About the Archive: The Deadhead Style Archive is the product of a longstanding fascination with the ways in which Deadheads construct, perform and negotiate their identities through dress and the fashioned body. While it may be true that “it doesn’t matter what you wear, just as long as you are there,” taking that sentiment too literally risks obscuring the ways in which clothing has long served as a meaningful form of expression within the scene. The visual and sartorial history of Deadhead culture is rich, and it deserves to be documented. With this project, I hope to not only preserve this history but also, in the spirit of the scene itself, invite fellow Deadheads to participate directly in the building of this archive.

About me: Annabelle Walsh teaches in the School of Art & Design History & Theory at Parsons School of Design in New York, where she also received her Master of Arts (MA) degree in Fashion Studies in 2023. Her research broadly explores the role of fashion within subcultural contexts and considers how fashion and dress inform processes of identity construction and group belonging among fans and followers of the Grateful Dead.