Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About BAPE (and Some Things You Didn’t)

The year is 2023, and BAPE is one of the most hyped brands in streetwear. When you first discover this culture and start doing your history research, Nigo’s label, aka A Bathing Ape, is in Chapter One. But as we’ve discussed at length over here lately, the last few years have been interesting for streetwear, because now it’s mainstream.

In an age where music is virtually free and everything else is little more than a click away on the internet, the youth have turned their attentions (and their wallets) to fashion and clothes as the means of expressing themselves. In any major developed city around the world, you’re likely to see kids wearing box logos. Style-conscious consumers, from your 6-year-old cousin to your law firm partner uncle, are looking for a pair of Yeezys. And Palace Skateboards is globally-renowned as being “better for bunning”.

In times like these, you’d be totally forgiven for assuming this is the way things had always been. Personally, I struggle to wrap my head around the fact that Supreme London now has queues around the block virtually every single day, when only a few years back it was a race between about 20 of the same guys to get to Hideout (RIP) on a Saturday morning in the hopes of being able to buy one of the three caps they may or may not have received on that particular week. Don’t get me wrong; this isn’t some “old man yells at cloud”-esque ‘you kids don’t know how good you’ve got it’ rant. All I’m saying is things have changed.

With the hype more fervent than ever, it feels like what sometimes gets lost is the perspective of a style movement that’s been going for over 25 years now, and nowhere is that more evident than with A Bathing Ape. The brand has experienced a return to vogue amongst the general consumer these days, with kids eager to own their own piece of clothing adorned with the iconic BAPE camo pattern.

What gets lost in the current trends, I worry, is the virtually dynastic history of the…