Limbo (boutique)
Encyclopedia
Limbo was a boutique which was opened in 1965 by Martin (Marty) Freedman, originally at 24 St. Mark's Place
between Second
and Third
Avenues in the East Village
neighborhood of Manhattan
, New York City
. The shop moved to 4 St. Mark's Place on the same block in 1967, and closed in 1975.
In the May 1968 issue of eye Magazine, Norman Steinberg described Limbo as: "...the East Village clothier of the 'tuned-in' generation." He went on to write: "For the uninitiated, Limbo is much more than just a clothing store. It is a social, intellectual, and entertainment experience that appeals to people of all ages, races, creeds, colors and political persuasions."
.
Limbo's eclectic merchandise – from vintage suits, dresses and military uniforms, to original designed outfits made of Indian cotton
s and silk
s – helped introduced the free-wheeling sartorial expression associated with the 1960s. A style that informed and was informed by rock & roll music and radical politics, Eastern spirituality and liberated sexuality.
Limbo helped turned clothing into a medium that critiqued assumptions of both high and low culture, just as pop culture became the dominant culture. The store also helped normalize the notion of unisex
clothing. It was regularly featured in the fashion and style sections of the New York newspapers, as well as national magazines including: Cosmopolitan
, Glamour
, Life
, Vogue
, Jet, and L'uomo Vogue In the process, it became the "haberdasher" of New York City's "counter-culture", as well as of musicians playing at the nearby Fillmore East
; the store also acted as an unofficial ticket agent to the Fillmore. The store dressed rock stars and legends from Janis Joplin
, Jimi Hendrix
and Jim Morrison
, to the New York Dolls
and Velvet Underground. John Lennon
and Yoko Ono
frequented the shop, as did Andy Warhol
and his "superstars" including Baby Jane Holzer, Nico
, Viva and Edie Sedgwick
.
In the Chicago Tribune
in 1966, photographer and chronicler of fashion Bill Cunningham
reported that "Even top designers of Paris, rush down to Limbo as soon as they arrive in New York." Hubert de Givenchy
, Halston, Courrege and other Couturiers frequented the store. Ralph Lauren
mined its shelves, particularly for "vintage" and unusual clothing, while Tommy Hilfiger
, initially a customer, later drove down from Elmira, New York
to load his trunk and backseat of his car with Limbo's pre-washed jeans to resell at his stores upstate.
Limbo was a destination to visit in the East Village, attracting not only fashion-conscious people from other Manhattan neighborhoods and the city's suburbs, but also people from other states and overseas. Limbo's exterior, identified by its noted "pointing hand" sign, can be seen in a segment of Ralph Bakshi
's 1972 animated film, Fritz the Cat
. The store's metal steps and landing were for a time a place to observe the scene and to be seen.
St. Mark's Place (Manhattan)
Saint Mark's Place is a street in the East Village neighborhood of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is named after St. Mark's Church in-the-Bowery on 10th Street at Second Avenue. St. Mark's Place, which is a section of 8th Street, runs from Third Avenue to Avenue A...
between Second
Second Avenue (Manhattan)
Second Avenue is an avenue on the East Side of the New York City borough of Manhattan extending from Houston Street at its south end to the Harlem River Drive at 128th Street at its north end. A one-way street, vehicular traffic runs only downtown. A bicycle lane in the left hand portion from 55th...
and Third
Third Avenue (Manhattan)
Third Avenue is a north-south thoroughfare on the East Side of the New York City borough of Manhattan, running from Cooper Square north for over 120 blocks. Third Avenue continues into The Bronx across the Harlem River over the Third Avenue Bridge north of East 129th Street to East Fordham Road at...
Avenues in the East Village
East Village, Manhattan
The East Village is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, lying east of Greenwich Village, south of Gramercy and Stuyvesant Town, and north of the Lower East Side...
neighborhood of Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
, New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. The shop moved to 4 St. Mark's Place on the same block in 1967, and closed in 1975.
In the May 1968 issue of eye Magazine, Norman Steinberg described Limbo as: "...the East Village clothier of the 'tuned-in' generation." He went on to write: "For the uninitiated, Limbo is much more than just a clothing store. It is a social, intellectual, and entertainment experience that appeals to people of all ages, races, creeds, colors and political persuasions."
History
Among its important contributions to the world of fashion, Limbo is recognized as being the first boutique to sell used, prewashed, distressed and embellished jeansJeans
Jeans are trousers made from denim. Some of the earliest American blue jeans were made by Jacob Davis, Calvin Rogers, and Levi Strauss in 1873. Starting in the 1950s, jeans, originally designed for cowboys, became popular among teenagers. Historic brands include Levi's, Lee, and Wrangler...
.
Owner Marty Freedman sold used Levi'sLevi Strauss & Co.Levi Strauss & Co. is a privately held American clothing company known worldwide for its Levi's brand of denim jeans. It was founded in 1853 when Levi Strauss came from Buttenheim, Franconia, to San Francisco, California to open a west coast branch of his brothers' New York dry goods business...
jeans to a local hippy clientele. When supplies of used Levi's ran low he took new, unwashed LeeLee (Jeans)Lee is a brand of denim jeans, first produced in 1889 in Salina, Kansas. The company is owned by VF Corporation, the largest apparel company in the world. Its headquarters is currently in Merriam, Kansas, just outside of Kansas City, Missouri...
jeans, a brand he also carried, and sent the out to a laundry. It marked the first time a retailer had washed a new pair of jeans to get a used, worn effect, and the idea became a hit. Moreover, Freedman used East Village artists to embellish the jeans with patches, decals and other touches, and sold them for $200. Freedman sold the store in 1975 to Trash & Vaudeville.
Limbo's eclectic merchandise – from vintage suits, dresses and military uniforms, to original designed outfits made of Indian cotton
Cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....
s and silk
Silk
Silk is a natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be woven into textiles. The best-known type of silk is obtained from the cocoons of the larvae of the mulberry silkworm Bombyx mori reared in captivity...
s – helped introduced the free-wheeling sartorial expression associated with the 1960s. A style that informed and was informed by rock & roll music and radical politics, Eastern spirituality and liberated sexuality.
Limbo helped turned clothing into a medium that critiqued assumptions of both high and low culture, just as pop culture became the dominant culture. The store also helped normalize the notion of unisex
Unisex
Unisex stands for the meaning that either gender or sex will be able to, but can also be another term for gender-blindness.The term was coined in the 1962 and was used fairly informally...
clothing. It was regularly featured in the fashion and style sections of the New York newspapers, as well as national magazines including: Cosmopolitan
Cosmopolitan (magazine)
Cosmopolitan is an international magazine for women. It was first published in 1886 in the United States as a family magazine, was later transformed into a literary magazine and eventually became a women's magazine in the late 1960s...
, Glamour
Glamour (magazine)
Glamour is a women's magazine published by Condé Nast Publications. Founded in 1939 in the United States, it was originally called Glamour of Hollywood....
, Life
Life (magazine)
Life generally refers to three American magazines:*A humor and general interest magazine published from 1883 to 1936. Time founder Henry Luce bought the magazine in 1936 solely so that he could acquire the rights to its name....
, Vogue
Vogue (magazine)
Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine that is published monthly in 18 national and one regional edition by Condé Nast.-History:In 1892 Arthur Turnure founded Vogue as a weekly publication in the United States. When he died in 1909, Condé Montrose Nast picked up the magazine and slowly began...
, Jet, and L'uomo Vogue In the process, it became the "haberdasher" of New York City's "counter-culture", as well as of musicians playing at the nearby Fillmore East
Fillmore East
The Fillmore East was rock promoter Bill Graham's rock venue on Second Avenue near East 6th Street in the East Village neighborhood of the Manhattan borough of New York City. It was open from 1968 to 1971, and featured some of the biggest acts in rock music at the time...
; the store also acted as an unofficial ticket agent to the Fillmore. The store dressed rock stars and legends from Janis Joplin
Janis Joplin
Janis Lyn Joplin was an American singer, songwriter, painter, dancer and music arranger. She rose to prominence in the late 1960s as the lead singer of Big Brother and the Holding Company and later as a solo artist with her backing groups, The Kozmic Blues Band and The Full Tilt Boogie Band...
, Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...
and Jim Morrison
Jim Morrison
James Douglas "Jim" Morrison was an American musician, singer, and poet, best known as the lead singer and lyricist of the rock band The Doors...
, to the New York Dolls
New York Dolls
The New York Dolls is an American rock band, formed in New York in 1971. The band's protopunk sound prefigured much of what was to come in the punk rock era; their visual style influenced the look of many new wave and 1980s-era glam metal groups, and they began the local New York scene that later...
and Velvet Underground. John Lennon
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
and Yoko Ono
Yoko Ono
is a Japanese artist, musician, author and peace activist, known for her work in avant-garde art, music and filmmaking as well as her marriage to John Lennon...
frequented the shop, as did Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
and his "superstars" including Baby Jane Holzer, Nico
Nico
Nico was a German singer, lyricist, composer, musician, fashion model, and actress, who initially rose to fame as a Warhol Superstar in the 1960s...
, Viva and Edie Sedgwick
Edie Sedgwick
Edith Minturn "Edie" Sedgwick was an American actress, socialite, model and heiress. She is best known for being one of Andy Warhol's superstars. Sedgwick became known as "The Girl of the Year" in 1965 after starring in several of Warhol's short films in the 1960s...
.
In the Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
in 1966, photographer and chronicler of fashion Bill Cunningham
Bill Cunningham
Bill Cunningham is an American talk radio host. His full-time job is hosting The Big Show with Bill Cunningham, a local show on 700 WLW in Cincinnati, Ohio. Cunningham now hosts Live on Sunday Night, it's Bill Cunningham, which is syndicated to over 300 stations by Premiere Radio Networks. He is...
reported that "Even top designers of Paris, rush down to Limbo as soon as they arrive in New York." Hubert de Givenchy
Hubert de Givenchy
Count Hubert James Marcel Taffin de Givenchy is a French aristocrat and fashion designer who founded The House of Givenchy in 1952. He is famous for having designed much of the personal and professional wardrobe of Audrey Hepburn, as well as clothing for clients such as Jacqueline Kennedy...
, Halston, Courrege and other Couturiers frequented the store. Ralph Lauren
Ralph Lauren
Ralph Lauren is an American fashion designer and business executive; best known for his Polo Ralph Lauren clothing brand.-Early life:...
mined its shelves, particularly for "vintage" and unusual clothing, while Tommy Hilfiger
Tommy Hilfiger
Thomas Jacob "Tommy" Hilfiger is an American fashion designer and founder of the premium lifestyle brand Tommy Hilfiger.-Early life:...
, initially a customer, later drove down from Elmira, New York
Elmira, New York
Elmira is a city in Chemung County, New York, USA. It is the principal city of the 'Elmira, New York Metropolitan Statistical Area' which encompasses Chemung County, New York. The population was 29,200 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Chemung County.The City of Elmira is located in...
to load his trunk and backseat of his car with Limbo's pre-washed jeans to resell at his stores upstate.
Limbo was a destination to visit in the East Village, attracting not only fashion-conscious people from other Manhattan neighborhoods and the city's suburbs, but also people from other states and overseas. Limbo's exterior, identified by its noted "pointing hand" sign, can be seen in a segment of Ralph Bakshi
Ralph Bakshi
Ralph Bakshi is an Israeli-American director of animated and live-action films. In the 1970s, he established an alternative to mainstream animation through independent and adult-oriented productions. Between 1972 and 1992, he directed nine theatrically released feature films, five of which he wrote...
's 1972 animated film, Fritz the Cat
Fritz the Cat (film)
Fritz the Cat is a 1972 American animated comedy film written and directed by Ralph Bakshi as his feature film debut. Based on the comic strip of the same name by Robert Crumb, the film was the first animated feature film to receive an X rating in the United States...
. The store's metal steps and landing were for a time a place to observe the scene and to be seen.