Destination Style: 90s Hip Hop Fashion Designer, Futurist & Prototype
Destination Style was a popular fashion television series that aired from 1999 to 2001. I'd like to take you back to a show we did around 1999, when the crew followed me through my many daily activities as a 90s hip-hop fashion entrepreneur who was both a streetwear and high-end fashion designer at a time when doing so was against the rules of the fashion industry.People used to say to me, "Fashion trickles down, but you're attempting to trickle up." I broke all the rules.A funny side story, on something seeminly common today: I ordered a custom-built Ferrari in 1998, which appears in the show. I asked the Ferrari dealership to chrome the rims. The salesman and the dealers’ staff freaked out. They said, "Maurice, are you nuts? No one puts chrome wheels on a Ferrari." I insisted they do it.Later, after the car was delivered, every so often I would leave it at the dealership for oil changes or tune-ups. One day I came to pick-up the car, and my salesman put his arm around me and said, "Maurice, do you know every time you leave your car here for work, we sell a shitload of chrome rims? Athletes, movie stars, musicians—everyone who sees your car wants them." I started two hip-hop record labels, one in the early 1990s and another in the late 90s called "Hostile Takeover," also producing the music. I invested in small start-up hip-hop genre films starring rap stars. I worked in collaboration with the director of "8-Mile," a big-budget film starring Eminem, to recreate the rap battle scenes from my store "The Hip Hop Shop" and the parties I promoted every Monday at Detroit's Shelter nightclub. In a way, I was the prototype fashion designer and entrepreneur hip-hop futurist, demonstrating what was possible for hip-hop-rooted designers and artists, regardless of doubters or pushback. Check out the show.