PATRON SAINT OF AMERICA

Cheers to Anthony Kiedis and his girl for this shot. It’s a good look. I’m always glad to see girls who know how to wear a fucking tee-shirt. Most women complain that we only make mens tees primarily. But that’s the point. Women and men alike are supposed to wear the same style. If you’ve ever bought our size “Small” you’d know its not particularly suited for a man. That’s because we have tried to cultivate this ‘cross-gender’ product from the start. Look at it this way, girls want to wear guy threads so why not make the most basic of garments compatible for both?

The shirt that she is wearing is called “Tamanend” and can be found in the Bazaar section of our site.
Chief Tamanend, or St. Tamanend was said to have died around 1698. His reputation was that of a peaceful conduit between the Native tribes of the Lenni-Lenape and the English settlers around the Philadelphia area. Tamanend promoted the peace and love of the colonists to other native tribes, until the stars and moon cease to exist. The name of the great king was then carried from generation to generation and from colony to colony until he gained its most notable of churches “The Society of St. Tammany” or “Tammany Hall” in New York City during the 18th century. This political mecca was fixed with a giant marble statue of the chief atop its massive façade.

The ‘Tammany Tiger’ came into play later in the society’s history as William “Boss” Tweed gained his seat as the “Sachem” of Tammany Hall. Tweed, who had owned and run the infamous “Big Six” engine co. adopted the Tiger as part of his symbol. He then brought it into Tammany Hall with him, thus giving birth to the iconic Tammany Tiger.

HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MAN?

To watch this guy in action is truly spectacular. But he was only the DJ. This was taken at the Gilded Age show on Friday. Eugene Hutz of Bulgaria Bar and Gogol Bordello fronted an early night of good ol’ fashion at Gilded Age’s huge loft showroom off East 4th. Amongst all our other peers and elders, I think Gilded Age does it right. There was an emphasis on fabrications and treatments and a de-emphasis on branding and over-the-top dandyism (if that’s a word). This can be expected from our kids at GA, but what’s most interesting is the execution of their convictions. They are both honest and without censorship.
It was a chill party afterwards, as the loft was none too crowded but had retained enough interesting people and free wine to stick around and chew the fat. The president of Converse was introduced to me as I slurred my way into an awkward conversation. Its not typical that I let the alcohol speak for me but Friday night was one of those moments. As he commented on the fact that I was wearing Chuck Taylors, I brilliantly quipped “Yeah, and they’re soaking wet”. One of my better moments I might add.

GET DOWN, OLD HAGUE!

For our Fall 2007 season I was being dragged into this "ghostly" theme by my research. Originally it wasn’t a conscious idea, it was more a theme that I kept running into accidentally. I became aware of it after prints started looking diffused rather than sharp. This diffusion was more or less a defense against knock offs. With all the iconography cropping up in prints now-a-days, I was trying to get a distinct technique that would separate Barking Irons from the recent flare of antique prints. Most of it is done with my pencil, but some of it is a result of older print shop methods and halftones in some of our out of print books.

The Daniel Divver print is not an example of this diffusion, but it is an example of how the now conscious theme of ghosts has become a part of the Fall 2007 collection.

Daniel Divver was born in Ireland in 1839. Soon after he came to New York and lived in the city's 4th Ward (Lower East Side closest to the East River). Divver, like all youth, had a fascination with being a volunteer fireman. When he became of age he joined the Eagle Engine Company No. 13 and proved his worth as one of the ladder's best men. As soon as the Civil War broke out, Daniel Divver joined the First Fire Zouaves and was elected Second Lieutenant. In 1861 during the battle of Bull Run, Divver's company met with a rally of Rebels.



Outnumbered and too proud to turn tail, Divver is reported to have rolled up he sleeves and yelled his old engine company's familiar "Get Down, Old Hague!" before rushing forward to his death. The Zouaves eventually pushed the Rebel force back enough to find Divver's body before his final breath. They said their goodbyes but could not move him as the South made another sally and Daniel Divver was never seen again. Until now. . .

The MULBERRY BEND welcomes you.

Here's a little story:

In the old-timey days of New York's Lower-East Side 'down near what is now Federal Plaza, Mulberry Street used to bend leading you directly into the depths of the Five Points. Well-to-do city folk considered "the bend" to be the cut off, or point of no return as it were since beyond that elbow in the street a man might expect to lose much more than a pitiful rookerful of change.

Photographer/police blotter, Jacob Riis became obessesed with the terror and inhumanity that swarmed below the Mulberry Bend. The Five Points was the intersection of five streets (Mulberry, Worth, Little Water, Baxter, Bayard) and was said to be the deadliest intersection in the world. Riis, an immigrant and well on his way to becoming self-made, championed to cause of erradicating the Mulberry Bend, and he did!

Until now.

Even still however, the Five Points was one of the most fertile cultural places in New York -an offshoot of the Bowery- it was the neighborhood that introduced tap-dancing, and the rough & tumble New Yorker, its own particular New York dialect, and a original and unpretentious style of dress. Writers such as Horatio Alger, Stephen Crane, Edgar Allen Poe, and Charles Dickens were all fascinated with the life that teemed in the points.

The slums of the Five Points and the Bend evenutally fell in the 1890s and in their place sprang the grass, trees, swings, and benches of Columbus Park. If you go there now you may see the park and the various Historical Society signs which to little justice to the pages of dark history that were written on those corners and their surroundings, now you will see a string of Chinese funeral homes huddled in the armpits of towering Federal buildings. U.S. Marshalls in their cheap suits buldging with some sort of firearm, can be seen every which way and that-

The Mulberry Bend is being reawakened. Not to impinge upon a slum-free zone, or to threaten, or terrorize, but to bring voices down into the mouths of a culture resting beneath the surface, of a forgotten code.

We will bring you news and culture, art and history, thoughts and fashion. We wont be preening the Bowery in case that be your worry, we want it stir it back to life.

Help our Cause.