Female Streetwear Devotees: "A New Supreme Hoodie Feels as Good as a New Designer Bag"

Business of Fashion has a feature Friday that looks at how streetwear companies that cater to women and the women who reciprocate that love.

Women have long been forced to carve out their own place in the streetwear industry by purchasing smaller sizes of men's products. This hasn't slowed women down from fully enjoying the genre of clothing, though. "Putting on a new Supreme hoodie feels as good as wearing a new designer bag,” creative director Jen Brill told Business of Fashion.

Streetwear, as we've written before, is moving quickly to be more inclusive of its female fanbase. Brands like KITH, Stampd, Aimé Leon Dore, and Public School, among others, have all introduced women's collections. "I feel like today, more than ever before, the female is very much in tune with what's happening with menswear with social media having made it easy for people to observe other people's fashion and style," KITH founder Ronnie Fieg told BoF. "In the last few years, men have been offered a wider selection of streetwear style pieces, and today women are wanting the same opportunities to buy into that."

Brands that have put efforts into womenswear are seeing a big return on their investment. Puma's profits have been buoyed largely by its women's clothing—an effort spearheaded by none other than Rihanna. However, some brands are still worried about how launching a women's line will affect its men's line. "I think men will look at a brand and think that it's a brand for their girlfriends and not for them, thus maybe shy away from it," Matt Powell, an analyst at global market research firm NPD Group, told BoF.