It's been five years since Jay Z and Kanye West teamed up on Watch The Throne, the collaborative rap album that set a new standard for collaborative rap albums. (It's not a stretch to say there might not be Drake x Future's What a Time to Be Alive without WTT.) Musically, WTT will be remembered for song like "Otis,"Paris," and "No Church in the Wild." But fashion-wise, the themes that dominate the album's verses—king-level confidence, declarations of luxury brand consumption, custom-made wardrobe mentions—remain a critical moment in Kanye West's ascent from stylish rapper to genuine menswear icon.
By the time Watch The Throne came out, West was already influencing hip-hop style at large. After all, early in his career he made his sartorial mark by not wearing standard fare like baggy jeans and throwback jerseys. In 2009, he collaborated with Louis Vuitton on a line of sneakers in 2009 and that same year he designed a sneaker with Nike, the Air Yeezy, which, just like Yeezys today, drew huge crowds who waited in line for days at each drop.
West rocked the Air Yeezys while promoting WTT with a wardrobe stocked with then-signatures like double denim, brooches, big-ass necklaces, and flannel shirts, but one key piece stands out from all others—a leather Givenchy kilt. Or rather, the leather Givenchy kilt. To this day it remains the anchor to Kanye West's boldest style move ever, and one of his most influential.
Despite being known for his immense (and sometimes maybe excessive) confidence, wearing a kilt wasn't as effortless as it may have seemed at the time. In a behind-the-scenes video (seen above) from around the time of the Watch The Throne tour, West, his stylist, longtime friend Don C and creative director Virgil Abloh debate the kilt during a fitting. In it, we see Kanye wrestling with the idea of being a man in what is effectively a skirt. "It kind of just looks like a long T-shirt," he says while staring at his reflection in the mirror. In a 2015 Paper Magazine article, West admitted to being insecure about wearing a kilt on stage, especially in front of die-hard rap fans in his hometown Chicago. Ultimately he decided to wear it.
At the end of the day, West's kilt didn't exactly inspire teens to go out and buy their own. Here's what it did do. 1) It raised the profile of designer Riccardo Tisci, who not only designed the tour wardrobes of Ye and Jay, but the album artwork as well. 2) It served as a loose silhouette guideline for the "under-layer" look kids are still scooping up today from labels like John Elliott.. There's a modern kilt-ish effect to a long tee styled under bomber jacket or shorter tee, though it's one that was hardly common back in 2011. "When I saw this kilt, I liked it. I was into it. It looked fresh to me," he wrote in Paper. "Who gets to decide what's hard and what's not hard?" Five years on, when gender-neutral clothing is trending, long tees can be bought at H&M, and Jaden Smith can kill it in a dress, the answer is pretty obvious: Kanye West decides, and he's usually right.
