#alfredsteiner

LV DIY by Alfred Steiner, Part 4.

The final installment of the LV DIY story brings a linen Banana Republic button-down shirt customized with all-over logo print in bleach.

To read more about this conceptual art project by Alfred Steiner, click HERE.

I would like to send special thanks to Goor Studio for their invaluable help in photographing this series.

LV DIY by Alfred Steiner, Part 3. 

For the third part of this story, I am featuring a hand-bleached all-over print on a back tee. 

I love how the color way ends up being similar to African mud cloth in which the logos are just beginning to diffuse into abstraction. My tattoos are by Mad Luellen. 

You can read more about Alfred Steiner’s LV DIY project by clicking here. 

LV DIY by Alfred Steiner, Part 2. 

For the second installment of this LV DIY by Alfred Steiner feature, I am wearing a Harley-Davidson tee customized in all-over logo print hand made with bleach.

You can read how I encountered these conceptual art garments by clicking HERE.

Such a pleasure to sport this comfortable tee which makes me think of riding an imaginary motorcycle while looking at a sky with clouds that shift shape into evocative form.

LV DIY by Alfred Steiner, Part 1.

When I visited the Spring/Break Art Fair last March, I was immediately drawn to conceptual artist Alfred Steiner’s LV DIY exhibit, a makeshift boutique curated by 101/Exhibit that mimicked the style of Louis Vuitton stores with walls made from McDonald’s and KFC cardboard boxes.

I immediately thought of Dapper Dan, the famed Harlem tailor whose redefined street style with his interpretation of luxury brand prints. From 1982 to 1992, he championed hip hop fashion by versioning designs of luxury brands into the epitome of freshness. I thought of Eric B and Rakim, Big Daddy Kane and LL Cool J in the late 80s; how they were sporting Dan’s streetwise versions of Louis Vuitton, Gucci and MCM which I greatly admire.

In a wry take on consumer culture, Steiner filled his boutique with blazers, t-shirts and button-down shirts emblazoned with approximations of the Louis Vuitton logo, customized with what appeared to be insulation foam, bleach or spray paint. My spirit soared admiring the mesh of high and low—the blend of luxury iconography with DIY attitude, a dynamic that often reenergizes luxury brands with much-needed edge. One example of this synergy is how Scooter LaForge’s bespoke Chanel sendup tote bag was the apparent inspiration for official bags from the brand soon after.

Mesmerized by the surreal melange of logos and by vintage tees and jackets customized with such finesse—and being an ardent fan of customized clothes—I asked how much the items cost. In keeping with the Vuitton theme, they were priced accordingly: $600 for a tee, $2,200 for a blazer.

I asked Alfred if I could model some of the clothes and he graciously invited me to his impressive Chelsea studio, where I went through boxes of items and found shirts that are perfect for summer outings and parties, and which I will feature throughout the week.

Alfred, whose watercolors, paintings and sculptures present a playful balance of darkness and innocence, imbued with pop references, is unafraid to mix imagery into unexpected places: from butterflies to genitals, from cartoon characters to bubble wrap cast in glass, he reveals a dreamlike state within the everyday.

Steiner moonlights as a copyright lawyer and is therefore in a perfect position to pursue this LV-themed concept. (Dapper Dan’s store, for instance, was closed in 1992 due to copyright infringement.) Vuitton has taken to court artists like Nadia Plesner for painting a Darfur refugee with one of their bags, while collaborating with artists like Takashi Murakami and Cindy Sherman.

Steiner perfectly navigates this environment, delivering clothes that I ultimately think are beautiful and worthy of the brand’s collaborations. Today’s t-shirt features a girl smelling a flower over a red background, with the LV print done in Sharpie. I love how the aesthetic of the shirt complements my tattoos by Mad Luellen.