In the 80’s and 90’s, the Hip Hop fashion became an expression of the Hip Hop culture showing in every aspect of dress. More music fans changed to the Hip Hop culture taking on the new innovative style of the Hip Hop fashion.
Hip Hop fashion is a characteristic style of dress, which originated with the African-American youth. Later on, it was influenced by the hip hop settings of Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, East Bay, and The Dirty South. Each city had its contributions to the diversity of its elements and to its overall style popularly seen in the whole world today. Such fashion complements the attitudes and expressions of the hip hop culture in general. It is now a prominent part of the famous fashion as a whole for all ethnicities.
In the 1980’s, hip hop icons were wearing brightly colored tracksuits, leather and sheepskin jackets, with boots and sneakers often with oversized shoelaces. At that time, men had Jheri curls. In the mid 1990s, the hip hop fashion was influenced greatly by the dress styles of inmates and street thugs, which included black ink tattoos, baggy pants, bandanas, shirt tails outside the pants, among others.
Those who have adapted the hip hop culture on the West Coast looked back to the 1930 and 1940 gangsters for inspiration such as silk shirts, double-breasted suits, bowler hats, and alligator skin-shoes. Meanwhile, on the East Coast, the “ghetto fabulous” fashion, of which Sean “Puffy” Combs was the one who coined such term, was more prevalent. Here, luxurious and extravagant items were worn big and baggy. Popular and fashionable accessories then were large eyeglasses, nameplates, multiple rings, name belts, and bucket hats.
Generally, heavy gold jewelry had become a lasting element of the hip hop fashion. Men wore heavy gold chains while women had large gold earrings. Performers like the group Salt-N-Pepa, Roxanne Shanté, Big Daddy Kane, and Kurtis Blow helped in popularizing the trademark gold jewelry. The heavy jewelry indicated wealth and prestige. Some have even connected the jewelry fashion style to Africanism. Platinum, which is the most expensive among all precious metals, had begun replacing gold as the metal of choice in the hip hop fashion in the mid- to late 1990s.
Artists, as well as their imitating fans, were using platinum (or silver) jewelry. Oftentimes, this jewelry is embedded with white gold and diamonds, known as ‘ice’. Famous artists drip their bodies with iced out bling bracelets, bullet chain, and bling cross pendants.
The primary artists who were greatly responsible for this style are Juvenile, Jay-Z, and The Hot Boys. While Big Daddy Kane and LL Cool J still use thick yellow gold rope chains, those more meticulous Hip Hop fan would opt for an Africa necklace with red, black, and green colors. Brian “Baby” Williams, the executive and rapper from Cash Money Records, infamously has in his entire mouth permanent platinum teeth. Others have contented themselves with fashioned grills, which are metal-jeweled teeth coverings that can be removed when desired.
