Wear Willi Wear
Willi Smith and a new vision for the future of post-work-workwear.
Bill Bonnell for WilliWear, Press Folder, 1983
[ID - black and white checkerboard print, with the word “WilliWear” in inverted black or white below the top edge of each black or white square. There is a second square featuring the same pattern, hovering in the foreground with a heavy drop shadow turned on its axis so it is oriented like a diamond.]
Remember sportswear? I know, it’s been a while since, capital “F,” Fashion had a social reproductive function other than motivating people to aspire to better their own class position through work.
Sportswear, now more often termed “Activewear,” tends to start at a more affordable price point. During the 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s it was a robust category, not just leggings and sports bras, which sat in a solidly middle-class price range. The lower end of the market was dominated by the Sears Catalogue (I’ll talk more on that in later posts) and do-it-yourself, with most people buying mass market patterns to sew their own clothes for special occasions, and buying their everyday clothes through catalogue or at a brick and mortar retailer – today’s corollary would be perhaps just be Zara.
Willi Smith for WilliWear, Illustration, SUB- Urban Fall 1984 Collection, 1984
[Image Description: Scan of manila paper with drawing, upper right corner has printed text reading, “Work Epic” - the drawing is a croquis, featuring a tall androgynous figure wearing a chunky slouchy turtleneck, under a v-neck long sleeve, with striped cuffs poking out at the sleeves, under a double layered open vest with pockets. The figure is wearing a long pencil skirt, though it’s clearly jersey and not suiting, with a belt at the high waist, high chunky socks and sneakers. The figure’s left arm is positioned with its hand in the vest pocket. To the right of the leg is a signature, reading, “Willi Smith/83” in cursive.]
In a January 2020 piece for W Magazine, Jenny Comita writes, “When Alexandra Cunningham Cameron, the curator of contemporary design at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York, set about organizing a show on the late fashion designer Willi Smith, she found no shortage of material…The only thing missing? The clothes. “When we approached Willi’s friends and fans about borrowing pieces, we kept on hearing versions of the same thing over and over again,” says Cunningham Cameron. “They loved Willi’s clothes so much that they wore them all the time—so much that they’d turned into tatters. They literally wore them out.” And that’s just what Smith intended.”
Willi Smith for WilliWear, Street Couture Fall 1983 Collection, Photographed by Max Vadukul, 1983
[Image Description: Black and white photograph of a young femme standing in front of a white seamless, with long curly hair in a wispy high ponytail, wearing a baggy flight jacket with the collar turned up, their right hand is in the jacket pocket, left hand is wearing a light knitted glove and resting on the thigh. Their legs are in a V, with their weight on their right foot and their left leg extended out, resting on the heel, with their toes pointed up. They are wearing signature Willi Smith baggy high waisted pants in a dark twill with rolled and cropped hems. They are wearing a chunky slouchy grey knitted sock, over tights and black large chunky sneaker boots with a folded over high-top-like upper with light soles.]
The name streetwear came from the idea that the clothes were sold at an impressively affordable price point, such that you would often “see” the clothes on the street. The aesthetics of everyday were elevated not by embellishment, but by fit, versatility and impressively deft layering. Dressing well and loving the way you feel in your clothes was not an exclusive privilege of the elite.
Willi Smith for WilliWear, SUB-Urban Fall 1984 Collection, Photographed by Max Vadukul, 1984
[Image Description: Black and white photograph of a young femme standing in front of a white seamless, with sort hair under a knitted hoodie. They are standing, contraposto with their weight on the right foot and their left leg extended out and resting on the inside of their foot. Their left foot is at a painful looking angle. They are wearing a chunky turtleneck with the neck pulled up over their head like a hood as well as a dark wool boucle ankle length skirt which is asymmetrical at the hem and a-line. They are wearing slouchy white socks and black and white marled knitted house slippers with a notch in the top. (Like a knitted pair of Tom’s)]
Willi Smith for WilliWear, Street Couture Fall 1983 Collection, Photographed by Max Vadukul, 1983
[Image Description: Black and white photograph of two figures in front of a white seamless. The left person stands with their back to the camera with shoulder length light hair. They are wearing a folded over hat, almost beanie like but made of a rough twill with their hair in a low ponytail. They are wearing a structured wool jacket with strong shoulders and a nipped waist with a sewn in fabric belt to secure at the high waist. They are wearing rough wool pants, straight-leg with a firm crease and low top Doc Marten like creepers. The person on the right is standing on their right leg with the left leg bent at the knee. They are also wearing a baggy twill beanie with short hair that is barely visible. They wear a skirted overall out of a chunky wool with a dramatic poplin white turtle neck underneath. Over their shoulder is a jacket, which they are holding up in their hands as if caught in the act of putting it on, there is a drawstring in their mouth and they are pouting. They are wearing bunchy/chunky light socks and prairie boots. The left figure has their left hand behind their back pointed at the right figure like a gun, and the right hand in the right figure’s pocket. ]
Described by many in retrospect as the anti-Ralph Lauren, Willi Smith died from AIDS-related complications in 1987 at the age of 39. His Los Angeles Times obituary framed his approach to price point as such, “Smith pioneered what he called “street couture,” comfortable, whimsical clothes the ordinary person could afford that also appealed to the wealthy and famous…“I don’t design clothes for the queen but the people who wave at her as she goes by,” Smith once said.”
The obituary continued, “Smith was the first designer to create clothes for men and women within the same organization. He also was the first to mix bold stripes and checks and to incorporate two plaids in a single design. His clothes stressed comfort and usually were lightweight, oversized and made of natural fabrics.”
Willi Smith for WilliWear, Street Couture Fall 1983 Collection, Photographed by Max Vadukul, 1983
[Image Description: Black and white photograph of a young femme standing in front of a white seamless, with dark, curly hair in a messy bun. Standing in a firm pose with both feet flat on the ground and shoulders square, they casually spin a baton with a puffy, furry something at the tip like a broom made out of a pekingese on a braided fur stick. They are wearing a white scarf wrapped up around their neck and up onto their hair with a white collared shirt underneath a long corduroy duster with a large high-stand collar in a darker color. Their light-colored pants are also chunky corduroy and are baggy/highwaisted with cropped/rolled hems. They are wearing chunky white slouched socks and black matte oxfords with tire soles.]
“People who wear WilliWear clothes make fashion,” [Willi] Smith told Morning Call in 1984. “I feel the person who wears my clothes is the person who wants to express himself . . . he doesn’t want to be intimidated by clothing.”
Final thoughts.
How the reverb loop of streetwear, luxury ready to wear, and fast fashion came to be as it is today is a much longer and more complicated history than I aim to tackle in this newsletter. The purpose of this series is to share an archive before it’s totally lost to me. I started collecting these images in 2008, while working for Proenza Schouler, I owe the guys a tremendous debt for taking me, a mere scrappy art student, on and bringing me up to rapid speed on the vast history of the industry back then. Willi Smith was the first designer who’s work taught me that the current state of the industry was not as firmly institutionalized into orthodoxy as Barney’s and FNO made it seem. I look forward to sharing more of Willi’s work with you, but there might come a time that I need your help to share it. I collected these images over 6 years, during which I intermittently (and frequently) went temporarily blind, until I abandoned collecting due to the sheer exhaustion of trying to exist as a chronically ill person in late capitalism.
TL:DR – I am now, quite possibly, permanently legally blind with worsening vision – if you would like to collaborate on Image Descriptions to help me share this archive then please let me know. As we collectively navigate our lives in Covid Year Zero, I think it’s time that we start to imagine a post-work garment industry. As sportswear died, and activewear rose, and luxury pillaged the street for inspiration, capitalism will also someday fade like many trends before it.
Until next time. Stay alive another week.
Beatrice