A tacky overpriced fashion by some guy named
Nigo in Japan. Bape caught on around the
mid 2000s around 2005-2006 in America mainly because it was spearheaded and shown off by guys like Lil Wayne, Pharrell and the whole
Hyphy movement. Bape also spawned a fashion
that's dead now thankfully and spawned a many imitators using the overdone design
atheistic as Bape, on hoodies, shirts, and other shit and sold for less than Bape, to people who couldn't afford it or simply lived in cities with no stores that sold it(almost every American city that's not L.A. or New-York).
Bape further proves that if you slap rarity, a high price, and put the only stores that sell it in famous cities know for status(New-York, Los Angeles, Tokyo) that you can get a few status obsessed assholes with the money to blow to buy something that's just ugly, like most clothing items that cost money, just overdone with a label on every inch of the clothing.
Bape is only supported now by rich hypebeast who want to be urban in the suburbs. Even then, you may find it rare to find a hypebeast who still wants Bape.