By Dove ~Sheepish Lordess of Chaos~
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Photo: Chilly-O Clothing was one of the hundreds of companies at the MAGIC Convention, but they stood out by repping on rollerskates! Check the Flicks section for more photos - link below]
Twice a year, thousands of eager retail store owners, buyers, fashion lines and celebrities converge upon the Las Vegas Convention Center for MAGIC.
An acronym for Men's Apparel Guild in California, the event is a necessary business venture for retailers to meet with countless fashion lines to secure orders for the new season.
With over a million square feet of space filled with booths and over 120,000 people in attendance, there is always a vibrant scene in the Streetwear section.
AllHipHop.com has been active with MAGIC for several years now, and last month's event was no exception.
Amidst the dozens of familiar clothing lines like Baby Phat,
Sean John,
Rocawear,
Lot 29, LRG,
Ed Hardy, Shady Ltd.,
Akademiks,
Miskeen and Triple 5 Soul (to name a few), there are even more independent niche brands.
Of course there are the artist-owned boutique lines like LL Cool J's
Todd Smith, Jim Jones and Nancy Jones'
Nostic Apparel, Eve's Fetish, Travis Barker's Famous Stars and Straps, Jeezy's Eight732, and the list goes on.
Some of my personal favorite finds were not even clothing. Skull Candy's booth was probably the hottest spot in the whole convention center. Freestyle champ Supernatural was repping Skull Candy, and even performed at the booth. They have a new headphone that is not only wireless, it actually functions with an SD card - so you don't even need an iPod to listen to your music on the go!
And this baby was a showstopper:
Over at POOL (an independent showcase of lines within the MAGIC convention) I found these amazing Andy Warhol watches. They are all based upon the pop art of Andy Warhol, whose work I really didn't appreciate until after I learned more about his relationship with Jean-Michel Basquiat. Here are three I thought were pretty wavy - I especially like the white bird design since it has doves on it too... go figure.
We ran into several stars in February, and got a few words to bring the excitement back with us: