your answer. Tracing the origins of luxury streetwear provides a particular challenge.
Regular streetwear and luxury apparel both share some similarities. Luxury streetwear emerged from a need for high-quality pieces that maintained streetwear's already-vaunted characteristics. We’ll go into the nuanced history of these pieces, what makes them special, and finish by highlighting our luxury streetwear.
How Does Streetwear Already Resemble Luxury Apparel?
The factors which make streetwear desirable are also part of what makes luxury apparel highly sought-after. These include design features, marketing, and recognition, among other factors.
- Status: There is something special about obtaining something that not everyone can have. Luxury apparel remains an exclusive status symbol, thanks to a particular product's quality and price point.
Streetwear attains this exclusivity due to a variety of reasons. Many streetwear designers put out designs in small batch sizes, making each piece a more unique possession for the wearer.
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Authenticity: No one ever likes being caught with a knock-off, or worse, accidentally investing in one. Luxury brands and exclusive streetwear brands both have name recognition, giving them a further degree of credence. The value that authenticity gives can only be gained through original, quality designs.
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Designer-Oriented: Fast fashion brands are more recognizable by name than by specific designers. Luxury and streetwear brands benefit from a close relationship between designer and consumer. When individual designers are given free rein to work, in either context, the result is streetwear that stands above others.
Where Did Luxury Streetwear Start?
Luxury streetwear started out of a new desire for luxury apparel by popular hip hop artists and other figures. For most award shows and other events, high-profile figures are dressed or sponsored by major fashion brands. These can be pieces given as part of their line or, in the case of special events, custom-designed pieces.
Many fashion houses in the 1980s saw streetwear as being beneath them. It was a minor subculture that had yet to truly enter widespread appreciation. Even when artists wanted to wear more mainstream apparel, many of them were shunned by houses for being off-brand.
Though it now seems impossible, there was once a time when even Beyonce couldn’t find a designer to dress her.
Dapper Dan emerged in the 1980s, as did many other designers, to fill this void. They catered to an audience of high-profile stars in a way that foreshadowed the modern closeness of music and fashion. Once the first luxury brand appeared, others followed for the virtues that luxury fashion exhibits.
Luxury streetwear is now available in many places, including brands that shunned it decades ago. Many luxury designers have introduced streetwear lines that attempt to meld their two worlds. We still believe that the best luxury pieces are to be had from designers dedicated to the virtues of streetwear.
What Makes Streetwear Luxury?
We previously stated that luxury apparel and streetwear fashion have some natural overlap. When they are combined, new trends appear.
The sense of exclusivity that marked luxury apparel and streetwear is made even more extensive. Low batch sizes and a high window of accessibility make the pieces more difficult to come by and worth it.
Luxury streetwear is also associated with unparalleled quality. This includes special designs on the part of the maker and materials beyond the norm. Hefty milled cotton fabrics and performance-boosting, lightweight synthetics both serve to bring luxury to practical aesthetics.
When you reach into the world of luxury it’s also more likely you’ll encounter special offerings. This can include genre-defying jackets, contrast-material panels in standard garments, and basic tees that work as standalone garments.
Streetwear is fundamentally about practical designs that can be worn anywhere. When high-end quality and attention to detail are added, the result is versatile garments that exude excellence everywhere.
What Makes Daniel Patrick Streetwear Luxury?
Daniel Patrick is proud to call ourselves a luxury streetwear brand. In calling ourselves that, we need to define why we are able to easily clear the hurdles of luxury apparel.
- Quality: Excellence is the base standard we hold ourselves to, in all regards. Our founder started Daniel Patrick without a safety net, knowing that anything less than his best was not an option.
We source the overwhelming majority of our fabrics from Los Angeles, our home, and produce them in the same city. This watchfulness helps us always meet our standard for excellence, no matter the context.
- Identity: A strong brand requires a strong identity. We take heavy inspiration from the sportswear side of streetwear. In doing so, we put out carefully styled performance garments.
We take out visual inspiration from the world around us, be it the natural environment or Los Angeles’ cultural richness. We know who we are so that our customers can know who they are buying when they style themselves.
- Exclusivity: Anyone who wants to wear streetwear should be able to. Luxury streetwear, at the same time, comes at a cost necessitated by the care and detailing that gives it value. Unlike brands who’ve excluded cultural figures, we’re happy to have been worn by Beyonce, Justin Bieber, and many others.
A luxury brand isn’t built in a day. It requires constant vigilance, constant growth, and an overarching dedication to searching for the next revolution in style. The end result is a series of garments that anyone can be proud of.
Our Luxury Streetwear Pants
The cutting-edge fusion of style that luxury apparel allows is best introduced by our Parachute Track Pant 2.5. Each pant features a black elastic waistband and a black contrast outseam stripe on each leg.
An additional diagonal stripe along the mid-shin, color-coded in relation to the primary of the pant, adds further highlights. Zipper pockets and matte zippers at each ankle help to create a customized fit for your pants.
The relaxed fit pant also features a blackout Daniel Patrick sports label on the left leg. Sleek comfort is assured thanks to the polyester microfiber which makes up the piece. Full lining adds both to this and to the overarching durability of the pant. Brightly saturated primary colors, cool neutrals, and additional exciting colorways make it a compelling base or pairing piece.
A widely differing appearance is available through our 7 Pocket Cargo pants. Individually milled and dyed denim forms the body of the pant. The nature of the pattern results in a unique and individualized appearance for each piece. Accent paneling at the pockets and knees results in a subtly contrasted pant.
One version of the 7 Pocket Cargo uses desert camo. Another one uses cloud wash denim for an ethereal look. Each version relates back to the natural environment of Los Angeles. Cloud wash denim mimics contrails in the sky, while desert camo reflects the vast natural resilience surrounding the city.
Our Luxury Streetwear Tops
The best apparel requires the best material. We integrate the comfort of cotton and the performance capabilities of synthetic materials in our Tri-Blend Standard Tee.
The blend is 50% polyester for flexibility, 25% cotton for comfort, and 25% rayon for a subtle sheen. The balance of fabrics emphasizes the good in each piece while eliminating the negative characteristics of some fabrics.
The relaxed fit garment fits true to size and features a center seam to upgrade your standard shirt. This makes it an immediately iconic solo piece or an effective layering garment elsewhere.
No set of luxury streetwear apparel would be truly comprehensive without the addition of a graphic tee. The California Wildflowers Tee combines the best of luxury apparel and the best of vintage fashion in this graphic tee. The graphic highlights the natural ecology and mountains surrounding LA with the Daniel Patrick name and a distressed, vintage-style appearance.
The shirt itself impresses thanks to heavyweight jersey material. This gives it a lush softness that perfectly matches the slight oversized fit of the tee. Colorways in neutral and nature-inspired colors like camel, mountain blue, and hunter green make this an environmentally aware streetwear piece.
These four pieces just break the surface of what streetwear has to offer in terms of both shirts and pants. The reality is that any sort of casual, practical piece has a place in streetwear. The style is forever defined both by those who produce it as it is those who wear it.
Where Is Luxury Streetwear Now?
Streetwear started as the essence of DIY fashion by small-scale designers appealing to small, local cultures in metropolitan areas. Its inherent charm led to growing popularity, expanding across the entire globe. This paved the way for luxury streetwear designers to embrace its values and dial them up for quality apparel.
Luxury streetwear bridges the divide between hip street apparel and cool collected high fashion. As long as either style is appreciated, which will be for the foreseeable future, it has an invaluable place.
Sources:
The Rise of Streetwear In Harajuku I The Comm
14 Celebrities Who've Called Out Designers For Refusing To Dress Them I Insider