A snippet from the Before Tacky podcast with filmmaker Kevin Macdonald about fashion designer John Galliano. Rumours have hit the fashion gossip circuit the once former creative head of Dior is set for a return to the famed house. Click below to understand why we think this story feels a bit false.
The film American Fiction depicts a writer fed up with racial tropes. Frustrated novelist Monk writes a book with outlandish African American characters. Too his horror, the work is a bestseller. Why would I sympathise with Monk? Because I understand his bewilderment. Life is stranger than fiction.
Being a person of color in any business has challenges. Being a LGBTQ person of color adds more weight to those challenges. The pervasive thinking is the fashion world is tolerant. This is according to how “tolerant” is defined. I had a person of color colleague was approached by a major television channel to become a cast member of a reality series based on the fashion business. One catch, he had to be flamboyant or the snap his fingers, sassy, black male. That was not his character. Calling me for advice, asking what to do?
Reality shows are tricky. Good reality tv viewing is messy, a guilty pleasure of relishing bad temperament on the screen. However, a non script program can offer a lucrative brand building platform. I asked, “ Would you be comfortable playing that role?” Plus, once penciled in as the sassy stylist, there will be no escape from this persona. He replied, “NO” because that was not him. My response, “decline the offer.”. I understood my friend’s conflicted position because similar opportunities to up my brand presence came to me.
As a gay person of color in fashion there seems to be a role to play. Does this performance have a a place? Canned behavior comes with the territory in any field. The fashion business is about exaggeration. I look over certain LGBTQ P.O.C colleagues IG pages. I am not knocking their hustle, certainly these guys deserve respect for working hard to get where they are today. Yet, these modern mannerisms could be from a dictionary entry on prototypical sass, wearing certain clothes, unrestrained personality, while having a “hyper see me” hairstyle. Is this a new stereotype? Could this level of modern sassiness be a new form of gaining acceptance in an upperclass space, continuing to play the racial gender role written by others.
Years ago I was advised to enact the sassy characterization, not my cup of tea to play a high spirited character for greater acceptance and success. Reinforce the feel good stereotype of a black man in the creative industry with fashion buffoonery: carry a flashy accessory to show “Yes, I have cash”, such as a Hermes bag, wear borderline garish clothing, veer away from a series conversation, victimize myself to the liberal class, carry a little nose candy box to help me overcome my all emotional traumas. As I wrote, “Life is stranger than fiction”.
Being Fabulous! Aspirational living! This is the lifestyle Vogue and other Conde Nast publications put in our faces. That $1500 bag matched with a $900 linen top. Advice; Pay the rent before heading to Bloomingdales.
All that FABULOSITY yet Vogue-Conde Nast cannot pay the rent! HUH! #Vogue #CondeNast #fashion #fashionblogger #fashiondesign #fashionblogger #style #nyc #NewYork https://t.co/WTG324URZx pic.twitter.com/5Rt50UJRSa
— BlackandPaper (@BlackandPaper1) August 7, 2020
Once again the magazines find themselves in the headlines, but for the wrong reason,,AGAIN! Six years ago Conde Nast debased from Mid Manhattan to the World Trade Center. Fast Forward to the 2020 Pandemic, ad revenue flat lined. Suddenly, those palatial 1.2 million square feet became a brick tied to an ankle in a sea storm.
Fashion magazines have been in a denial stage for a decade. Bloggers and social media elbowed in once exclusive territory. Brand advertising splintered. But to the heads of Conde Nast, this was a bump on a Champagne Boulevard. They had become victims of a movement they help create, “Living In A Fake Reality”.
Nothing says success than new digs. Trading up, moving to 1 World Trade in lower downtown New York represented the future, optimism. Anna Wintour and staff sat on top of the world. August 4th 2020, reports started circulating Advance Publications, parent company of Conde Nast, is scouting for a new office. I had to do a double take. Suddenly, Vanity Fair, New Yorker, Teen Vogue’s 21 floors lost its appeal or a need to “trade down”. Six months ago I saw Vogue editors coming in and out of the Bristol and Hotel de Crillon hotels in Paris.
In April requesting government a bailout, today negotiating cheaper rent. No more fashion week teas in “Le Boudoir”. Have the company credit cards been cut? No worries, if a Vogue Staffer is reading this, send me a message. I know a few affordable places in Paris and Milan.
Looking over the magazines social media channels, I could see problems. Access to the best writers and photographers in the world, yet, a lack of original content replaced by recycled stories. How many pictures can be from the archives? Or Vogue Challenges every week? HMMM!
All smokes and mirrors, denial is a fabulous way to live until a “reality brick” hits the face.