A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away – actually, it was Germany – Ben and I befriended Martin Magielka, publisher of Streetwear Today Magazine.  At the time, we were exhibiting at our first international tradeshow – Bread & Butter – with nothing but a box of T-shirts and some cut/sew to show for ourselves.  Martin gave us some of our first European press, a 1-page feature that year, but we were just cheeky enough to expect more.  Over the years, Streetwear Today had honored the culture’s brightest luminaries like Hiroki of Visvim and Eddie Cruz of Undefeated on its covers – when were we gonna get ours?  Every year we’d run into Martin, it became the running joke.  “Hey Martin, you ready for that cover yet?”

This past summer at the Bright Show in Berlin, Martin finally had the answer we were looking for.  Either we had worn him down or had finally earned the right to grace the cover of Streetwear Today, but regardless, he blessed us – and now that issue is on newsstands!  You can pick one up while you’re at the tradeshows in Berlin this week or you can flip through it right here, as this is the inaugural online edition of Streetwear Today.  I guess there’s a first time for everything…

Thanks to Martin and the Streetwear Today team, as well as our good friends Andy and Kellen Ellis who (by way of London and Oakland) conducted the interview and shot the portraits.

Click on the issue to begin…

Some excerpts from the interview…