Top image: Still. ‘Spirit of Buffalo’. Dr Martens FW15

Titled Spirit of Buffalo, Dr Martens’ FW15 Campaign taps into a movement that sent shockwaves through 80s youth culture, and those waves still reverberate to this day.

More than merely a trend, the Buffalo movement was a multi-faceted collective and cultural youthquake. Laying the groundwork for the merging of sportswear and high fashion, the movement elevated youth street style to glossy new heights.

Three decades on Dr Martens have marked the thirtieth anniversary of Buffalo via their FW15 campaign teaming up with Buffalo alumni Jamie Morgan and Barry Kamen to forge a contemporary take on the iconic aesthetic. In the campaign video, dubbed by Swedish-born singer and songwriter Neneh Cherry, the Buffalo story is traced from it’s raw beginnings in Post-Thatcher Britain, to the collective’s ongoing cultural impact.

Spearheaded by Ray Petri, the Scottish-born stylist (long before this was a coveted job description) corralled a close-knit pool of young creatives including a young Naomi Campbell, photographers Jamie Morgan and Marc Lebon, and musicians like Neneh Cherry – who penned an ode to the movement in her 1988 chart-topping hit, Buffalo Stance.

The Buffalo aesthetic created a new breed of menswear styling. Boys in highly polished brogues worn with tracksuits; Crombie coats teamed with shorts; sportswear and couture; kilts and diamanté, and the definitive Petri Buffalo garment, the no-nonsense Nylon MA1 army surplus flight jacket, lined in bright orange, teamed with Levi’s 501s: the look that evolved into the iconic urban male uniform of the 80s.

‘People tend to associate the word Buffalo with Bob Marley’s ‘Buffalo Soldier, but in fact it’s a Caribbean expression to describe people who are rude boys or rebels. Not necessarily tough, but hard style taken from the street… a functional and stylish look; non-fashion with a hard attitude.’ – Ray Petri

 

Above image: Felix Howard by Jamie Morgan for The Face (cover) March ’85 (From Buffalo- Ray Petri)

The aesthetic best presented itself to the world via Ray Petri and Jamie Morgan’s game-changing editorial in The Face. Thirteen-year-old Felix Howard, with the eyes of gangster, stared out from the front cover, dressed in a secondhand chalk-stripe suit with the word “KILLER” ripped from a tabloid and pinned to his hat.