On Thursday, Feb. 23, in a fireside chat with LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, Dapper Dan talked about the intersection of Black History Month and the celebration of Hip-Hop’s 50th Anniversary. One of the conversations he talked about is the comments made by Kanye West and his position on his relevancy in fashion.
The fashion icon did not sugarcoat anything but did not throw the controversial creative under the bus, according to WWD.
“I think there’s a lot of confusion with a lot of the information coming from Kanye,” he said.
“Now, some of the things he said I totally don’t agree with, but there’s glimpses of what he says that are true,” he continued.
“One of the things that I don’t think people understand about Kanye is that with all of his money, he couldn’t launch a brand successfully,” Dap said referring to the GAP deal. “A lot of people couldn’t understand why that is. They tell designers all the time, ‘why don’t you get your own brand?’ as if we can go put it in the toaster and pop it out. It’s not like that. Kanye tried to point that out to people.”
“He just couldn’t articulate it right,” the Harlem native added. “There are certain messages that Kanye had that made sense, but there’s the other side to it.”
The next day, Dapper Dan joined April Walker, Karl Kani, the founders of FUBU, Shirt Kings, Special Ed and the Lo Life Crew, Haus of Swag, Riche Threads, Malik Dupri, and Pepper Jacques at Ralph McDaniels’ and Video Music Box’s “DRIP” Phat Fashion Show, sponsored by the City of New York and the Universal Hip Hop Museum.
It was the very first activation of the 50th Anniversary of Hip-Hop in New York City.