This week, the Scion car company will be hosting a "Swinging Celebrity Golf Invitational," at the Arizona Biltmore Resort and Spa in Scottsdale, Arizona. It's part Hip-Hop industry, celebrity-studded fundraiser for the Boys & Girls Club, and part celebration of their new men’s clothing line, "Release."
Fixins reported that Release is "a new clothing line commisioned by your forward thinking peeps over at Scion. Release is a sportswear line with a twist, combining traditional golf wear with cutting edge, high end streetwear sensibility. The 2006 Release line is co-designed by Blue Davis and Jupiter Desphy III, two of the most sought after streetwear designers in the country."
The article also delved in the creative thought behind the development of the clothing line:
"According to Blue, the inspiration was 'to think back to the roots of the Toyota brand and the meaning of the word Scion, (1 (SCION) a young shoot or twig of a plant, esp. one cut for grafting or rooting. 2 a descendant of a notable family or one with a long lineage: he was the scion of a wealthy family.) This pointed us in the direction of early Japanese art; rock gardens, floral arrangements, Yakuza tattoo art, even kit graphics. The next step was to graft these classical themes with the present Scion concept, car customization and car junkie culture. Other themes we used were, organic vs. inorganic and a twist of Scottish golf patterns but our main goal was to acknowledge ancestry and pay homage to Toyota's Japanese design sensibility and heritage.'"
Adrants flatly stated that, "that boxy SUV is so hip, it's spawned a fashion label," but it seems to me more like the overzealous brainchild of brand planning and developing. Two years ago, shortly after the first rumblings the Scion began, I wrote an article about the obvious marketing agenda aggressively pursued by Toyota. Its website and catalog were totally tricked out into looking like customizing fanzines as they played up the customizable options available for drivers eager to buy in to the hip auto-customizing scene.
At the time I noted how the Scion was Toyota’s ready-made answer to the exploding popularity of auto-customizing, and its cultural ties to urban fashion and music -- an inexpensive, cash-cow of a product with some very clever packaging. I doubted then, as I do now, that any real auto-customizing enthusiast would fall for the Scion.
Though this is a blog about the sport of fashion, not cars or car customizing, I find the idea of a Scion-based fashion line really interesting. In the years since the Scion’s introduction, Toyota has taken its campaign in an even further, more obvious marketing agenda, the latest round of which being sportswear. I’m also surprised at the level of fashion credibility they are clearly striving for. Though the Scion catalogue has always offered Scion gear, an actual stab at artist-designed luxury clothing is the first I’ve seen from a car company (okay, minus Hummer’s take on cologne, but who wears that stuff anyway?).
I have to admit that from the photos floating around the internet, the Release line doesn’t look that bad, and sort of reminds me of the street-cred worthy labels Fred Perry and Ben Sherman. But let us not forget that Release is the spawn of the marketing minds at Toyota, and what's fashionable about that?
