This week The Guardian published an interesting article on the rise of skateboard brands and clothing to a multimillion dollar business – The Fall and Rise of Skate Chic. They talk about Supreme’s London store opening, Ed Banger Records and Busy P, Jason Dill, Odd Future’s Tyler The Creator and many other topics that we often speak about here. Furthermore they also speak about the sale of Volcom to PPR, the parent company of Gucci and YSL.
In the article they interview Keith Hufnagel of Huf and other tastemakers, designers from the industry. Certainly an interesting read and mainstream take on the trends in our market.
“When Supreme opened its London store this September, the young and well-heeled spilled on to the streets of Soho from a launch party many had queued for hours to get into. Inside, Ed Banger Records label owner and Parisian DJ Busy P rubbed shoulders with legendary skaters such as Jason Dill. This was more than good PR for the New York-based skater brand, recently worn in prolificacy by Odd Future’s Tyler the Creator. This was an event that marked a remarkable change in fortunes for a fashion once largely dismissed as the style concerns of waster teenagers.
Supreme started life in the mid-90s, when New York skating was at an all-time low. Companies were going out of business, skaters couldn’t afford to live off their sponsorship and the sport had developed a reputation for being popular among a nuisance generation of slacker kids. The idea that, a decade down the line, skater fashion would not only occupy a burgeoning corner of the market but also infiltrate high fashion must have seemed absurd. But that is what’s happened.
This spring PPR, the parent company of Gucci and Alexander McQueen, bought the Californian skate company Volcom in a deal worth $607m. The leap in Volcom’s stock to $24.39 from $19.73 when the deal was announced in May even prompted some law firms to take a closer look at it because they claimed shareholders weren’t getting a fair price.”
Read the full article here.
