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"Twenty years ago, Kathleen Hanna wore a little red dress emblazoned with the words \"Kill Me\" while performing at a Rock for Choice benefit concert. The phrase was a reference to her band Bikini Kill, as well as a defiant message to those who weren't cool with a \"militant feminist punk band.\" In the spirit of all things '90s once again stealing the spotlight, you too can sport some Hanna-esque sass\u2014in a recreation of the infamous frock, no less\u2014thanks to Bikini Kill's new capsule collection for VFiles.\n\n We chatted with the seminal Riot Grrrl and her Bikini Kill bandmate Kathi Wilcox (who's also in Hanna's current band, The Julie Ruin) at the launch party, which coincides with the release of The Riot Grrrl Collection book. Read on to find out about the pair's coolest concert getups and why, as a Hanna-designed poster in the capsule reads, punk rock feminism rules.\n\n How did this Bikini Kill collection come about?\n\n Kathleen Hanna: Kathi and I have slowly but surely started working on our own fashion stuff! We've made a bunch of shirts, and we want to start designing. We got the email from VFiles, and were like, \"Oh! They do fashion, and they want to do something with us that sounds cool.\"\n\n What's the plan for the line?\n\n KH: We're in this band called The Julie Ruin, and we're putting out our record in September and then we're going on tour, so it's kind of hard to think about right now. It's on the back burner, but I'd love to do something with Opening Ceremony. That's like a fantasy! I've always loved how Kathi dressed, so I was like, \"We have to make clothes together!\" For my body type, since I'm shorter and a little bit curvier, it's fun to design clothes that look good on me. Kathi does all the sewing! I need shorter shirts and stuff like that, so she made me a bunch of short ones!\n\n There's obviously been this huge '90s revival lately. What do you think about all the nostalgia?\n\n KH: I don't like the actual nostalgia part of it, but I do think nostalgia can lead to something interesting. Hopefully younger girls and women are getting interested in Bikini Kill because we're very associated with the '90s and are like, \"This speaks to me. I want to learn more about feminism, I want to read feminist books.\" That's what the revival could bring, and for me it's been awesome because when we were in Bikini Kill, we had a lot of controversy surrounding us. I guess you can tell...we helped design a dress that says \"Kill Me\" on it! I actually wore a dress like that that was red with cutouts because as women in a militant feminist punk band, we got a lot of crap. A lot of people hated us. Men and women thought we were too strident. Now it's nice because people are appreciating us! I go to lectures and girls are finding out about Bikini Kill or Le Tigre for the first time and are like, \"This is my jam!\" It still feel fresh to them. I mean, we're over it, we're in a new band\u2014we've moved on! But that's the great thing about music. You can find some '60s pop record and feel completely invigorated by it, even though it's so old.\n\n What was your uniform in the Bikini Kill days?\n\n KH: Kathi remembers all of it!\n\n Kathi Wilcox: For you, in the very beginning, it was these really short cutoff jeans and a striped tank top.\n\n KH: And black tights!\n\n KW: And combat boots, of course.\n\n KH: I had a T-shirt that said \"girl\" on it with a barcode. It played into the \"generic girl\" idea. Kathi wore little dresses with big coats over them so it looked just like coat and legs.\n\n KW: I would get these dresses, and to shorten them, I wouldn't sew them. I'd just cut them! They were always too big, so I would cut the bottom and the sleeves off.\n\n KH: Kathi wore a lot of velvet!\n\n KW: Yeah, in the early years. It's not good on stage! It's really hot and it doesn't wear well.\n\n KH: I wore a lot of Girl Scout uniforms. I also had a waitress apron, and clothes that referenced different female jobs and imagery about women. My most famous dress that I wore over and over had a muscled guy on it. It's like a nightgown. You know those ones that have a girl in a bikini on them? I thought of it as the man inside of me. I thought of it as the man inside of me.\u00A0A lot of what we were trying to do was play with gender roles, so I tried to get pieces that expressed that.\u00A0And one of my favorite things was when I splurged and got myself a Betsey Johnson stretch plaid suit. It was pink and blue and green. We all wore it!\n\n KW: I borrowed that a lot on tour!\n\n KH: We switched clothes a lot.\n\n Do you still share clothes?\n\n KH: She's wearing my tights right now!\n\n The DIY ethos was a big part of the Riot Grrrl movement. Do you have any favorite DIY tricks?\n\n KW: I always did the thing of taking a T-shirt and turning it into whatever\u2014a skirt, a headband. If you go to a thrift store and get a big T-shirt, you can really turn it into anything! You can even buy a really big muumuu and cut it up and sew it back together.\n\n KH: My big thing is finding handmade clothes at thrift stores. I look for stuff without tags. When I first came to New York, I got this gray dress that has a beige cummerbund built into it. It's clearly someone from FIT's failed project, but it became my favorite dress! It looks really expensive, and it cost like $10.\n\n KW: And it's awesome!\n\n What music are you into now?\n\n KH: I like Grimes. I was just watching a bunch of videos of her, and I think it's so cool she produces her own music. I really like this band called The Younger Lovers. They're incredible! It's this guy Brontez Purnell. He plays guitar, and he's a dancer. I like Hunx and His Punx a lot. I was a big Gravy Train fan, and both those guys were in Gravy Train and split up. That's always an exciting thing! I remember when Bikini Kill broke up, and we were like, \"Why are people bummed?\" The exciting thing is that when you split up, all these new bands start.\n\n What's your advice to teen feminists?\n\n KH: Find something you really love doing and mix it with something you really care about. That's why I've had such longevity as an artist. I really, really care about ending violence against women, and I really, really love playing music. It's super enjoyable! We actually just came from a practice that was really fun. Because I enjoy doing it and because I care so deeply, I'll keep doing what I'm doing.\n\n Click through to see the Bikini Kill for VFiles collection!"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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