A newly discovered rivalry in East Coast Hip Hop was brought to the surface over the weekend when Harlem’s Jim Jones and Dave East squared off with Brooklyn’s Fabolous and Maino to debate who is more known for fashion between Harlem and Brooklyn during a spirited segment on the Artist 2 Artist Podcast.
New York has always been hip-hop’s fashion capital, but the question of which borough wears the crown remains unsettled. In less than seven minutes, the quartet gave their perspectives on the debate: does Harlem own the legacy of originality, or has Brooklyn defined hip-hop’s style for the world?
Fabolous wasted no time staking Brooklyn’s claim. He pointed to the borough’s heavyweights—The Notorious B.I.G., Jay-Z, and himself—as arbiters of global taste.
“Me, Big, and Hov outweighed Harlem’s [impact],” Fab declared.
He invoked Biggie’s Coogi sweaters and Versace shades as icons of ’90s luxury, while crediting Jay-Z with reshaping rap’s uniform by trading jerseys for button-ups and designer suits. For Fab, Brooklyn’s power rests in scale, in turning street-born looks into mainstream fashion language.
Jim Jones countered with Harlem’s case. He traced the borough’s lineage back to Dapper Dan, whose custom Gucci and Louis Vuitton pieces in the 1980s blurred the line between high fashion and the block. Harlem, he argued, set the stage for the bling era through Dipset’s pink furs, velour tracksuits, and oversized jewelry in the 2000s.
“The jewelry game, that was us,” Jim reminded Fab, insisting Harlem lit the spark Brooklyn only amplified.
Dave East added fuel, citing A$AP Rocky as proof of Harlem’s enduring reach. “Rocky got a generation,” he said, noting Rocky’s ability to merge uptown swagger with Paris runway elegance.
Jones went further, joking that Brooklyn’s role has always been to “steal” Harlem’s ideas. Fab didn’t dispute it—he reframed it. “I might take a Harlem style,” he admitted, “but I bring it to Brooklyn in my own way.”
The viral clip, already surpassing 454,000 views on X, split fans sharply. Harlem loyalists dubbed their borough “the Urban Fashion Capital of the World.”
Brooklyn supporters fired back that “Fab was flyer than the whole Dipset.” Others simply embraced the exchange as pure New York theater.
The debate between the two boroughs appears to be eternal.
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