Pauly Guwop Showcases Charlotte Artists in Avirex with It’s All Leather

DJ Pauly Guwop is bringing the power of hip-hop’s golden age into Charlotte’s present with his new digital publication, It’s All Leather, Vol. 1. Launched exclusively on Instagram on Jan. 15, It’s All Leather pays homage to Avirex, a brand that has shown love to hip-hop artists since the late 1980s. 

Originally founded in 1975 as a military apparel brand in New York City, Avirex became known for their A2 bomber jackets, used by the U.S. Air Force in the 1980s and made famous by Tom Cruise in 1986’s Top Gun. 

Young New York rappers like Biggie, Fat Joe, and Mobb Deep emulated the underground entrepreneurs who could afford the pricey jackets in the mid-80s. 

As DJ Pauly Guwop explained to Queen City Nerve, “Back then, only dope boys and real, like, upper-echelon European guys would wear them, you know? But mainly it was the entertainers, rappers, dope boys, etc.” 

Donning Avirex in an age before hip-hop artists were perceived as style icons, these rappers elevated the military apparel company to one of the most iconic and exclusive streetwear brands. 

Importantly, major brands at this time didn’t see rappers as desirable brand ambassadors. Before Saks Fifth Avenue was selling four-figure sneakers with fat laces and Virgil Abloh took his Off-White bolt cutters to the gates of European prestige fashion, hip-hop fashion was defined by these independent tastemakers. 

Fashion powerhouses like European legacy houses and American brands that catered to white middle-class consumers were resistant to embrace an art form seen at best as a fad and at worst a menace to society defined by violence. 

If they weren’t outright ignoring hip-hop’s style icons, they were legally persecuting designers like Dapper Dan, who creatively sampled the logos of luxury houses to make entirely original custom pieces. 

Avirex, however, was one of the early brands to embrace hip-hop, placing ads in hip-hop magazines like The Source and having groups like Brand Nubian model for them. DJ Pauly Guwop brings this history down south with the first volume of his digital publication It’s All Leather, Vol. 1, which celebrates the US South’s legacy of leatherwear. 

Shot by photographers like Mike Jones, Keilan Armon, Linus, Marc Prosper, and Guwop himself, It’s All Leather challenges the bicoastal chauvinism of the fashion industry and centers Southern aesthetics while featuring four Charlotte artists: Cyanca, Reuben Vincent, Lute, and Fetty P. Franklin. 

Guwop began working on the project around nine months before its Jan. 15 launch on Instagram. At the time, he was searching for a job in creative directing and marketing. A contact at Nike heard of an opportunity at Avirex and passed Guwop’s name along. 

Guwop was no stranger to the marketing world. He has helped launch two cultural businesses in Charlotte: the lifestyle brand Clean Slate USA (2012) and the marketing firm 1234 Agency (2019), the latter of which collaborated with the Jordan Brand and WeWork during Charlotte’s NBA All Star Weekend in 2019. 

Guwop quickly put together a deck that showed his vision for the project, originally titled “Avirex: A Dirty South Perspective.” He wanted to demonstrate to the company, which was looking to break into markets in Atlanta and throughout North Carolina, that Charlotte artists could have a global imprint. 

“I had to come up with four people that kind of represented us to New York or anywhere else who doesn’t know us,” Guwop explained. “It was not only people that I wanted to highlight, but also more importantly, people that the brand is going to be able to recognize.” 

He sent the folks at Avirex a breakdown of his initial artist roster, which went through three different lineups. He picked two indie artists (Franklin and Cyanca) and two signed (Lute and Vincent) to show the diversity of Charlotte’s music scene while highlighting the global impact and brand partnerships of each artist. 

After two weeks of silence, Avirex requested samples of Guwop’s photography. He selected 10 photos that he believed showed his range. While the folks in charge of the project approved the deck, they remained doubtful whether the project fit their contemporary brand vision. 

Guwop never doubted his vision. 

“There’s no way that this isn’t Avirex,” he told Queen City Nerve. “What do you mean? I’m culture. I’m the cloth.”  

It was this kind of confidence that helped him as he worked with Mindy Gale, owner of Gale Branding who runs the US accounts at Avirex. They went back and forth about Guwop’s vision, and Gale helped him maintain the integrity of his work while elevating his vision to the level of global branding. 

“I love how Mindy challenged me,” he reflected. “It was almost like everything I would come with, Mindy would challenge me … in a constructive way. At first I didn’t understand it, but now I’m so grateful for it because it gave me a true taste of legacy fashion.” 

Breaking down the looks of ‘It’s All Leather’

The result is a sprawling editorial that features four of Charlotte’s most distinct voices in hip-hop and R&B. Fetty P. Franklin kept the 1980s legacy of Avirex going in his shoot, donning the Wheat N3B Avirex Snorkel Jacket with authentic military details, which he paired with Timberland boots, a grey toboggan and light-washed ripped jeans. 

Franklin reflected on the power of the jacket to Guwop in his It’s All Leather interview: “It gives more of a like, ‘Yeah get out of my way, you see what’s going on. You see the temperature. No, you ain’t got this jacket. No, you have never seen it. No, you can’t touch it.’” 

Reuben Vincent, Charlotte’s Roc Nation signee, interlaced hip-hop fashion with a classic preppy look, inspired by Kanye West’s collegiate, early-aughts look. Vincent paired the Avirex Classic Team Eagle Wool Leather varsity jacket with a cream silk tie, white button down, general green cargo pants, and Timberlands. 

Read more: Reuben Vincent Finds His Voice on Roc Nation Debut ‘Love Is War’ (2023)

He told Guwop, “My fit was a balance of bringing urban wear/streetwear and amplifying it with a lil business casual.” 

Vincent ended up rocking the “hip-hop-meets-business-casual” ’fit for his debut at the 2024 Dreamville Fest, where Linus, Keilan Armon, and Mike Jones teamed up to capture the shots that populated the final editorial. 

Cyanca, the Queen City’s creative shapeshifter, brought her eclectic style to the fore as she modeled the Black Icon Avirex Military Bomber in her shoot. She accentuated the jacket with J. Reid Cranberry Classic sunglasses, grills, light-wash jeans, and Social Status x Nike Air Mac Attacks with cheerleader socks. 

Read more: Cyanca Returns With New EP, Readies Debut Album (2023)

Guwop was particularly excited to include Cyanca in the initial rollout of the project because, as he told Nerve, “Cyanca’s actually really a fashion person. Out of the whole thing, that’s the fashion person.” 

Lute, whose history in Charlotte hip-hop goes back to the early collective Forever FC, strongly contrasts Cyanca’s commitment to engaging fashion. 

“Then we got Lute, who’s like the calm, he’s like the polar opposite of fashion,” Guwop said. 

That lukewarm relation to fashion trends didn’t stop Lute from showing out for his shoot with Marc Prosper. Shot at Damian Peters’ car shop Clubhaus 704, Lute donned a White Icon Avirex Military Bomber Jacket that he paired with grey Champion sweatpants and Timbs, a callback to an old photo of Allen Iverson getting off the team bus in Charlotte in the early 2000s. 

Read more: Lute Talks ‘Gold Mouf,’ Anxiety and Dreamville Before First Local Headlining Gig (2024)

With braids done by Queen City songstress Makeda Iroqouis, Lute felt the power of the Avirex jacket, reflecting in his interview that, “I just feel like when you step outside, your confidence boosts when you feel like you enjoy what you have on.” 

These four artists, each reflecting a different legacy and history all through the Avirex brand, are emblematic of where Guwop wants to take It’s All Leather in the future. He has an eye toward expanding the project for at least two more volumes and possibly moving beyond the Instagram-exclusive release into print. 

But outside of that, Guwop sees It’s All Leather not just as an opportunity for Charlotte artists but an opportunity for major brands to expand their creative imagination. 

“What legacy brands have to do a better job of is tapping in with people like me,” Guwop exclaimed. “People who care enough to say, ‘You know what? This isn’t about money. This isn’t about any of that. This is literally about pure passion.’” 

The vision is a powerful one. Hip-hop fashion has never exclusively been about brands or the bottom line; it has been about that feeling that Franklin and Lute describe. It’s been about using fashion to feel unstoppable, to conjure the transformative power of cloth to become someone or something different altogether. 

Guwop’s partnership with Avirex highlights this legacy. In spite of a 50-year history that has largely ignored fashion trends outside of New York and LA, Guwop is showing that the South is still talking, and it’s time for the major brands to listen.