“I wanted to bring the skate park to the runway,” said Steve Aoki, the DJ, record label owner and designer who has spent the last year and a half prepping Dim Mak, the apparel line he’s produced and sold in Japan, for the U.S. market.
Since being active is a trend, this New York Fashion Week: Men’s season has already shown a few designers injecting movement into their shows — whether that was the ice skating at Samuelsohn or the light cycling at Uri Minkoff. But Aoki’s presentation was more of a bold declaration as opposed to a cute idea. The CFDA allowed him to set up two half-pipes within Skylight Clarkson Sq where groups of Dim Mak-wearing skaters took turns dropping in while Mangchi, a self described “hammer” band — mangchi means hammer in Korean — performed.
For the past few seasons, the skater’s wardrobe has been a primary point of reference for a multitude of brands, but Aoki’s proposition felt authentic. The skaters looked quite comfortable in the collection, which consisted of the pieces one would expect — hoodies, denim jackets, Carhartt-style coats and wide-leg trousers — but Aoki said he made a concentrated effort to distinguish the line from what’s already in the U.S.
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