CRIME, IN STYLE
Went from gambler, to convict, to stylist to the stars
nically, Day says, it wasn’t.
It was a crime to steal credit cards, of course. But there wasn’t a law about appropriating credit card numbers. Even when they were nabbed, Day and his gang would always get the charges tossed.
Until finally, the feds got wise. Bills were proposed, and the day they became laws, Day threw his embossing machine in the East River. It was time, he declared, to go straight. Straight into fashion. Day had always loved clothes. Now, instead of shoplifting them, he decided to sell them. He found an empty storefront on 125th St. and started buying wholesale from Fred the Furrier. Day would sell mink coats to the pushers and pimps who loved the style but didn’t want to deal with a white storekeeper’s attitude.
Once Day had the gangsters buying, he started getting the folks who just wanted to look like them. Soon people like Eric B. & Rakim, and L.L. Cool J were all shopping. They didn’t just want furs; they wanted to be outfitted in designer jackets, suits, coats.
Seeing an opportunity, Day went down to the Louis Vuitton store on Fifth Ave. and bought an armful of their monogrammed garment bags. Then he took them back to his store, pulled out the stitches, and had a tailor turn them into suits.
Vuitton might not sell clothes. But now Dapper Dan did.
The look took off. Day expanded, buying equipment so he could dye the leather himself. Soon he was turning out entire wardrobes stamped with any designer logo anyone wanted.
You wanted your car upholstered with leather stamped LV? Sure. You wanted a bulletproof parka emblazoned with the Gucci double-Gs? Done.
His 24-hour-a-day boutique expanded and filled up with millionaire rappers and celebrity athletes. Russell Simmons came by to flirt with the salesgirls. Heavyweights Mike Tyson and Mitch Green got into a street fight in front. Dapper Dan’s clothes started showing up in MTV videos.
They also started showing up on law enforcement’s radar.
Today, Day defends his work as cultural commentary, like Andy Warhol painting a Campbell’s soup can. The designers’ lawyers, however, saw it as theft. Day’s Fendi trench coats were knockoffs, they said, no different than counterfeit pocketbooks sold on Canal St.
He started getting raided regularly, whole racks of merchandise confiscated. His store was shut down. He survived by hawking T-shirts on the street, clothes out of his car.
Slowly, though, Day came back. Avoiding other people’s logos, he started doing custom designs for artists like Ghostface Killah, Busta Rhymes, and Aaliyah. Floyd Mayweather became a regular client. Fat Joe and Jay-Z namechecked him in songs.
Fashion critics took serious notice. His designs were featured at the Smithsonian, the Metropolitan, and MOMA. Finally, in 2017, he reopened his boutique — now in partnership with Gucci. The outlaw was finally, ultimately, legit.
And for Dapper Dan, that must be the weirdest happy ending of all.