Brooklyn Dom has seen it all, done it all, been to hell and back, and miraculously, lived to tell the tale. From national champion BMX rider to legendary rock-and-roll roadie to MTV VJ to OG skate and streetwear pioneer to infamous Twitter antagonist, Dom DeLuca has had his weathered hands in all parts of the culture for longer than most of the current class have been alive. So, there really isn’t anyone better to tell streetwear’s story from the beginning.

“People don’t realize I’ve been doing this for fucking 25 years,” Dom tells me from his office in the back of Brooklyn Projects, mere inches from the collection of thousands of vintage groupie Polaroids he would later show me, including a very special photo of one of your dear sweet mothers making a glass Coke bottle disappear like heavy metal magic.

A quarter century ago, Dom was in his hometown of Brooklyn, facing the end of his career in the music industry. Fired from MTV and no longer working at Def Jam, the question of what he would do next loomed large. Like many of us who have been in an in-between phase and weren’t sure what to do, Dom turned to retail. But he wasn’t picking up shifts at the mall. No, Dom was still on his boss shit, still doing what he wanted. He opened Brooklyn House, a skate shop that would set the course for the rest of Dom’s life.

Things fell apart shortly after, however. Dom lost his apartment in the 9/11 attacks and his Brooklyn House brick-and-mortar as the result of a lawsuit that took everything from him. For Dom, the great loss marked the end of his time in New York and the beginning of his storied run in Los Angeles.

“I had to make money,” Dom said of his move to the west coast. “At the time, I had a pretty big CD and record collection and back in 2002, you would sell them at Amoeba and get $3 or $4 per CD. I sold thousands of them.”

“I made enough money to get myself an apartment and stack some more to get down with my partner Merf, who passed away. RIP Merf.”

Dom and Merf opened the LA iteration of Brooklyn House in 2002, calling it Brooklyn Projects. There are a lot of different things that happened to set off the streetwear boom in Los Angeles in the early-2000s but if you’re looking for the “Big Bang” moment, look no further. Brooklyn Projects quickly became the go-to skate shop in the city and became a springboard for hundreds of brands, skaters, and other LA personalities that found their home away from home at Dom and Merf’s shop — or behind it by the infamous ramp.

For The Hundreds, Brooklyn Projects was instrumental in expanding the brand’s reach. As well as offering validation for Ben and Bobby early in their streetwear careers. The co-founders tell a great story about securing their first wholesale account in LA at Fred Segal, where they finessed the buyer into thinking The Hundreds was far more established than the stark reality. Then, they sent all of their friends into the store with money to simulate a “sell out” once the retailer took some pieces on consignment.

But it was the brand’s second wholesale account at Brooklyn Projects that gave The Hundreds the momentum to continue growing exponentially. Bobby Hundreds told me landing The Hundreds in Dom’s shop was monumental in the brand’s early trajectory.

“Brooklyn Projects was revered in the city,” Bobby said. “We knew a lot of brands got their start there and it felt great to get a shot from someone we really respected.”

Dom didn’t just give any old brand a spot on his shelves. Authenticity was key in his assessment of up-and-coming creators. When I asked Dom what he saw in Ben and Bobby in those early days, he lit up thinking about the golden days, before LA streetwear became big business.

“They had this innocence about them, but also a fire within,” Dom said about the new kids on the block. “At the time, I really didn’t have much to benefit from them and vice versa. We did it because we connected. We were down for each other. It was on some real friendship shit. It was solid. And that’s how Merf worked. Merf was a handshake dude. That’s it. If he says he’s going to be there at one o’clock with $100, he’s going to be there at one o’clock with $100.
Bobby and Ben are the same way.”

“They came to me at first because they were customers of mine,” Dom said. “And I didn’t buy into The Hundreds at first, so they went down the block to Fred Segal and sold it there. Then I said, ‘Okay, you got Fred Segal. I’ll do it now. Fuck it, let’s do it.’ I was all over the place but I really liked them. Those kids were our family. Ben and Bobby were like our little brothers.”

“People thought I owned part of it, you know what I mean? Merf would hang out with them more than me because I’d be dealing with the shop. When we went to Vegas, it was the Ben and Merf show. And if there was ever a problem, Merf would just jump in and fucking handle it for them, no questions asked.”

Not long after that initial partnership, the personal and business relationship between The Hundreds and Brooklyn Projects blossomed and produced a number of collaborative projects, including the legendary Dom Bomb character, one of the very rare occasions that Bobby’s Adam Bomb character has been altered in any way.

“Brooklyn Projects was revered in the city,” Bobby Hundreds said. “We knew a lot of brands got their start there and it felt great to get a shot from someone we really respected.”

Fast forward a couple of decades. Brands have come and gone, as have friends and family. The Fairfax district that fostered the early growth of LA streetwear has evolved into the epicenter of a multibillion dollar industry that has dominated fashion and transformed from the outlaw to the overwhelming norm. But Brooklyn Projects and The Hundreds are still here, still shining.

That’s why Dom wanted to kick off this very important anniversary year with a collaboration with The Hundreds, his brothers from the beginning.

“When I said I have this idea, less than six months ago, I told them I want to do this, this and this,” Dom told me. “It wasn’t like other brands that say, ‘Oh, let me see. Well, man, I don’t know, the calendar. Maybe next year. I don’t know.’ The Hundreds is like, ‘Yeah, come down. Let’s go. We’ll fit it in.’”

“You can set your clock to The Hundreds. They follow through. It may take a month. It may take a year. But they always get it done.”

The rest of my conversation with Brooklyn Dom covered an insane range of topics from hacking payphones on tour to him basically inventing Supreme, but I couldn’t publish all 30 pages of it on the blog. Maybe Dom will write a book someday, but for now, here’s some bits and pieces from the OG.

DUKE LONDON: What does this collab mean as far as the legacies of both brands?
BROOKLYN DOM: Well, The Hundreds is one of the first brands we ever collabed with. We’ve been family for — fuck — almost 20 years. It means a lot to me because a lot of brands that we’ve fucked with in the past, they get to a certain point and then everything gets lost in the sauce and nobody cares. But with The Hundreds, we’ve always done things together. This year is a big anniversary for Brooklyn Projects and I have a bunch of collabs coming out. But I wanted to start off with The Hundreds because they get it. I wanted to create something that was very reminiscent of when I started in the early ‘90s.

What were some of the references you went back and dug up to inspire this collection?
One of the brands that we took inspiration from for this collab was Pervert, hands down my favorite brand of all time. They’re not given enough credit because Don, the owner, just kind of lost it and joined a cult and all of this stuff. But they’re not given enough credit in the industry for what they’ve done and how much they impacted the game. So, I figured, let me take inspiration from them and redo some pieces. One of the pieces we referenced was this vest that I’ve had for years and still wear. People that see me when I wear it are like, “What the fuck?! A Pervert vest?” Nobody’s ever thought about remaking it. I’m like, “Damn, this would be great to reference for today’s youth to show them the history of where today’s streetwear comes from and to really pay it forward.”

First-generation streetwear.
It was. Back then, it was STÜSSY, then Split, then X-Large, Fresh Jive, Fuct, and Pervert. Not From Concentrate, Project Dragon, Recon, Stash, Gouge, Phat Pharm. The list goes on and on. Alphanumeric was a huge brand in the ‘90s. They were all the pioneers and then we really took it to the next level. These were brands that were doing it before Supreme, but yet a lot of them don’t get that credit.

They were doing it when there was really no structure, kind of winging it.
There was nothing back then. Nowadays, it’s readily available because of the internet and social media. But making it readily available, it also makes it way more corny. I mean, look who buys Supreme now. In the early-2000s, it was only the cool kids and people that knew. Then, it became kind of corny and you see who buys Supreme now. The kids that used to wear it even 10 years ago, they don’t wear it anymore because it’s not what it used to be. Back then, it was almost a badge of honor. You had to know where to get that stuff. That was one of the reasons why I wanted to create a store in Brooklyn, because there was nowhere to get Fuct. Nowhere to get Fresh Jive. Nowhere to get Project Dragon. Nowhere to get Pervert. Nowhere.

So these pieces were really like streetwear passport stamps to you?
Yeah, it meant you knew where to go. You knew about it. There was a store in New York called Swish back in the day that was really dope. Even coming out to LA, there was Gouge. There was Not Guilty. There were the Jokers. There was Label Whore. Fresh Jive, of course, Fuct, of course. There was X-Large, of course. Again, you had to know. It wasn’t readily available. Triple 5 Soul. Now, it’s become so homogenized, it’s become whack.

Besides the availability, what else irks you about modern streetwear?
The people that are “running” streetwear now, like Virgil and people like him. They came in on the coattails of Kanye. Kanye came in and people welcomed him, but he just took it. Through him, he birthed the Virgils, the Jerry Lorenzos. Everyone knows that Jerry Lorenzo was a club promoter and he played that card right and came in on Kanye’s coattails and now he has a $100 million a year brand or whatever. Same thing with Matt Williams. Matt Williams was a sneakerhead. He used to hang out at Brooklyn Projects. White boy sneakerhead rapper. He came in and started working at the homie’s brand called Corpus. He played his card right and got into that whole scene and then, boom, he did Been Trill with Virgil.

It’s kind of like what happened back in the day with my career at MTV. When Headbangers Ball started, the host at the time was this dude Riki Rachtman, he owned The Cathouse. Axl from Guns N Roses was his best friend. LA Guns were his best friends. He was there, so he got the job being the host. Years later, I was supposed to be the host of this new MTV show called Super Rock — which is a shitty name, but I got the gig. I filmed the first episode with Faith No More. Next thing you know, I got canned because this girl Jackie, who was Kurt Cobain’s nanny, wanted a gig and Kurt and Courtney Love were the biggest thing since sliced bread back then. So, she got the show and it failed.

So, how big of a role does nepotism or social climbing play in streetwear success today?
When you look at these people, what have they really done? It’s by association. Even some brands, you go into Dover Street Market or you go to Supreme, you look at it like, “Who are these fucking brands?” Who are they? “Well, I was friends with this one and he’s friends with that one.” There’s no real mass appeal. Half the designs are garbage, but it’s in there because of who they know.

So, how does one build a valid brand?
The Hundreds came and did this thing with websites and blogs that nobody else was doing. Ben and Bobby were fans and Bobby used to work for Stance Magazine. He was part of the culture. They came in and they nurtured the culture, and they grew it and they reap the benefits, but they always kept it real. They didn’t leave Fairfax. They did everything they could to help Fairfax.

How important is authenticity?
I was taught at a very young age, it’s all about integrity. Back then, integrity would pay the bills, you know what I mean? But when I got on MTV, I had to talk about bands that I didn’t like, that I had nothing to do with. But that was my job, so I did. I remember going to a show and seeing Scott from Anthrax or Kurt from Metallica. They’re saying, “Hey, you talked about this new band, dude. You don’t like them.” I felt so bad. I’m like, “Wow, I just fucking bigged up this band and then these kids probably think, oh, wow, I fucking like this band.” Again, I gave up my integrity for that, but fuck it. I had to.

I’ve kept my integrity for the last 20 years, but it has led me to sometimes struggle to keep the lights on whereas the fakes and the frauds and the people that are sellouts, they have no integrity. They come in and they make all the money, but then they’re not around in three or four years. Perfect example, look at Been Trill. That was the hottest brand and then what happened? The bubble burst in a year-and-a-half. You can’t forget where people come from. You could trace my roots back to the Brooklyn House. I didn’t do anything that I’m embarrassed of.

How political is streetwear and the skate scene today?
I think I’m the only shop that will never sell a shop deck because that kills skateboarding. It takes away money from the pros. I don’t have Brooklyn Projects skateboards. People that do sell shop decks make money hand over fist because they can sell it for less than the core skate companies. I get it, you have to be political. It’s a political game. Politicians go up there and they’re smiling and they’re kissing those asses on stage, but behind closed doors, they’re talking shit and plotting. I’m just like, “No, fuck it. Fuck everybody. Fuck them.” If I don’t like it, that’s it. But yet, it kind of hurts me and I’ve learned to bite my tongue a lot. You’re not giving me anything, so what am I going to lose? Now, it’s Instagram that feeds you, “Oh, that’s cool. That’s cool.” They’re not going to tell you what it really is because it’s all about clicks. They don’t want to offend anybody. Everybody’s so PC. Now, my opinions are received as fucking hatred for some reason. Whatever, fuck it. I don’t care. 

You talked about streetwear getting away from its core values. Are we starting to see everything come back around?
I think it’s starting to cannibalize itself. I think people are starting to be aware of the smoke and mirrors. The smoke has dissipated now and the mirrors are cracking and people are seeing what it is. Palace came in on a hot one. They opened up the store on Melrose thinking it was going to be like lines around the block. I live two blocks away from it. Not a goddamn line there any day of the week. Virgil’s saying, “Streetwear is dead,” and backpedaling it because he fucking cannibalized it. He didn’t put back into the pool. For every tree you chop down, you have to plant two more so it’s always going to sustain itself. What these dudes did, they came in and fucking took everything. They’re a swarm of locusts. They just pillage and then go to the next thing. Now, he’s saying, “Oh, it’s all about vintage. It’s this and that.” Yeah, because you fucking took everything and you didn’t give it back. A lot of my friends pander to him thinking they’re going to get something from him. They ain’t getting shit from him.

Do you think brands can come back from selling out to appease temporary leaders?
I think the only way it’s going to stop is when the real brands, people, and skaters start saying, “Yo, enough’s enough. No, I’m cool. That’s not what I’m about.” I love and respect Fucking Awesome, even though Dill and I have our weird little shit sometimes. But Fucking Awesome not selling to a shop like Brooklyn Projects, but going to Dover Street Market. That’s skateboarding? In the ‘90s, if any skateboarder said, “Yeah, I’m selling my brand at Barney’s,” you’d be calling him a poser. Get the fuck out of here. You’re just on some bullshit. But now, it’s acceptable. What has Dover Street done for skateboarding? Nothing. And a lot of these stores have gone out of business three or four times. This shop’s closing, that shop’s closing. I’ve kept the doors open for skateboarding for over 20 years. They all come around eventually. They all start coming around. I’m a staple. It’s not fake news. There’s nothing that I’ve ever done in my 50 years of existence that I would be like, “Fuck. I can’t believe I did that.” Never sold scooters. I never did anything that I’m embarrassed by, you know what I mean?

What burns a bridge forever?
If somebody answers me but doesn’t want to work with me, I can live with that. But to not answer me? Yo, homie, I’m busy, too. But if I can get a response from Jay-Z after like two text messages, then you shouldn’t be so busy to fucking not answer me after four or five emails, straight up.

Who are some young people coming up in streetwear the right way?
Zac from FTP. Zac is the epitome of streetwear. He is what the godfathers did in the ‘90s. He is what Don did. What Eric Brunetti did. What with James did. What Rick did. What Shawn did. Nobody fucked with him. He made his own rules. You don’t like it, go fuck yourself. He is the epitome. He is the future of streetwear. When you get a guy like him that supports Brooklyn Projects still, that’s the biggest payoff. When somebody like him comes to me and shows love, it means a lot. There are a lot of newer brands that have started doing it like Zac. They’re the anti-Fairfax, selling only online. They don’t want to be associated with that and they’re succeeding. There’s a handful of brands. There’s Half Evil. There’s Foul Play, Gnarcotic. These brands are doing it without aligning themselves with one particular type or group of people. It’s winning for them.

The way brands have used the internet to accelerate growth is very reminiscent of the way the music industry has worked in the last decade or so. You’ve been one of the people bridging the gap between music and streetwear for a long time. What was it like to go from being a roadie with a band like Slayer to working with them on a collab?
I was the first one to do a Slayer collab then Supreme followed. Now, Diamond has it. It means the world to me. It’s like my dream to work with my friends that I’ve looked up to because these are the guys that put me on. Anthrax, Slayer, Metallica, they put me on. I don’t care if I sell one t-shirt. I become that 16-year-old kid again that’s fanning out. I don’t do collabs with just anybody. If I don’t have some sort of connection with them, if I don’t really love them, then why bother?

Should all collabs have that kind of foundation underneath them?
I see brands do collabs with everything under the sun. When I went to the licensing show, some people were talking about, “Yeah, you could do a collab with this brand or this brand.” But I don’t like those brands. I don’t even use those brands. So, it doesn’t resonate with me. I don’t want to put my name on something I won’t use. Like, I wouldn’t do a Pepsi collaboration. I want Coke. I’m a Coke guy. I like Coke.

Well, we got our pull quote.
[Laughs] The soda, not the drug. Everybody knows that I’m not a drug guy. People think I’m on coke. I’ve never done cocaine in my life. I sold it but I’ve never done it. It’s funny, there’s people to this day that think I’m on fucking cocaine because I’m so erratic. There is one pro skateboarder — this is one of the best stories ever — we’re in Vegas at the trade show. He’s hanging around. I’m all over the place. He thinks I have coke and this and that. I remember at one point,  I’m with Braydon Szafranski and we’re hanging out and this other pro, I know him, but it’s not like we were friends, is like, “Hey, where you guys going right now?” I was like, “Closing up the booth. I’m going to go to my room and get ready for dinner.” He says, “Oh, cool. Can I come with you?” I look at Braydon like, “What’s up?” He’s like, “I don’t know.” Because Braydon was staying with me. We’re walking back through the fucking casino. This guy starts asking, “What’s up? You got any beaks?” I’m like, “What the fuck is a beak?” He’s like, “All right. Stop fucking with me.” I look at Braydon and go, “What the fuck?” Braydon starts laughing. The other pro is like, “No, seriously, what are you guys going to do right now? You’re going to go up there and bust out a couple of beaks?” I’m like, “What the fuck is this beaks thing you’re talking about?” Braydon is laughing and Braydon’s like, “Dude, Dom doesn’t know what you’re talking about.” He’s like, “Fucking blow. Cocaine.” I’m like, “I don’t do that shit.” He goes, “Yeah, right.” I’m like, “I’m serious.” He’s like, “Well, if you don’t want to share — sharing is caring.” Braydon’s like, “No, he doesn’t.” I said, “Dude, you want to come to my room and check my locker? I don’t have coke.” He really came to the room and looked.

So, what’s next for you, Dom?
My next chapter is focusing on my brand because I spent the last couple of decades building other people’s brands, connecting them with this person, or that person and everybody lives in $5 million houses and I have a fucking two bedroom apartment. Just focusing on my brand and then there is a script by a very, very, very well-known screenwriter based on the story of my life that’s being shopped around. There’s a couple of people that are very interested. 

It’s full circle. I’m going to go back to TV again, but still have the shop. I’m always going to have the shop. It’s funny, I was doing my will. I know, we’re talking about morbid shit. I don’t have kids. I don’t have brothers or sisters. So, I started thinking, “Who’s going to get what?” I started like, “Okay, my BMX bikes are going to go to this person. My record collection is going here. My CD’s are going here. My fucking t-shirts and streetwear stuff is going here. My skateboards are going here. The store, the name is going to get split between some of my employees. They’re going to have a piece of it because when I die, hopefully, these fuckers would keep the fire going until way after I’ve gone.

Photos courtesy of Emily Berkey

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