Remembering when Kanye West didn't just dress in black Rembrance of the last pre-Yeezy Kanye
«I want to be the best-dressed rapper in the game» is a pretentious and complicated sounding sentence to say when you haven't released a single album yet and are only known for producing songs. A phrase that, if you think about it, lends itself very well to the pretentious and complicated character of Kanye West. In the second episode of jeen yuhs, Ye makes his ambitions clear with a veritable manifesto of determination and obstinacy, two qualities that have always distinguished him throughout his career - and life. The link with fashion blossomed slowly, following a more tortuous path than Kanye evidently expected. Ten long years have passed from his desire to be the best-dressed rapper to the possibility of making it into fashion, a period in which Kanye West tried everything to enter an elite system like that of fashion, which instead insisted on keeping him at a safe distance. Thus Ye began his act of rebellion.
When the rapper, between 2012 and 2014, began to show himself in public more and more often with knockout outfits that manifested how much stronger he was than the fashion system, it was evident that a feeling of protest had manifested itself in him. This had also emerged from his rants on radio programs, in which, unabashedly, he reminded everyone how much he counted in pop culture, shooting at zero without worrying about the consequences. «Look at Gaga: she's the creative director of Polaroid. I like some of the Gaga songs, what the fuck does she know about cameras?» Sound familiar?
That's also why Kanye West's path to the fashion world has seen him go from internships at Fendi and collaborations with Nike and Louis Vuitton, to timid attempts to land in the business with his first brand, Pastelle, before his "DW by Kanye West" collection dated 2011, much criticized by insiders, and his collaboration with A.P.C. in 2013. The deal with adidas, in hindsight, turned out to be anything but a definitive milestone for Ye. In fact, Kanye is currently in a collaborative relationship with GAP, and even his connection with Balenciaga is not trivial in its being. Thinking that one day Ye could be appointed creative director of a fashion house is no longer utopia as it would have been ten years ago, and this shows us once again how Kanye's hands can get everywhere, his influence change areas that we did not even imagine could be touched by Yeezy. Define Kanye West only a rapper is now reductive for quite some time, at least since 2014.
