Hot Hip-Hop : Fashion: Rap artists are branching out. Afro-centric and even <i> haute couture</i> looks are joining the early born-on-the-street styles.

Back in early 1989 when they were just another unknown rap group posing for their first photo session, the members of De La Soul went out and bought some track suits. But when the photos came back, the trio disliked the stereotypical rapper look they saw, so they arranged for another session and switched to the loose-fitting cotton clothes and psychedelic emblems they were used to wearing.

Today, De La’s black flower-power look--characterized by daisy chains, peace signs and natural woven fabrics--is one of the fresh fashion streams infusing the street-wise world of hip-hop. That’s the stylish artistic arena that includes rap music, break-dancing, graffiti and video.

Spawned on the gritty streets of America’s inner cities, rap fashion is evolving away from the track suits, sneakers and gold chains that were once de rigueur .

“We don’t dress with the gold chains and the Cazal glasses ($400 wrap-around shades with 18-karat gold finish) and the Kangol hats (an updated Safari with a sloped brim) . . . and the sneakers,” says De La Soul’s Trugoy the Dove. “We just choose to be ourselves. We’re peaceful guys, and we like to wear peace signs in our hair.”

While the street-outlaw look will always have followers, especially among more hardcore and politically conscious followers of rap music, today’s trend-setters stress fashion individuality and attitude above all else.

Many seek to develop their own unique style, incorporating “Afro-centric” clothes that celebrate African culture, as well as elegant, Euro-centric suits.

“Rap fashion is a hairstyle, glasses, the way you wear your shoes, it’s attitude,” says Doctor Dre, a hot rap producer who co-hosts the weekday show “Yo! MTV Raps.” “It can be anything from dashikis, kente clothing (Ghanian hand-woven fabric) to dreads (Jamaican-inspired dreadlocks) to high top ‘fades’ (a hairstyle that is shaved clean on the sides, and shaped high on top of the head.)”

Increasingly, the rap style is beamed to the masses via MTV, which showcases a growing number of rap artists. As a result, rap-inspired fashion can now be seen from Melrose to Martin Luther King Boulevard, from suburban high school campuses to the houses of haute couture .

In Chanel’s spring collection, for example, Karl Lagerfeld takes the utilitarian bicycle bag--long a favored accouterment of hip-hoppers--and turns it into a $915 quilted-leather purse on a chain belt that can be strapped onto both suits and evening gowns.

But “Downtown” Julie Brown, a New York-based MTV video jockey, says fashion plates need not discard their track suits just yet. Instead, she suggests dressing up the generic track suit by rolling up the pants to show off some clunky black kicker boots, and adding a studded hat and a black sequined bra underneath under a see-through blouse.

Rap fashion “has given kids their own identity,” says Brown, who hosts an MTV video dance show called “Club MTV” and says lots of kids who dance on her show now make their own African-accented fashions. Others roll onto the dance floor wearing custom-made leather-and-suede track suits.

Like the music itself, rap fashion began in New York City in the mid-1970s as a raw street style that cost little but said everything to black urban youth.

It was called the “b-boy” look, which stands for either breakdance, break or beat, says Bill Adler, a publicist for New York-based Rush Artists Management, which represents the rap acts Run-DMC, L.L. Cool J and Big Daddy Kane. But the look was well defined: certain brands of sweat suits, tennis shoes, hats and even underwear; arms folded high on the chest, and attitude that stretched from here to the South Bronx.

But it took rap impressario Russell Simmons to see the commercial potential of both the look and music. More than 10 years ago, Simmons founded Rush Management and Def Jam records, whose roster has included rappers Public Enemy, The Beastie Boys and L.L. Cool J.

Simmons is an image maker, the Berry Gordy of the streets, the guy who told L.L. Cool J to take off his fancy boots and slap on his Adidas so his fans could relate to him. Bringing marketing and management skills to rap, he also helped transform his brother Joseph--a middle-class suburban teen-ager from Queens--into Run of Run-DMC.

Rappers Run-DMC added gold chains to the fashion mix, creating an irresistible but pricey look for millions of young fans. Last year, Details magazine called the New York rappers--who once penned a love tune to their tennies called “My Adidas”--one of the biggest fashion influences in the last decade.

But fashion is fickle, and today, the styles set by Run-DMC--an exaggerated “Gangster,” or gang member style--are as stale as last year’s hip-hop hit.

“People (are) trying to be more stylish,” says Pam Turbov of the Los Angeles-based record company Delicious Vinyl, whose stable includes artists Tone Loc, Young M.C. and Def Jef. “Nike shoes and sweat suits have almost become a parody of themselves.”

As rap fashion pulls away from gold chains and casual street wear, it mainlines into a growing awareness and appreciation of black culture and political activism.

Afrika Bambaataa, a longtime New York rapper, helped popularize African pride, beginning in the ‘70s with his “Zulu Nation” hairstyles and clothing. Now comes the Native Tongue posse, a group of artists including De La Soul, Queen Latifah, the Jungle Brothers and A Tribe Called Quest, who consider Afro-centric dress, culture and history an integral part of their artistry.

Hair carving, the style of closely cropping and shaving the hair to create patterns, also has roots in African tribal culture.

“We have a friend who had the beach, the waves, two birds and palm trees on the back of his head. It was incredible,” says Almight T, one-half of the group Body and Soul, which hosts a rap show on Fox TV.

But the world of rap fashion also includes Euro-centric threads--such as Italian silk suits with continental styling. Just look at the white suit with matching fedora that Big Daddy Kane wears on the back cover of his album, “It’s a Big Daddy Thing.” Kane’s is a distinct rap style that Adler calls “the hustler style, high roller style.”

And the trend from Adidas to Armani goes on.

“I wear consciousness clothes, but I like the way Heavy D (a rap artist known for his girth) looked in a suit, so I went out and bought one and wore a suit two weeks ago for the first time in my life,” says hip-hop artist Def Jef.

Public Enemy, the controversial rap act known for its politically charged lyrics supporting black activism and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, keep flash to a minimum. They want attention focused on their message, not their fashion.

Although Public Enemy is credited with singlehandedly creating the vogue for Africa medallions that swept rap more than a year ago, the group’s lead singer prefers a stripped down look.

“Chuck D. (the group’s leader) isn’t very flamboyant in terms of dress,” says Adler. “He wears a baseball hat, black jeans, a black jacket and sneakers, and then he’s done.”

Of course, fellow Public Enemy member Flavor Flav more than makes up for Chuck D’s restraint. At the group’s recent Palace show, as well as for the Grammy Awards this year, the flavorful one sported his usual oversize clock pendant, a white tuxedo with bow tie, a top hat, gloves, and a pair of day-glo Batman glasses that looked about ready to take off.

Rounding out the look is the group’s alter ego, the S1W security forces, who drill on-stage in para-military outfits with imitation Uzis. While it’s doubtful they will prompt a fashion run on cold, hard steel, S1W presents a disciplined look of black power.

The Public Enemy logo--a b-boy trained in a telescopic gun sight--received widespread exposure at the 1989 Grammy Awards when Irish singer Sinead O’Connor performed wearing their logo drawn on her clean-shaven head.

Heading up the hoods-and-sweat shirts “Gangster” look is L.A.’s own N.W.A, whose “Straight Outa Compton” album sold more than a half million copies just six weeks into its release last year. N.W.A’s music features sirens and gunshots as backdrops for brutal X-rated tales of dealing, gangbanging and police confrontations.

Sports caps remain a perennial favorite--from L.A. Kings to silver-and-gold Raiders hats--which school officials in some districts have banned because the police say they are favored by black street gangs.

Nonetheless, “You see a lot of L.A. rappers dressing in the L.A. Kings hats and jackets,” says Def Jef.

When it comes to women’s rap fashions, the look has moved away from the b-girl casual epitomized by Salt ‘N Pepa--who appeared on their 1987 album wearing colorful oversize T-shirts, biking shorts, gold chains, and medallions and baseball caps. Today, the duo has swapped its bleached blond hair for a more sophisticated look that includes suede boots.

Boots of almost any kind are in, from ankle to mountain. Also popular are the evergreen Doc Martins (clunky black industrial shoes from England), big gold hoops, African or Egyptian pendants and colossal pants. D-Zire, the other half of Body and Soul, calls it “the jungle look, like an African princess.”

But the reigning royalty of this look is undoubtedly Queen Latifah, who mixes rap with reggae, R&B; and house music (pulsating dance music with a heavy bass-line). Latifah has a regal presence and favors Afro-centric dress: intricately woven Nefertiti-style headgear, brightly colored African and leopard prints, and military-style riding outfits set off by shiny medals and gold trim.

“My style and my music are one,” says the Queen, who hails from East Orange, New Jersey. “Africans were very proud people, and I wanted to display that in a modern way.”

Alisa Bellettini, who produces MTV’s video magazine “House of Style,” says rap fashion increasingly is crossing over to white audiences.

“Young black kids are the coolest kids on the street right now. They know how to pull together outfits without a lot of money. London clubs are filled with these white kids trying to dress like black kids . . . in sports outfits, Adidas and matching sweat suits.”

Black rap artists find this ironic.

“There’s (become) a stereotyped rap fashion, and that’s not what it’s about at all,” says Def Jef, who adds, “We want to damage the stereotype.”

So just how does a hip-hop artist dress?

Jef has the def answer.

A hip-hop artist who’s into the music dresses “just how he feels.”