I’ve written about the BAPE (A Bathing Ape) store in Ura-Harajuku.
For those not familiar with BAPE, back in 1993, Tomoaki “NIGO” Nagao founded A Bathing Ape (BAPE) in Ura-Harajuku.
With nearly two dozen stores in Japan which include BAPE, BAPE Pirate, BAPE Kids, BAPexclusive Aoyama and BAPexclusive Kyoto.
But before he founded BAPE, he was an editor and stylist for “Popeye” Magazine and he would open his first store “Nowhere” with Undercover’s Jun Takahashi in April 1, 1993.
But wanting to start his own brand, he created A Bathing Ape, inspired by the 1968 film “Planet of the Apes” and a reference to “A Bathing Ape in Lukewarm Water”, as Japanese people have daily baths in water at temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (104F).
With exposure thanks to music artists such as Cornelius sporting his t-shirts (which he gave to Cornelius to wear during performances), he would make 30 to 50 shirts a week to sell and the other half to his friends.
The brand would become a popular Japanese street fashion brand with many celebrities such as Notorious B.I.G. sporting the clothing (and was not easily accessible to the masses as the price for BAPE clothing is quite expensive because the clothing was scarce, production run only fulfilled 10% of demand), but the fashion brand earned respect by BAPE fans.
And on February 2011, A Bathing Ape was sold to Hong Kong fashion conglomerate, the I.T. Group. NIGO would stay as creative director through April 2013.
While the BAPE of the ’90s and 2000’s are much different than the BAPE of today, the brand continues to thrive.
NIGO would create Aape, a second fashion line that was initially a women’s streetwear line in 2012 but now features clothing lines for men, women and children.
While BAPE has the ape faced logo which many people are familiar with, Aape is a circular-faced logo.
The other big difference is that Aape are less expensive than BAPE, which is very expensive. But is one better than the other? That’s subjective. But I do notice the 2019 clothing trying to show people that Aape is the same family as A Bathing Ape and the emphasis on “Aape by A Bathing Ape” on a lot of their clothes.
Btw, similar to Harajuku, the Shibuya store doesn’t allow photography, so I just took a picture of the store outside.
While I’m more of a BAPE fan than an Aape fan, I will say that the Aape “Super Dragon Ball Super: Broly” film tie-in clothing from earlier in the year were pretty awesome.
But again, it’s all subjective and what you are willing to spend.
But Aape may be more for you and financially more convenient. So, definitely check the store out!
