OR MANY it started with Chuck D and that signature Pirates hat and jacket. Or maybe, If you grew up in the “set” laden West, your fascination was triggered by the rise of N.W.A., and the images of them dashing through downtown LA in matte black snapbacks with the silver embroidery and that “LA Kings” shield, shimmering in the sun. Beamed through the flickering images of television tubes whilst draped and displayed upon our favorite microphone fiends during YO!, to the backs and crowns of the local “hustlers,” “bangers,” and “wanabees,” Starter became part of the street uniform in the late ‘80s and on into the ‘90s—that was the badge of honor one had to have to get respect, and eventually became a nationwide youth culture trend. Whether in the ‘burbs or on the block, how Starter came to represent hip-hop’s Golden Age rhyme era, Generation X and Generation Y suburban youth and “heads” around the way; is in many ways traceable to the regionalism that hip-hop presented on the grand scale and Starter’s ability to link itself to it.

While nationally, during the brand’s reign, big city and tradition soaked franchises like the Yankees, New York Giants, Chicago Bulls, Atlanta Braves, LA Raiders, LA Kings, Boston Celtics, and the ‘80s and ‘90s later emergent teams like the San Antonio Spurs, Orlando Magic, Charlotte Hornets, San Jose Sharks, and the expansion squads of the professional leagues with their wilder colorways, were among the highest selling pieces; collectively boosted by their stars, the growing cable coverage of the four major sports by a then-fledgling ESPN, their hometowns’ scenes and the galvanized pride in those areas spurred on by hip-hop and sports fandom—the constant common denominator was always the signature “S” and its adjoining star logo.

“In the era of Reganomics, economic hard times, the peaking of organized street gangs and rise of the “crack era hustle” in inner-city America, Starter brought with it a dark side and controversy that discussions on the brand are often marred by. For the media and lay people of the time, Starter was a flash-point that much like British Knight shoes or Air Jordans, was associated with crime and urban blight. Hearing the words “run it” anywhere in America, during the period, probably meant that your life was in danger — if the one hundred plus dollar jacket, thirty-dollar hat or fifty-dollar hoody wasn’t given up.”

Beautiful, simple and effectively “visually communicative”; the famous Starter logo linked hip-hop’s young and growing commercial culture and its purchasing and marketing power throughout the United States. Whether in Houston with the powder blue, to honor the hometown squad the Oilers and their man Warren Moon, or in Philly in the form of a satin varsity jacket with the bold white base of a 76ers back patch logo or a hooded trench coat in the green of the hometown Eagles, that evoked a young Randall Cunningham out of the pocket and in a scramble, Starter was selling local pride, in a world where professional sports increasingly became the shared totem for the lack of larger connections in disconnected urban life.

In the era of Reganomics, economic hard times, the peaking of organized street gangs and rise of the “crack era hustle” in inner-city America, Starter brought with it a dark side and controversy that discussions on the brand are often marred by. For the media and lay people of the time, Starter was a flash-point that much like British Knight shoes or Air Jordans, was associated with crime and urban blight. Hearing the words “run it” anywhere in America, during the period, probably meant that your life was in danger— if the one hundred plus dollar jacket, thirty-dollar hat or fifty-dollar hoody wasn’t given up.

But Starter was not the only victim of this stigma. The also high-priced Reebok Pumps and Air Jordans were a part of the social cachet triumvirate (Starter coat, Reebok Pumps and Air Jordans) for young, urban America at the time, and with the economy befallen by hard times and even harder streets, where guns quickly became the norm and the easiest way to gain high-ticket urban wear by those left out of the middle class, Starter along with Reebok’s Pump line and Nike’s Air Jordan division, found itself benefiting in the first iterations of the unfortunate phenomena later known as “street cred,” at the end of the ‘90s.

It was a term that ironically labeled the danger associated with the brand, as a selling point. The demand for a Starter coat or hat—due to high pricing points—and its associations to the streets underbelly; was partly what made them so popular. The brand’s coats, hats and hoodies, often splashed with color blocking, large logos and at times, technical details, made them a hit in the streets and the rappers who identified themselves with it, which began a symbiosis. The streets loved it and the rappers wore it, all at or about the same time, in an age when there had yet to be a true urban market and mainstream products were co-opted by the subculture. And so, Starter found great fortune that, unfortunately didn’t last.

By the end of the ‘90s the rise of wear specifically targeted toward urban consumers, exclusive team-licensing once reserved for Starter now given to major companies like Adidas, Reebok and Nike, the dip in negative news blips concerning the brand as financial times got better, the rise of similar brands like Pro Player, the loss of earnings due to the NHL and MLB lockouts and strikes, and the brand’s own inability to expand into other products to combat its loss of exclusive licensing, led to its ultimate demise in 1999, and it declaring bankruptcy, eventually being bought out for $46 million by another company.

The Starter brand since that time, has found itself in lesser retailers than the ones it once used to populate. But to this day, it is a symbol for many ‘90s revivalists and Golden Age hip-hop era fans, as its iconography finds itself in songs by Common, Kanye West and others, and in homages by upper tier street brands like Supreme, who are in many ways beneficiaries of the image Starter unexpectedly sold. In late 2007, the brand even approached many independent branded companies geared towards the street-market for exclusive collaborations—once again linking it to a movement of expression and opening the door for another possible rise.