"Basquiat ""You know how Thelonious Monk used to make all the picture frames on his wall crooked? Basquiat was like that—deliberately asymmetrical,"" says GQ's Style Guy, Glenn O'Brien, of his late friend, the downtown New York painter Jean-Michel Basquiat. ""He had a great eye, so he would find quirky things."" Basquiat soon went from picking through bins at vintage shops to walking the runway for designer friends like Rei Kawakubo, the founder of Comme des Garçons. Yet even as an art star, Basquiat kept his eccentricities intact. ""He'd buy an Armani suit and then go paint in it,"" O'Brien says. ""Or he'd dress like an African prince—a cross between what a Yoruban king would wear and what you might find at Givenchy. Jean-Michel had a regal air about him—he could put on anything and look good because his style came from within. To me, he was always a prince."" Traditional clothes don't have to be traditional. When you've got dreads and plenty of attitude, that striped tie and toggle coat become downtown cool instead of East Coast prep school."
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