A group that started as a fanpage dedicated to Supreme has since evolved into one of the most active streetwear communities on the Internet. The Basement's brainchild Peter Mitchell has grown the forum for streetwear fans into a business, which hawks bars of soap that would make Tyler Durden proud and T-shirts, and recently hosted a pop-up to bring the activity to a physical location. Dazed spoke with Mitchell about why streetwear fans are so passionate and what makes The Basement unique.
Mitchell believes that streetwear's multiple layers adds to fans obsession with the genre, especially in the age of social media. "People have always latched onto something and pushed it further within the communities, to the stage that there are subcultures within subcultures," Mitchell told Dazed. "Now within an age which is dominated by social media, people don't have to be out on the street to be seen in the latest items."
The Basement's user base has a deep level of knowledge in many of the areas that influence streetwear as well. "Anything and everything you can learn from the group," Mitchell says. "The members tend to prefer searching on The Basement asking questions and hearing responses than simply using Google... People ask what brands do the best denim, what songs to listen to in a certain genre, what brand was a celebrity wearing."
One of The Basement's greatest advantages is that it runs through Facebook, meaning everyone is using a personal verified account instead of being enabled by anonymity. "I find that the mutual respect level in the group makes it different to any other group," Mitchell says. "We have been strict with members from the start and I feel this has really helped to keep everyone grounded and brought people closer together to the stage where they can genuinely become friends." To this point, members call themselves The Basement Fam.
Members are so hardcore that they created a sub-page to The Basement called The Waiting Room, which is for users that have been banned.
Join the conversation at The Basement now.
