21 Days of Street Style: Day 7, Alex, South St

 Alex knows a little about street style himself, writing street style features for Philadelphia Magazine along with Emily Goulet. I first met him on the way to a party for the local fashion label NINObrand last summer. We shot these images after I finished doing a shoot with Ps and Qs shop on South Street that he helped orchestrate. As for his own style, Alex has done a fair amount of thinking about it as well. This is what he had to say: "My sense of style is simple, to be honest. It's clean. My philosophy is that it's not so much about trends. It's really about finding what works for you and repeating it. Or just finding what makes you feel comfortable. I'm not saying, like, sweatpants. Just your kind of aesthetic. And then doing that." "Black skinny jeans," he explained, "will always be my go-to. And maybe that's not in this season. That's kind of classic in general. But I really just think that people need to figure out what works for them and do it. And have a really strong sense of self in that representation. Like, I love book bags, and I don't think book bags are necessarily always revered as the most stylish things. At times I have trouble dressing up. I wear a lot of casual. Like in summer, I wear shorts all the time, regardless of them being trendy. And that's just who I am."

In these images, Alex is wearing Velodyne headphones, a jacket by Publish, a chambray shirt by Naked and Famous, Mint scratch 'n sniff raw denim jeans also by Naked and Famous, shoes from Target, sunglasses "from a little vintage shop in LA," and, of course,  a book bag from United by Blue.

"I think the Philly style scene is one that gets a lot of slack from people on the inside and the outside," he told me. "I definitely think in general Philadelphia is a comfortable place. We're cheaper than New York. And that's what so great about this place, that we have this freeness and comfortableness to just be ourselves that I think at times kind of resonates in fashion with us being lazy. But I think that people that do fashion well in this city do it really well, and those people are heightening our city over all."