I think there is some confusion regarding the use of the term “Castro Clone”. People seem to think it was this ONE THING when really it was a term attributed to several different looks that evolved slowly out of the Castro Street scene.
Let me try and explain… Going all the way back to my first memories of San Francisco I can only point to what I considered the Original Castro look…
From: Uncle Donald’s Castro Street
Here you go… This was the “gay look” back when I was a young chicken and I first started visiting San Francisco. It’s sort of a sexy hippy look with the ever present Ray Ban Aviators with t-shirt and the grungy boots with wide belt and the bulging Levi’s 501 jeans. Levi’s was a local clothing company in San Francisco.
In my opinion though this was not just Castro ONLY though it was in my recollection a more sleazy Tenderloin/Polk Street look with a strong LA vibe going on. When I first started going out though I ran into lots of gay guys who used to talk about how Polk Street used to be the epicenter of the gay scene which eventually moved to The Castro so maybe that’s where it got it’s start. I was not around for that so I have to accept what others told me I guess.
It was not till later in the seventies that I consider the real strong looks started showing up basically around the type of bars gay guys would go out to…
From: Papermag ~ No H8 A Fashion Story Paying Homage To The Gays Who Started It All
Here were the two main looks in masculine bar wear or an Al Parker/Joe Gage porno video shoot from around the late seventies.
All American Boy “Disco/Athletic” Sex Toy and Folsom Street Leather Bar Stud. Oh yeah, I remember the All American Boy short shorts and the long socks and the tennis shoes were always big in the Castro during the day especially if it was sunny. I used to hangout by the front window of The Elephant Walk and see guys dressed just like this go by all day long. The Leather Bar gear with the typical Ray Ban aviators, tight t-shirt, Levi 501s, leather jacket and boots was predominate for Folsom Street Leather bars of course. Remember the Leather Bars and Discos had dress codes back then and these looks would get you into most of them no problem so people dressed for whatever bar they expected to go out to later that night.
The Castro Clone look could be considered by this point any combination of either one of these looks mixed together within reason. You could choose to wear really short cutoff 501s and a wife beater with a short sleeve lumber jack shirt and Red Wing 875 boots in suede and that would still fit into The Castro Clone category very easily. Think of the construction worker from the Village People for a reference.
Eventually by the 80s the whole Castro Clone thing started going much more preppy…
From: Papermag ~ No H8 A Fashion Story Paying Homage To The Gays Who Started It All
See the guy above with the leather jacket and big mustache and heavily styled blow dried short hair with the plaid shirt and the Levi’s 501 jeans? He represented just about everyone I knew in the Castro around 1981 onwards. It’s not quite the “hard core” Leather vibe and it’s not a tragic Disco Dolly outfit either. Your basic homogenized All American Castro Queen look that would fit in at work or play and would not shock anyone at the local church picnic.
You could still find some variety out there but “most” gay guys pretty much stuck to this default clean cut look without really thinking about it so it was not unheard of to walk into any San Francisco gay bar on a Tuesday night and find ten guys all standing at the bar in pretty much the same outfit. It was how I learned to tell what type of crowd the bar attracted.
When I say “Castro Clone” these are the primary styling examples I am thinking about but now maybe you can see the look itself and how it was worn evolved in several ways over the years so it’s more of a general idea than any specific set of clothing.
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