On view at Central Library, Lower Level 1
December 07, 2025 to February 15, 2026
2025 Creator in Residence Ashley Walker has created Threads of Los Angeles, a new fashion line that embodies the city’s past, inspired by materials from the Library’s historical archives of documents, manuscripts, and photographs. All six pieces will be on display together at Central Library through February 15, 2026, and will then travel to branch libraries across the city.
The Rhythm of Rebellion
Theme: The Zoot Suit Riots & Fashion as Resistance
Materials: Wool blend suiting, metal chain, cotton
This suit reinterprets the spirit of the 1943 Zoot Suit Riots—a moment when Mexican American youth used fashion to assert visibility and pride amid wartime prejudice. The exaggerated silhouette, marked by sweeping lines and abundant fabric, reclaims the very excess once deemed subversive. The wavy cut of the pants and sleeves captures the rhythmic motion of swing and jazz, echoing the defiant elegance that pulsed through Los Angeles dance halls. The Rhythm of Rebellion honors those who stitched dignity into their style—transforming fabric into freedom, and movement into protest.
When the City Sang
Theme: Jazz on Central Avenue
Materials: Satin, wool yarn, sequin, embroidery
This piece celebrates the soul of Central Avenue—the heart of Los Angeles’ jazz era, where legends like Billie Holiday, Charles Mingus, and Dexter Gordon transformed nightlife into liberation. The gown’s instruments and street sign embroidery form a tactile memory of rhythm and resistance, rendered through a patch-work technique to honor tools used in performance. Each embellishment reflects the resilience and artistry that defined a generation of Black performers who turned rhythm into revolution. Jazz on Central Avenue is both tribute and translation—turning music into cloth, history into texture, and sound into silhouette.
Blueprint of Elegance
Theme: Paul R. Williams’ Architecture
Materials: Neoprene, cotton twill, metal zipper
This sculptural hoodie draws inspiration from the visionary forms of architect Paul R. Williams, whose modernist buildings reshaped Los Angeles with grace and audacity. The garment’s exaggerated hood and arched silhouette echo the vaulted ceilings, swooping facades, and celestial geometry of Williams’ chapels and civic designs. Crafted in minimalist cream neoprene, it reimagines architectural structure as wearable form—a meditation on space, identity, and belonging. Blueprint of Elegance pays homage to a Black architect who built the visual language of Los Angeles long before the city recognized his genius.
Woven Journeys
Theme: Migration, Memory & Cultural Identity in Los Angeles
Materials: Mixed global textiles from Mexico, Guatemala, Philippines, Korea, Persia, Ethiopia and Belize
This wrap dress is an ode to Los Angeles as a city stitched from many homelands. Each panel, drawn from traditional textiles across continents, represents the immigrant stories that shape California’s cultural fabric—from Guatemala to Korea, from Ethiopia to Mexico. The garment’s intersecting seams symbolize connection and exchange, a geography of belonging mapped through cloth. Woven Journeys transforms migration into material memory—a wearable archive of movement, resilience, and the beauty of coexistence. It honors the hands, histories, and hopes that continue to weave Los Angeles together.
South Central, 1992
Theme: The Los Angeles Uprising & Street Culture Rebellion
Materials: Polyester, chenille patches, embroidery, cotton
This varsity jacket memorializes the 1992 Los Angeles uprising—a moment when outrage and resilience ignited the streets of South Central. Covered in bold patches that recall hip-hop iconography, protest slogans, and neighborhood pride, the piece becomes both armor and archive. The red and black palette burns with the heat of unrest, while varsity lettering reclaims the visual language of American sport for a generation demanding justice. Complementing the jacket, the trousers feature archival newspaper clippings and photographs from 1992, grounding the look in lived memory and transforming workwear into a canvas of collective truth and resistance.
From Soul to Soil
Theme: Los Angeles Flora & Environmental Identity
Materials: Vintage Levi’s denim, preserved & artificial flowers, moss, soil
This ensemble reimagines Los Angeles as a living garden—where denim, once a symbol of American industry, becomes fertile ground for renewal. The vintage Levi’s jacket bursts with native wildflowers, while the 501 jeans are hand-embellished with moss, grass stains, and traces of soil, suggesting both decay and rebirth. The soft, wavelike shape of the fabric evokes the rhythm of water that sustains California’s fragile ecosystems. Beneath its beauty is a meditation on farming justice—a reminder that care for the land is inseparable from care for the people who work it. From Soul to Soil transforms wear into ecology, honoring both the natural world and the human hands that nurture it.
Ashley Walker is a fashion designer and entrepreneur. He is the founder of Leimert Park Threads, which transforms cultural history into wearable art, celebrating the resilience and creativity of Black communities in Los Angeles. Walker’s past work includes collaborations with Metro Art Los Angeles, Forever 21 and Savage X Fenty, and he has led projects centered on themes of migration, activism, and identity. A graduate of Howard University, Walker began his career as a visual merchandising manager for Levi’s and Nike in New York before returning to Los Angeles, where he expanded his practice into photography and creative direction.
The Library, in partnership with the Library Foundation of Los Angeles, has established a residency program, Los Angeles Public Library Creators in Residence, designed to engage creative Angelenos from a multitude of disciplines. The program supports local interdisciplinary creators and inspires new work informed or enhanced by the Los Angeles Public Library’s collections and services, while also highlighting the impact of the library as a creative haven.
Ashley Walker is part of the 2025 Los Angeles Public Library Creators in Residence cohort, along with Creator Tien Nguyen.