10 of Today's Trends That the Notorious B.I.G. Predicted

Image via Complex Original

Bow down to the foresight. Bape's 1993 founding date makes B.I.G. one of the earliest, if not the first, of the hip-hop community at least, to welcome Nigo with open arms. The brand didn't quite catch on with his contemporaries until about five years after his death, which makes you wonder: With an eye like that, how big (no pun intended) of a trendsetter would Frank White have gone on to become?

Clothes get weirder, sure, but at times Frank's shirts were just as loud as those of today's most colorfully-dressed spitters. Biggie's baroque prints matched the decadence of his lifestyle, and set the bar for aspiring rags-to-riches rappers and artists the second he swathed himself in silk.

Hockey and baseball influenced jerseys made a big impact on style in 2013, with the former being embraced primarily by A$AP Mob. However B.I.G.'s penchant for the ice sweaters proves the boys from Harlem can't quite claim #influencer status on the NHL look—Notorious was on that Gretzky wave first.

The sweater steez, specifically Coogi, of course, was so influential throughout the decades that for a time the world very nearly lost Drake to an ill-fitting sweater abyss from which he might never have recovered. No matter what your favorite album or single was, we'll all remember Biggie rocking a Coogi counting racks and/or standing in front of the Twin Towers.

In the aftermath of the brief but still devastating apocalypse that was white-rimmed shades, the rap game looked to the past to move forward in the present: vintage decadent sunnies. Of course, Sir Wallace beat them all to the punch before they even knew what time it was with the likes of his oft-sported decadent. His silk Versace shirts are the stuff of legend, but his shades from the same label are just as influential.

The fedora-adorned hardboiled noir mob boss look B.I.G. used to pull off effortlessly is replicated with diminishing results these days, but even the Notorious one couldn't have predicted hip-hop would take it as far as Vivienne Westwood's Arby's-approved headgear.

In the aftermath of all-black-everything, the coke-white snowed out look reigns supreme, favored by everyone from Kanye to the swag god B. Sales and Ellen DeGeneres. We all know French Montana loves borrowing from the '90s rap scene; maybe he got the Coke Boys inspiration from the '90s king of the game himself, seen here in the angelic steez his contemporaries are so into these days.

Biggie rocked a few leather looks during his day but, to be honest, no one could've called just how far rap's obsession with leather would go. Ditto with the gold. After 2013 cows across the country might officially be on the endangered list.

And based off Tyga's fits, he's been raiding B.I.G.'s storage for material. Imagine Biggie on the "Versace" remix alongside Migos and Drake? Goddamn, he was taken too soon.

"Versace shirt, Jesus laying on the chest
Man I swear BIG did it the best, I mean
Nas did it fresh, Jay did it fresh, I mean
Ye did it fresh, but man, BIG did it the best"
-Stalley, "Ten Jesus Pieces"

"BIG was the first one that had it"
-Big Sean, "First Chain"

The list goes on. The golden Christ-ice reigns supreme at #1 in the Notorious' influencer catalog even twenty years later.