R.I.P. Pastelle: A History Of Kanye’s Lost Clothing Line

Clothing lines are almost a rite of passage for rappers. You know the formula: sell a couple million records, launch a record label, start selling clothes. Yeah, rapper clothing lines fail frequently, but everyone expected different from Kanye West and his Pastelle brand, given his well-documented passion for fashion.

Surely the habitually trendsetting guy who shops enough to speak Italian would put out one of the dopest rapper-helmed fashion lines ever, right? Wrong…sort of. While ‘Ye supposedly plans to release a collection under his own name in the near future, reports surfaced yesterday saying that Pastelle is officially no more, leaving us with nothing but a series of unfulfilled announcements and public sightings of Mr. West rocking pieces from the line. To honor the brand that never came to fruition, we’re taking a look back at all of Pastelle’s Greatest Moments…

WHERE: “The New Workout Plan” Music Video & Boost Mobile Advertisements
WHEN: 2004
• During his first full year on the scene as a solo artist, Kanye was seen rocking polos embroidered with the College Dropout bear on multiple occasions. The shirts were never released due to Ye’s desire to “really get into design.” In our 2007 interview he told us, “There were phases where I could just do the bear on a Polo and it would’ve made $100 million, but I always say I was a designer before I was a rapper.”

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WHERE: “Stronger” Music Video
WHEN: June 2007
• The song responsible for hip-hop’s current obsession with electronic music is also the song that gave us early hope that Kanye’s clothing line was really on the way. Here are the particular lyrics that got us hyped: “So go ahead, go nuts, go ape shit / Especially in my Pastelle and my Bape shit / Act like you can’t tell who made this.”

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WHAT: Pastelle x Ksubi Sunglasses Collaboration Announced
WHEN: May 2008
• Before anyone even saw a single item of clothing, the brand was already poised for collaborations with top designers. Well, one top designer. Kanye and George Gorrow of Ksubi had previously worked together on eyewear for Ye’s performances and planned to release co-branded sunglasses in October 2008 for $2000. Clearly, the plans never materialized.

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WHERE: Dior Fashion Show In Paris
WHEN: July 2008
• ‘Ye had already been talking about Pastelle for years, but this “Warrior” hoodie was the first confirmed apparel that anyone saw in public. Like many Bape hoodies, this one was equipped with full-zip functionality. Don’t overlook the leather accents and shark fin hood either.

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WHERE: VMAN Magazine
WHEN: August 2008
• When pieces showed up on the pages of an official fashion magazine in this Kim Jones-styled photoshoot, it seemed like the line would inevitably hit stores soon. Rihanna, Lupe Fiasco, and Kanye himself modeled Pastelle clothing in the four page spread. Unfortunately, these glossy pages are as far as the gear made it.

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WHERE: Pastelle Past.Tell.Museum Website
WHEN: October 2008
• Once home to the colorful logo in the top half of this picture, the Pastelle website underwent significant changes last year with no explanation. Clothing was still nowhere to be seen, but the logo changed to the symbols in the bottom half of the picture and the site began forwarding to Past.Tell.Museum–we’re still confused like Young Buck.

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WHERE: American Music Awards
WHEN: November 2008
• Back when Yeezy was rocking the black mullet, he sent hypebeasts worldwide into a flurry of excitement and speculation when he wore this jacket at the American Music Awards. It sucks that it was never made available for us common folk, but you can bet if Pastelle was alive, we’d probably have this two-tone.

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WHERE: City Streets & New Zealand Press Conference
WHEN: November 2008
• Kanye was spotted wearing this jacket just three weeks after designing it. He quickly took to his blog to identify the garment as Pastelle and vowed to start “releasing some of the pieces online starting in January.” Of course, that never happened, but the jacket did show up again in a press conference while ‘Ye was promoting 808s & Heartbreak in the land down under.

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WHERE: Saturday Night Live Performance
WHEN: December 2008
• At the height of 808s-mania, ‘Ye premiered a couple more Pastelle pieces during his third appearance on SNL. The tiger hoodie was seen during his “Love Lockdown” and “Heartless” performances and he wore the yellow crewneck alongside cast and crew at the end of the episode.

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WHERE: YSL Fashion Show In Paris
WHEN: March 2009
• While overseas last spring, Kanye stepped out with Amber Rose on his arm and Pastelle on his back. The wool and leather jacket was the last item from the line seen in public. So that means the first and last documented Pastelle sightings were at fashion shows. Irony!

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WHAT: Pastelle Lookbook Images Leak
WHEN: October 2009
• We were psyched when these pics hit the Internet yesterday and thought that after all the delays, Pastelle was finally happening. For real. Two hours later High Snobiety reported that the line would never be coming out. Ever.

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