“O
ur first drop had maybe ten orders,” 23-year-old Jaden Yo-Eco tells me in front of Oakland Filipino restaurant Lucky Three Seven. “Now it’s thousands, but it’s still only two of us packing in our garage.”
Yo-Eco, along with his best friend Humbert Lee — who’s not here because he’s training for an MMA match — is the owner of the streetwear brand Enter Nostalgia. Their clothing line, which modernizes classic Filipino cultural wear, has found viral online success and has been worn by a long list of rappers that includes YG, Blxst, Toosii, Rucci, Shordie Shordie, 1TakeJay and others.
Tonight, the owners of Lucky Three Seven have allowed Yo-Eco to shoot a lookbook in the restaurant. It’s been overrun by a fleet of photographers and videographers, and in the kitchen, a group of models — which include Stockton Filipino rapper MBNel — are laughing and eating chicken wings and lumpia as they wait for the shoot to begin.
Underneath the iridescent glow of the restaurant’s red-and-yellow electric sign, Yo-Eco leans against the hood of his car in baggy cargos, Timberland boots and a faded purplish Enter Nostalgia crewneck. The car, which Yo-Eco bought after one of the brand’s first successful drops, is a vintage 1999 Mercedes SL500.
“I’ve always been into things from before my time,” he says. “That’s why I chose [Lucky Three Seven]. The neon signs remind me of the city back in the ’40s when they had the bright signs everywhere.”
The past, Yo-Eco says, is one of his biggest design inspirations — hence, the name Nostalgia. Their latest collection draws upon the traditional Filipino garment barong tagalog, a type of sheer, long-sleeve button-up shirt typically worn at Filipino weddings and celebrations.
“Growing up, I had a barong I’d wear on special occasions like my sister’s coming of age party — in Filipino culture, it’s called a debut,” says Yo-Eco. “So I thought, what if we did a short-sleeved version?”
Yo-Eco and Lee originally released a cream colorway in March and shot the lookbook for it at Barong & Formal, a Filipino bridal shop in Oakland. The photoshoot garnered online attention, helping Barong & Formal gain their first couple thousand followers on social media and inspiring them to launch an online store, Yo-Eco says.
“We’ve had instances where something blew up, but those didn’t mean as much,” Yo-Eco says. “With these shirts, we started telling stories and giving exposure to [Filipino-owned] businesses, like the barong shop. So it’s different.”
After the initial success, Yo-Eco released new colorways the models are wearing tonight: olive, grey and blue. The shirts, he notes, are not a totally faithful rendition of the traditional barong. They sport a paisley pattern drawn from hip-hop culture, a culture whose innate anti-authority spirit offers Yo-Eco — who dropped out of college to pursue Enter Nostalgia — a different, but valuable, medium through which to articulate his experience as a Filipino American.
“I’m that delinquent son that got tatted, got into the art and clothing scene,” says Yo-Eco. “Many Filipinos have talented creative arts backgrounds, but our immigrant parents just want us to find stability, to be a traditional nurse or a doctor or something. It means a lot to be able to represent this different side.”
After eating some of the best tocino I’ve ever had, Yo-Eco and I say goodbye. We plan to meet again at Lee’s house where the two pack their orders in Lee’s parents’ garage.
As I drive away, I play MBNel’s most popular song, “In My City,” on my car’s aux. “I never went to college like my mama, papa wanted,” MBNel croons.
