I finally found the perfect pair of alligator pumps to wear to the Save the Everglades dinner tonight!
I only recently discovered that I live next to the park where they filmed the opening credits for the Fresh Prince of Bel Air, and for that post recreating the shots, I must have watched the credits perhaps one billion times. So only recently having seen the double set of Pumas out a few years ago based on the Fresh Prince (the first pair incorporating the graffiti from the opening credits, the second representing Bel Air), I figured they were just as awesome the second time around. Or wait, was that Step By Step? Pictures via Hypebeast:
Gentrification and the Fresh Prince
I was super freaked out the other day by this little throwaway line in a post on City Paper’s the Clog about a cleanup effort in Clemente Park, which is a few blocks from my house:
Kimberly Neff and a small band of kickball players-turned-community-minded activists in the neighborhood were trying to do for the park which is a neighborhood icon less for its role in the opening credits of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and more for its long-held status as something of a neglected eyesore.
Whaaaaaaaa? I always assumed it was actually in West Philadelphia! Clemente Park, for the record, is at 18th and Wallace, in Fairmount, and lately it’s less an icon for being in the Fresh Prince credits OR for being a neglected eyesore than for being the focus of arguments between crazy yuppie dog owners and crazy yuppie parents on Phillyblog. I looked the video up on youtube.
But rewatching those credits I’ve seen a million times, I found that not only are there verses that my local Fox affiliate always left out of the theme song, but that Will Smith was clearly shooting b-ball outside of the school right by my house… minus almost 20 years of demographic shift and cleanup efforts done by groups such as Neff’s, which can be found here at Fairmount is Fun. The neighborhood has changed a lot since the video was shot. Here’s Clemente Park in 1990 vs. 2009; apologies for the poor-quality screenshots of the credits: