Fashion

private icon: patti smith

the look on the cover of horses is g-l-o-r-ious!

by rebecca willa davis

July 10, 2013

To celebrate this month's Music Issue, we're looking at more than our favorite new bands--we're also mining our favorite album covers throughout history for a little bit of style inspiration.

You could say that punk was officially born December 13, 1975--the day that Patti Smith's debut album

Horses

came out. It would be another year before the Ramones' self-titled debut and two years before Television's

Marquee Moon

But Smith was never about being first, being the best, or being the most influential; the punk-poet was always about being herself, even if that meant pulling on a men's button-down and not bothering to brush her hair as her then-boyfriend Robert Mapplethorpe snapped a photo for the album cover. Of course, though

Horses

did have us singing, "G-L-O-R-I-A," at the top of our lungs, it also gave us a little sartorial inspiration. From a men's-inspired blazer to a unisex fragrance first mixed in downtown New York City--Smith's stomping grounds--consider this one way to capture the essence of this turning point in punk history.