Philadelphia Street Style: Laura, Sansom St

 "You caught me at my most slobbish," Laura said to me when I stopped her at the corner of Sansom and 17th. "Then I'd love to run into you some time when you're more dressed up," I responded.

In this shot, Laura's wearing an oversized flight jacket from Alpha Industries, a pair of classic checkered Vans, and a pair of sunglasses by Celine. The T-shirt and pants are vintage. Laura described her style to me as "modern," then added "boy" as if for good measure.

Philadelphia Street Style: Nikki, off 4th Street

I stopped Nikki as she was about to step into a tattoo shop on 4th Street to get her elbow done. "It's going to suck!" she told me. But from the number of tattoos she already has, I'm guessing she can take it. 

Philadelphia Street Style: Isaiah, Walnut Street

"I was feeling very Prince today," Isaiah told me, on his way to a photo shoot. He describes his style as "sleek, edgy, and androgynous," all attributes the Purple One embodied like no other. The motorcycle jacket is from a brand called Cooper. Neither of us were familiar with it. We had to check the tag. The pants are J Crew. The boots are Talbots. The choker he picked up from Buffalo Exchange, a partnership with a local jewelry company. 

Philadelphia Street Style: Kat, Walnut and Broad St

Kat has gotten quite adept at recognizing the potential in the clothes her mother no longer wants. That bleached denim jacket was hers. So was the Gap sweater. The jumpsuit she's wearing underneath those, however, she scored at Goodwill. Same skill applied in a different venue. The boots are Doc Martens, though I didn't recognize them as such without the signature yellow stitching. Kat never much cared for that stitching. 

What works so well about this outfit for me is that none of it should work together at all. It is pieced together, almost haphazard. It is not on trend. It is not easily identified as some recognizable type. Instead, it creates its own visual vocabulary.   

Philadelphia Street Style: Monika, Walnut St

Monika described her style to me as "a good mix of '90s, classic style, and a little bit of western minimalism." I'm not sure what western minimalism is, but I'm pretty sure I would like it. 

In this shot, she's wearing Calvin Klein jeans, Guess vintage westerns booties, an American Apparel top, and an Urban Outfitters bag.

Philadelphia Street Style: Lukeja, Walnut St

I first photographed Lukeja back in February of 2013. I didn't recognize her when I saw her walking around Center City the other day. But she remembered me, and reminded me of who she was when I stopped her. Her look, you'll notice, has changed pretty dramatically over the last three years. 

Philadelphia Street Style: Gibbs, Walnut St

Nearly everything Gibbs is wearing in this shot has either been personalized in some significant way or has a personal story attached to it. As an anthropologist, that's exactly what I would want in a photographic subject. The hood, Gibbs told me, they got for $2 at a surplus store in Minnesota. They added the staple pliers patch after working on a puppet show. Staple pliers play an important part in puppetry, apparently. The jacket belonged to Gibbs' friend Max. Gibbs borrowed it, and after Max got used to seeing it on them, he decided they looked better in it than he did. So he gave it to them. The pants, you've probably noticed, are covered in paint, because Gibbs is a painter (though I failed to find out if they're the kind of painter who paints buildings or the kind who paints canvasses). The pants are patched up, Gibbs said, "because I'm broke." Peaking through the jacket is a Siouxsie and the Banshees T-shirt. The googly eyes, Gibbs explained, they started wearing a few years ago. Gibbs was a spider for Halloween and adhered a whole bunch of them to their face. Gibbs liked the effect. So they've been wearing them ever since. But only three, lined up like this. The Doc Martens Gibbs has had for only a couple of years, but they're already falling apart. Gibbs is convinced Docs used to be made better than they currently are. 

When I asked Gibbs how they would describe their style, Gibbs looked pensively off into the distance, placed their hand on their chin and eventually said, "utilitarian."

Philadelphia Street Style: J. off 17th St

"I usually dress way more conservative than this," J. told me, as we stood at the entrance off an alleyway off of 17th St. "I usually dress like a grandmother."

In this shot, she's wearing boots by Nine West, a dress from The Gap, an army coat from Urban Outfitters' mens line, glasses by Retro Super Future, a Banana Republic bag, and a Gap scarf worn as a head dress. She likes to wear it on those days when she can't quite get her hair right. When she first started wearing a head wrap a few years back, she says, it was for style. Now, it's largely to cover up a style that isn't working. 

Philadelphia Street Style: Aubrie, Chestnut St

I could see Aubrie's vintage Liz Claiborne scarf from hundreds of feet away, that classic color-blocked patchwork that Claiborne has made so synonymous with her brand. Funny how a simple pattern of colors can come to represent a designer's entire oeuvre, even items not marked with it. Aubrie has paired the scarf with another vintage Liz Claiborne item, that black topcoat. She's also wearing a black "work trouser" and some black suede boots. The bag is from H&M. 

Aubrie describes her style as "urban street style with a twist." The twist is the most important part, that intangible something that an individual injects into the cultural mix. 

Philadelphia Street Style: Vonnysemaj, Chestnut St

My street style photography has always been circular. I seem to loop back around to a certain core aesthetic, an aesthetic, I might add, that has remained essentially unchanged since the late 1980s: black jacket, tight black pants, band T-shirt, big boots, and a scowl. This is street style as I originally conceived of it, and I'm not ready to let it go.

Fortunately, I can find plenty of people on the streets of Philadelphia who share my aesthetic. Like, for instance, Vonnysemaj, who I waited for outside a CVS when I couldn't quite catch up to her before she went in. Vonnysemaj is rockin' an updated black "bomber jacket" (she can't remember what brand it is or where she picked it up), a Forever 21 Ramones T-shirt, a vintage fanny pack, worn front and center, and boots she got off of ShopJeen.com.  

Now, some of what I just wrote needs some unpacking. First, I put "bomber jacket" in scare quotes, because to me, bomber jacket has always meant something different: one of those soft brown-leather coats fighter pilots wore during World War I and II, and which reemerged in the 1980s as a symbol of mainstream American masculinity. The kind of jacket Vonnysemaj is wearing we called a "flight jacket," and that's still the official name given to the original military-issue MA-1 jacket that inspired the bomber jacket trend. When I was a teenager, these were the preferred jackets of racist skinheads. They were worn with an American flag sewn onto their right sleeve. Kanye probably deserves some credit for bringing them back into public consciousness, as do a number of other streetwear trendsetters who have made "bomber jackets" a staple of any street-savvy wardrobe. Bomber jackets, it seems, have shed their older racist associations, and to do so, they had to undergo another kind of erasure: a changing of their name. We could call this process "re-appropriation." I would be tempted to think of this as the kind of subcultural "semiotic guerrilla warfare" Dick Hebdige glamorized in Subculture: The Meaning of Style, except for two things: 1)There is no longer a singular subculture to whom the jacket belongs. Vonnysemaj, after all, describes her own personal style as "funky, edgy, with lots of leather." She calls it "punk rock slash..." Leaving what comes after the slash unfinished. That incomplete slash speaks volumes. 2) I strongly suspect most of the teens and twenty-somethings I see out on the streets wearing bomber jackets have absolutely no awareness of their former associations. This is semiotic guerrilla warfare without the semiosis. And that, of course, is the beauty of fashion: it strips clothing of context, empties its signifiers of content, so that all that's left is their surface aesthetic. It is a kind of pre-articulate revolution, a slow undoing of a problematic past.

Second, Vonnysemaj is wearing a Ramones T-shirt by Forever 21. Let me write that again, a Ramones T-shirt by Forever 21. When did fast fashion companies become the primary caretakers of rock merchandise? There was a time, not that long ago in the grand scheme of things, when The Ramones were seen as a countercultural force. Now Forever 21 prints thousands of cheap re-issues of their old shirts. Fashion, that is, may be a revolution, but it is a revolution that ends in the bargain bin. It does real semiotic work, but it does so, ultimately, in the service of capital.

Philadelphia Street Style: Charlene, Walnut St

I'm taking a break from posting my pictures from New York Fashion Week. After a while, those images start to get old. All flash and no substance. Clothes that even those adorned in them don't actually wear apart from Fashion Week. I start to get hungry for something more grounded in everyday experience, something that feels more "real" or "authentic." So last Friday, I went out scouting the streets of Philadelphia. That's where I saw Charlene.

She describes her style as "eclectic." "Some days," she says, "I wanna dress up, and I wear a dress. Other times I wanna dress funky, and I wear holey jeans and cowboy boots." In this shot she's wearing a fox fur jacket from Maximilian Furs (go ahead and send me your hate mail, animal rights activists, but I am reporting, not endorsing), Via Spiga suede shoes (off frame), sunglasses which may or may not be Tom Ford, and some off-brand plaid pants.  

Philadelphia Street Style: Daniel, off 4th St

Daniel describes his style as "eclectic and cheap," but those terms could very well describe the style mantra of his entire generation of Philadelphians. Pledging allegiance to some specific subcultural type (say, indie, grunge, or goth) is just so 1990s. Today's stylish consumers are bricoleurs, taking a little bit from here and a little bit from there, and assembling together their own unique configuration of influences. Just so long as it doesn't cost too much. And Daniel's outfit doesn't. That top coat is from Forever 21. The jeans and scarf are both H&M. His shirt is from ASOS. The t-shirt beneath it is from Philadelphia brand Kitten Ace. The shoes, of course, are classic Chuck Taylor Converse All-Stars, the sneaker of choice for all vaguely alternative, non-specific subcultural practitioners. I have a pair. My wife has a pair. You probably do too. Chuck Taylors have pulled off the neat semiotic trick of referring to all subcultures but no one subculture in particular. As such, they fit the stylistic sensibilities of today's youth better than any other shoe could.

Philadelphia Street Style: Mary, Sydenham St

Philadelphia Street Style: Richie, Sydenham St

Photographing Richie for this blog has become—as he pointed out—something of an annual tradition. I first caught him in April of 2013, then in May of 2014. I caught him a little late this year, hence the mid-Autumn light. But I did catch him on the same street! He was walking with his friend Mary, who I will feature on Friday. 

Philadelphia Street Style: Ryogo, Sydenham St

Ryogo and I didn't have the easiest time communicating. He's from Japan and is still working on his English. I had to show him my blog on my iPhone and pantomime with my camera to explain what I wanted from him. I'm glad I went through the effort, though. He has a stylistic sensibility I just don't see that much on the streets of Philly. Or at least, not yet. And I dig those loud-print harem pants. Harem pants—or "drop-crotch joggers" as they are most often called in athleisure streetwear lingo—have already taken the urban centers by storm. I can't wait until they reach middle America. Think of how profoundly they would alter a white frat bro's look! They are by Chai Hane, by the way, a Japanese label I couldn't verify through Google. The shirt, if I understood correctly, is by Harriot Launch Market. The hat is by Grace Hats. The shoes he just slipped out of and checked for me: Camper.

Philadelphia Street Style: Jacquelyn, off 17th St

One of the best things about shooting street style is the people you meet, perfect strangers who take time out of their lives to pose for you and talk with you. Jacquelyn spent nearly half an hour with me, first scouting a good place to shoot and then conversing about her taste in clothes, her feelings about the new Yeezy collection (we both liked it much more than we expected). Every time I go out to shoot, there is one fewer stranger on the street. Philadelphia gets more and more familiar.

Jacquelyn, or Jackie as she's usually called, describes her style as "sleek and dark." She likes brands like All Saints, Vince, Ssense, Kenzo, Helmut Lang, and Alexander Wang, and she cited FKA Twigs as a style inspiration, before acknowledging that it is more the spirit of her style that inspires her than her actual look. Her own style is not visibly influenced by FKA Twigs, except in its audacity.  

In these shots, Jackie is wearing classic Chuck Taylor Converse All Stars, All Saints jeans, an American Apparel sweater and a Marc Jacobs perfecto motorcycle jacket. That jacket was an "investment" piece.Notice the red, white, and blue plaid sleeve extensions in the shot below. When you pay the extra price of high-end labels, those are the details you're paying for. The bag is Prada, by the way, and the glasses are Warby Parker. Jackie has only recently shaved her head. She's still getting used to it, she says, but she wears it with confidence. In fashion, confidence goes a long way.

Philadelphia Street Style: Mayleen, Walnut St

Mayleen says she dresses "like a little boy five days out of the week." But even on the other two days, she prefers to dress comfortably. Yesterday, when I took this shot, that meant a faux army jacket and pair of jeans from H&M. She doesn't remember where the shoes are from, but then, paying careful attention to the names of the brands she's wearing doesn't really seem like Mayleen's thing.  

Old School Philly Street Style: Gianfranco, 15th St

The weather is changing fast. This shot, taken just over a month ago, already feels like days gone by. No more tying the flannel around the waste. 'Tis layering season.

Old School Philly Street Style: Viviana, Walnut St

Viviana, in classic punk fashion, describes her style as "a lot of black." It's a declaration I can get behind. I debate ridding my wardrobe of color practically every week. There's something so cleansing and ascetic about wearing just black, as if you were committing yourself to a simpler, less frivolous life. In this shot—another lo-res film scan—she's wearing a band T-shirt for Code Orange, a skirt from Target and a pair of Ron English X Ubiq Vans. Hey, I was at the launch party for that! 

Old School Philly Street Style: Katie, Walnut St

Another lo-res film scan, shot with my Nikon F4 on Tri-X 400.