Under the Radar | 10 Upcoming Brands to Check out From Streetwear: Mastered
In many ways, it’s easier to start a brand today than ever before. Online design courses, affordable suppliers, social media, and e-commerce options are available to almost everyone. However, starting a brand isn’t the difficult part. The struggles are maintaining it, building it, and standing out from the crowd.
Streetwear: Mastered is a 15-week online course providing emerging streetwear brands with the tools and knowledge to overcome such barriers.Curated by Virgil Abloh, the program’s experts include Fraser Cooke, Jörg Haas, Kevin Poon, Leah McSweeney, Samuel Ross of A-COLD-WALL*, Carri Munden, Gary Aspden, Eric Elms, Fats Shariff, Steve Bryden, Josh Vides and Darren Skey – Harvey Nichols’s menswear head.
A wealth of talent took part, and successful applicant numbers were highly limited. Below you’ll find some our favorite new fashion brands, take notes before these guys blow up.
St-Dié
Montreal-based brand St-Dié channels youthful disaffection—in their words, “misunderstood youth carried through adulthood”—using graphic doodles and capitalizing on the doodling trend. The doodles range from original children's drawings to humorous depictions of banana homicide. Further developing the brands angsty teen narrative, they've also released numerous short and intriguing fashion films.
Low Key Industries
Since launching his first collection in 2014, Low Key Industries founder Drew Shifter has continued to design distinctly urban garments. Vintage graphics, embroidery and screen prints, video game references, and early computer typography embellish simple streetwear pieces in a generally muted color palette.
4254 Sport
Taking a clean and minimal approach to athleisure, Olympic medalists Olivia Borlée and Elodie Ouedraogo founded womenswear label 4254 following the Beijing Olympic Games. Continuing to represent their nation using Belgian manufacturers, the Olympic duo’s brand offers what one would expect: tees, sweats, tank tops, shorts, and tights.
Parca Equipment Co
In a developing Australian streetwear scene, Parca Equipment Co re-works signature styles from brands such as Polo Sport and Patagonia. Firm favorites include the “Paranoia" dad cap, "Hyperformance” long sleeve tee and 5-panel cap, and “Dash” jacket.
Foreign Homme
Foreign Homme recently shot its Spring/Summer 2017 collection on a sunny rooftop in New York City, the brand's offering next season includes ornate t-shirts, jeans, and some technical outerwear pieces
Hoodlum
Hoodlum promises to drop its latest product offering very soon. Riddled with teen angst, the brand references iconic cultural images across a range of streetwear staples.
Alex Mostella
Quality and precision is key to Alex Mostella’s hand designed and crafted ready-to-wear garments. Sourcing fabrics from Japan, the North Carolina label presents rib tanks and boxy tees for FW16, alongside sherpa sweaters, cropped hoodies, and vintage denim. A green cadet jacket is a genuine hero piece and made from vintage U.S. military tents; no two jackets are alike.
Day-Off
Formerly known as Don’t Kill The Chill, Day-Off’s primary focuses are short and long sleeved t-shirts. The brand designs understated graphic prints in an attempt to distinguish themselves from the crowd, nodding to what they refer to as “nerd” culture—anime, comics, cinema, gaming, art, fashion and various musical sub-genres.
Paradice
British label Paradice draws on ’90s rave and youth culture; scrolling through their Instagram one will find references ranging from Pete Tong and Ralph Lauren to Terminator 2, Hackers and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. With handmade tie dye patterns and simple statement logos being a big part of its SS16 collection, the brand promises an AW16 preview very soon.
NGHT SHFT
NGHT SHFT isn't giving much away but their Instagram feed suggests they're working on trousers, long sleeve t-shirts and graphic tees. The brand takes a political direction with the Amerikkka tee currently available online.
Mastered develop online courses to help emerging fashion professionals develop their skills, network and attitude, working with some of the most respected names in the industry to do it. Their 2017 programs are enrolling now via the link below.
