It’s a sign familiar to New Yorkers, seen regularly on the plywood walls around construction sites around the city: Post No Bills. That message of warning (with its implicit dare) struck Roger Brue McHayle A'92 as the ideal name for the streetwear company he and a group of friends, including fellow Cooper alum Kahlil Zulu Williams A'91, began in 1987, while McHayle was in high school. Using an acronym for the sign, McHayle and his friends founded PNB Nation, which proved to be an extraordinary success as an early purveyor of clothing for people who identified with skate and graffiti culture, its famed logo a PNB in spray painted script topped with a three-pointed crown. McHayle, himself a graffiti artist, was looking to create clothes that spoke to his generation of graffiti writers, skaters, and anyone who admired the culture. "The vision and intention was to be socially relevant for our people, outside of race," he told an interviewer.

That early success led him to many other creative positions in the apparel industry; he’s been with Nike since 2006, starting as the company’s global business director for urban apparel and now Nike’s senior product director of global men’s lifestyle apparel. In his career at Nike he has worked with Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and Michael Jordan and says that “working with each of them were personal highlights for me.” Most recently, he and a team of colleagues launched Nike Forward. With the goal of drastically reducing the company’s carbon footprint, the line is made with an average of 75% less carbon than their usual knit fleece products. McHayle sees it as a first step to far more sustainable products in Nike’s future.