What: A T-shirt for a fictitious band, the Socialites, and its who’s your daddy world tour (stops include Gstaad and East Hampton) – with a logo that looks suspiciously like the Strokes’.
Raison d’être: The Strokes are always being slammed for slumming (they’re uptown boys, Julian’s dad is John Casablancas, etc.). Now two designers are dissing the upper-crusty rockers: “I went to school with a Stroke, and they’re kind of socialites,” says Chrissie Miller, who designs the shirts with Shawn Regruto, the man behind 1999’s hit shirt MODELS SUCK. “Everyone in New York comes from a privileged background,” counters Jim Merlis, the Strokes’ publicist. “Give it up.”
Poseur patrol: So-called rock fans also irk Miller: “All these socialite girls at a party were in New York Dolls shirts. I asked one to name, like, one song, and she couldn’t!”
Oh, the irony: The shirts, seen on Johnny Knoxville and Drea de Matteo, are $40 at C. Ronson (takes a socialite to know one!), at 269 Elizabeth Street.