Clan de Banlieue, from the Dutch
port urban of Rotterdam, has set its attractions on greater streetwear-orientated technique because it seeks to increase in the course of the rest of
Europe. Founded in 2014 with the aid of Sinan Karaca, Levie Merckens, and
Richard Lopes Mendes, it started out out as a humble school undertaking that
speedy caught on. Now the emblem, as soon as stimulated by using the sportswear
of the past, is seeking to the future with the aid of subtly recasting its
streetwear.
On a sunny August afternoon, bright
crimson banners with models in tracksuits and hooded sweatshirts welcome site
visitors at the entrance to Slot Zeist, a castle located within the coronary
heart of the Netherlands. Mannequins in varsity jackets and sweatpants have
already made their manner via the wooden-paneled rooms and chandeliers of this
seventeenth-century Dutch fortress. Clan de Banlieue selected this grandiose
region to mark their departure and enlargement of bold emblem hoodies and
T-shirts, including a touch of luxury for Fall / Winter 2021. Their “Luxury
Grime” series is stimulated by way of subcultural style. From the 90s
associated with the underground musical genre Grime.
"The collection is referred
to as Luxury Grime because we see that streetwear is defined by luxury now,"
Richard Lopes Mendes, one of the logo's three founders, said in an interview.
Clan de Banlieue, which started life as a faculty undertaking in 2014, quickly
won unswerving neighborhood lovers, thanks in huge part to its ties to soccer,
together with its jerseys for the neighborhood membership "Sparta
Rotterdam." Two years ago, the brand additionally started selling thru
sports clothing giants like Footlocker and JD Sports.
Now the brand is seeking to
expand its purchaser base by using diversifying its sports clothing-stimulated
patterns, which include its satisfactory-promoting tracksuits. While many of
the opulent baroque-fashion rooms at the floor of the fort displayed
pieces of the brand in stark assessment, others hinted at the future line of the
logo.
Forever 22
"The extraordinary salons
additionally outline us as an emblem. We are not just one sort of brand, we are
an emblem that evolves with special sorts of apparel," explains Lopes
Mendes. Sitting in a baroque armchair, in a white and green tracksuit, he seems
the embodiment of the emblem's bold yet humble mindset to existence and style.
"We do what we reflect is best to do. We additionally try and be honest
with ourselves, we do not do things that we can not," he responds while
requested about the motive for the achievement of the logo in the latest years.
Down a room down a timber-floored
hallway, lead dressmaker David de Ruiter gives a glimpse of the brand's future
imagination and prescient for its streetwear in a 150-piece SS22 series, which
includes various coloration combos. The emblem's brand has disappeared from a
white terry t-blouse with fleur-de-lis motifs. Instead, the call
"Banlieue" appears subtly revealed on a small bronze plaque at the
lower back of the blouse. Inspired by means of an antique Wrangler jacket from
the fashion designer's private archive and Levi's 501 jeans from the 1960s,
the emblem's first denim clothes are crafted from jacquard with fleur-de-lis
motifs, an image worn with the aid of French royalty.
The identity of the SS22 series,
Forever 22, is a nod to the French heritage embraced by means of the emblem.
Clan de Banlieue borrowed its name from the French words for "suburb"
or "ghetto", which it desires to lose from its bad connotations.
"Paris has 21 banlieues. We claimed the 22nd. We desired to be the voice
of the actual world wherein one-of-a-kind cultures converge," explains de
Ruiter, who joined the label in March 2020.
The emblem's transition also
comes at a time when sportswear outlets are looking for extra style objects,
says de Ruiter: "A lot of manufacturers can promote a tracksuit, however, it's magic that brands need to sell something. Greater than a tracksuit ".
Initial fulfillment and
contemporary growth
The preliminary achievement of
the brand become based on the community it built, with the assist of the sport
and a few well-known gamers, including Chelsea footballer Hakim Ziyech, who
wore Banlieue. However, co-founder Lopes Mendes insists that notwithstanding
the numerous connections that have been formed whilst he performed football
in the past, the emblem does not use those connections to put it up for
sale.
"I had the luxury of meeting
soccer players, who have become greats, but we never used a picture of
them," he says. The brand stays close to its community, with its personal
football membership FC Banlieue. "Soccer is the language we talk and the
game we adore. I do not assume it's our method to apply football, it's our
manner of being."
His authentic and truly humble
approach adds to the attraction of the Clan de Banlieue. In the final years, the streetwear brand's sales have
grown with the aid of as much as 30%. In addition, it has extra than 100 retailers
around the sector, which include two of its own shops, the Dutch branch store
chain De Bijenkorf, JD Sports, and Footlocker. The Netherlands is the logo's
maximum essential marketplace and now Banlieue wants to enlarge into Germany,
Belgium and the United Kingdom with new and modern companions.
