Youthquake
(~1920 – Present)

The conventional “modern” chapter is usually told through European and American art movements and 20th-century geopolitics. Reimagined and localized, this culminating chapter brings the story home to the pilot city. This is the most LA-specific period with hyper-local material such as South Central and Crenshaw’s role in hip-hop fashion and LA’s sneaker and car-culture style economies.

Research completed to date traces the throughline from Black American design and culinary innovation into global streetwear:

• Stephen Burrows becoming the first Black designer to win a Coty Award at the 1973 Battle of Versailles;

• Willi Smith co-founding WilliWear in 1976, widely credited as streetwear’s inventor;

• Dapper Dan reinventing luxury on 125th Street in the 1980s, remaking Gucci, MCM, and Louis Vuitton into custom streetwear for hip-hop stars;

• Patrick Kelly becoming the first American elected to the Chambre Syndicale du Prêt-à-Porter in 1988;

• Daymond John and partners founding FUBU in 1992;

• Marcus Samuelsson receiving a three-star New York Times rating at 25 in 1995, then the youngest chef to do so; Gucci’s 2017 partnership with Dapper Dan, helping him reopen his Harlem atelier;

• Virgil Abloh’s 2018 appointment as artistic director of Louis Vuitton menswear, the first Black designer to hold the role;

• Telfar Clemens’ unisex “Bushwick Birkin” becoming a 2020s cultural phenomenon for gender-neutral, accessible design.

Historical Cultures: Pachuco/Pachuca, Chola/Cholo, Hip-Hop, Koreatown K-Fashion, Tehrangeles, Little Saigon, and Little Ethiopia.

Contemporary Cultures: Los Angeles itself