Bape Thursday No.2

For the second Bape Thursday I thought I'd go with vintage a piece that you don't see too often. I'm a big fan of a crew neck sweatshirt, especially in grey so when I found this on ebay 8 years or so ago I didn't hesitate to bid on it.

The heathered sweatshirt material is great quality and I love the military inspired elements, with the striping on the sleeves (which are individual panels, not printing) and the Bape trooper badge. The details on the patch are great, I love the parachuting Bape letters combined with the shooting stars, and the classic flowing scroll at the bottom. The contrasting black and silver/grey stitching gives it a really striking & smart look.

Throw in a classic Ape Shall Never Kill Ape neck tag & the trademark sleeve tag & you have an awesome vintage piece. Much like the white camo hoodie from my previous post this is Bape in a much more subtle way than you normally see. Its definitely the side of the brand that I gravitate towards, particularly the collegiate or military elements and you'll probably see this reflected in the Bape Thursday posts going forward.

Bape Thursday No.1

It's been ten years since I first discovered Japanese streetwear brand A Bathing Ape, and over the years I've collecting a whole variety of interesting pieces. I thought it would be fun to showcase some of my favourite stuff from my collection, so welcome to what will be a regular series of Bape Thursdays.

My first exposure to Bape was back in 2006 through the Niketalk.com message boards. Back then everyone in the 'What did you wear today?' thread wanted to dress like Pharrell who was wearing almost exclusively Bape & BBC. It was the Bapesta sneakers that first caught my attention with the crazy colours and shiny patent leather. They were so different to everything else at the time and they were the first Bape item I got (more on those another week). But camo hoodies are Bape's iconic piece & so it was definitely one of the first pieces of clothing I wanted.

At the time I was living Portsmouth so visiting Busy Workshop in London wasn't very convenient, so ebay was the obvious next choice. One of the first things you learn about Bape is that there is a ton of fake stuff on ebay. But I did my research and through recommendations and legit checks on various forums I found the semi-legendary Bape ebay seller Pondon. It was super exciting to order from a seller in Japan, and definitely made it feel a little bit extra special.

I love the combination of the white camo panels and the raglan sleeves in contrasting grey shades. It makes for a super clean look with the Bape camo giving it just the right amount of interest. Bape popularised the loud all over print hoody trend, but this does it in a much more subtle way. It has all the usual great Bape details with the traditional ape head sleeve tag and the custom zipper pull, and even if it has no practical use I still think the full zip-up hood is kind of fun.

Although its ten years old its still one of my favourite pieces in my collection, even if the white is completely impractical to keep clean.

Kaws

Last week I was on holiday for the week in Yorkshire. We stayed in a cottage on a farm out in the country, and spent a bunch of time hiking and generally getting away from the hecticness of London life.

One of the main reasons we chose Yorkshire was that the Yorkshire Sculpture Park currently has the first UK exhibition for Kaws. I've been a big Kaws fan for a number of years so was nerding out pretty hard at getting the opportunity to see his work in person for the first time. And while the 6 giant sculptures are the pieces that seem to be attracting the most attention it was actually the gallery display of his other work that I liked the best. It was great to see some of the artwork and sculptures that have been iconic for so long. The dissected companions and the Passing Through companion being particular highlights.

There were a few bits and pieces available in the gift shop and I picked up this tote bag. There were three different designs available, but I really love the Passing Through companion so this design was an easy choice. I'd definitely recommend seeing the exhibition if you have the chance as it really is worth the effort.

From the Volt

I've been wearing my current pair of Nike Lunarglide 6 running shoes for over a year and a half, and they've racked up a lot of miles. I've trained for & run 10k's & half marathons in them and they're definitely reaching the end of their life.

One of the reasons I hadn't replaced them yet was that I really don't like this years Lunarglide 7 (Plus spending sneaker money on basketball shoes is tons more exciting than running shoes). While they haven't changed a whole lot from the 6's I really dislike the toebox, which is a really loose material, and I much prefer the more structured shape of the 6's.

So I did a little hunting online and found a store that still had the Lunarglide 6 in my size. Because they're an old model I got them at a great discounted price, however that did mean I was pretty limited in the colours available, but decided this pair in Volt/Flash Lime/Liquid Lime are just the right side of too loud.

As I mentioned in my post about the Nike Hyper Elite basketball socks last week I think its definitely worth investing in good ahtletics socks. So with that in mind I added a two pack of Nike running socks to the order so the new shoes are extra comfy.

The Icon Part 2

Back in the early 90's ITV showed WCW wrestling as part an awesome Saturday afternoon line-up that also included McGyver and The A-Team. As a kid who didn't get to see a lot of WWF at the time I became a big WCW fan and I used to love watching Vader (who I was terrified of), Ron Simmons, Jake the Snake, and especially Sting.


Sting is arguably better remembered for the black & white NWO era gimmick, but I loved his 90's surfer look. So even though I'd just got one Sting shirt, when WWE Shopzone emailed to say they were having a sale on legends tees, I couldn't resist picking up this classic Sting shirt at the bargain price of £12.

I love the neon 90's style graphics, and the pale yellow will be great for summer. I found a scan of a 1991 WCW merchandise catalog on the WCW Worldwide blog (a great site with a ton of cool WCW stuff), and as you can see it does a great job of capturing the look of the classic WCW tee's.

Image from WCWWorldwide.com

Hyper Elite

I know socks are generally regarded as being really boring, but I'm definitely of the opinion that sports socks are the exception to that rule. It was when I started running that I released what a difference good socks make. It doesn't matter how great your shoes are if your wearing socks that are going to rub and be uncomfortable as soon as they get a bit sweaty.

For basketball Nikes Hyper Elite socks are awesome. They have extra thick panels and cushioning in key areas and really help to keep your feet comfy when playing.

I'd seen this awesome multi-coloured pair (more than a little reminiscent of the colours in Nike's flyknit shoes) a few weeks back, but hadn't been able to find my size (for some reason I always struggle to find my size in Nike socks). So when I saw them again when I visited House of Hoops this week I didn't hesitate to grab a pair.

They're not cheap but I definitely think its worth the investment especially if your playing regularly. I was going to get a pair of Kevin Durant Elite socks as well, but when I checked the price I decided that paying an extra £5 just for the KD logo was a bit ridiculous.