You're listening to Comedy Central. Hey, welcome to Beyond the Scenes, the podcast that goes deeper into segments and topics that originally aired on the Daily Show with Trevor Mill like this, This is what this podcast he is. All right, Look, you know how you get dressed to go somewhere, right and you look at the mirror and your outfit is nice, it's sharp, and then you think to yourself, you know what, maybe I need to add a watch and a belt
and some shoes, some ear ring. You know what, let me put one of them Leprechaun belt buckles on my shoes to and boom, your outfit goes to the next level. Now you're in magazines, you're on Best Dress List, you're flying private, no more commercial.
That's what this podcast is. I'm Roal Withjr.
And speaking of fashion today, we're talking about a CP Time segment that we did that celebrated black trail blazers in fashion.
Give me a clip.
Normally, when we think about black fashion, we think about church hats so big they block your view of Jesus. What we think about those soups that Steve Harvey Wear has had haul all the buttons leave some buttons for the rest of us, Steve, they'd keep him my clothes together with staples. But in actuality, the world of fashion has been filled with influential and iconic African American designers, like our first trailblazer, Zelda win Valdez, who was one
of the first designers whose clothing accentuated women's curves. Before her, women's fashion covered up their figures with big ass skirts the size of a carnival cruise ship. Women would get lost just bending over to tie the shoes. Zelda's curve flooring designs were so popular that Hugh Heffner asked her to design the iconic outfit for the Playboy Bunnies. Our last designer brings us to the modern day. Virgil Ablo, the first African American artistic director at Louis Vauton and
driving force behind this decade street wear movement. He made high end fashion take street weear seriously. You know, fancy logos, T shirts, chunky sneakers, hoodies, pretty much anything you're not supposed to wear to a funeral unless you're in the deceased had beef rist in peace.
Spencer Miss Jordan's is stepping on your grave.
Right now, I'm joined by Daily Show producer Chelsea Williamson. A little later in the show, we're gonna be joined by two black women that are doing the damn thing in the world of fashion, but it was not an easy road for them to get there. We're gonna talk to them all about their journey. But first, Chelsea, we got to talk to you about this segment, how we put it together. How are you doing today?
I'm doing good.
How are you, Roy, I'm pretty good.
I don't know why I'm qualified to talk about this. I have no fashion set. Have you seen photos of me, Chelsea?
I have go Did they expect you to agree with me? Goodness? Gracious.
You do a lot of the research for a lot of the CPE time segments, so you know you're shouldered with, you know, deciding what lives and what in terms of what's relevant in the piece. But let's just get to the impetus of this piece. What inspired this piece in the building.
So this piece was actually pitched by one of my coworkers, Madeline Koons, and she was thinking about this in twenty eighteen when the MCA had a exhibit on Virgil Ablow, and she really wanted to go, So she kind of pitched as an idea and was like, we should talk more about black fashion icons. And then on the back end I came in and pitched the idea for the CP time on black fashion models.
So it was kind of a two hander.
So, you know, in the piece, we touched upon a few trail blazers like Zelda win Valdez, Stephen Burrows, and the late Virgil Ablow of course aforementioned. But why did you all choose to feature those designers in particular?
Yeah, so I feel like all of them were vanguards in their specific field. So Zelda is interesting because she was embracing women's curves at a time when that wasn't quite the norm in fashion. Stephen Burrows is like one of the great designers of the you know, the disco era was a big in Studio fifty four, was making these like danceable and just like very weariable clothes that were iconic. And then you know, Virgil Ablow obviously is
the first black designer to holm Louis Vaton's menswear. So I think all three of them are vanguards in their specific areas. They're all pioneers, and they all represented three very distinct eras in fashion and especially in black fashion.
But are there other designers that played a big role and we have those big three. The issue we have at the Daily Show, of course, is always time. We are a thirty minute program, thirty thirty five minute program, so we only have, especially for CP time, we only have three to five minutes to really get into anything. So the battle as always do we tell you a little bit about a lot of people or do we
tell you a lot about a few people? So who were some of the other black designers that played a big role in the industry?
One? And two?
What kind of snubs did you find in your research? You know, like the people who weren't always properly credited for the thing that they that eventually, you know, caught fire.
Yeah, so, I mean there was a lot.
There's a lot of black designers who weren't given their proper due. One that immediately comes to mind is Anne Lowe, who actually designed Jackie Kennedy's wedding dress, and then on the day that she was asked to bring it in, you know, before.
The wedding, they made her use a surface entrance.
And she literally had to tell them the dress comes in with me, I made this dress, and Jackie actually didn't give her credit for the dress in the end, and then on top of like being like, you're also black, so now you have to suddenly use a service entrance, even though she'd actually been working for the Jackie's family for a couple of years, like dressmaking and such, so you know, she was snubbed, and then it was later
kind of found out that she designed the dress. But there's a lot of other you know people as well. I think of like Elizabeth Kleckley, who was you know, the Civil War like dressmaker, and she dressed Mary Todd Lincoln and also did like a scandalous memoir which got
everybody up in arms in the eighteen sixties. But you know, and then you come into now you start thinking about streetwear, you think of somebody like Dapper Dan, who was literally shut down multiple times, including by now you know Supreme Court Justine Sonya Soda Mayor on one of the raids
Findy was doing against him. So you have people like that, and I think in continuing with streetwear, there's so many black designers in streetwear like walk or wear, and then just all the stylists that came out of that era, and even if you didn't have black people designing the outfits themselves, we were typically remixing and making things more cool, like Tommy Hill figure during that time, Polo Ralph Lauren during that time. Even Nautica, like Natica was very much like a black brand.
Yeah, I say right now, as Duck Hid and this cheer.
Shoot, cross Colors, Fu Boo like all of that during the nineties, and then I think I'd be remiss also mention that even though they may not have been designers, I think, especially during the sixties and the fifties, a lot of the girl groups and a lot of the boy bands, they made their own clothes, like the Temptations. Eddie Kendricks, who was a member of the Temptations, actually made their like iconic purple suits and he made a
lot of their suits. And I feel like it's not often talked about, but especially for that time period, like who was going to be dressing them? You know, you actually think about it, and it's like you have a group of like you know, three, four or five people, it's like, well, somebody got to know how to sell
and we'll figure it out for us. So I feel like you also have to bring up, you know, those types who were not traditional designers and maybe didn't design anything for anybody else, but they made iconic contributions to the culture, and I think should be included in our overall black fashion history.
You know, there are styles and trends that originate in the Black community and then somehow they just magically appear in the fashion industry. Give me a down some of the stuff that's been appropriated from Black culture that makes its way into mainstream fashion without accrediting the place of the culture of origin.
I actually think on the jewelry side, we saw a big example is like Sex and the City when Sarah Jaxica Parker's character Carrie calls her like nameplate necklace. That's a Carrie ghetto gold and that was something that you know, I think she wore it two thousand and two, two thousand and three something in there, And it's like by that point, you know, black women had been wearing nameplate necklaces years in all, since the nineties, like, and it
was something that was considered derogatory. Then now you see nameplate nexluces everywhere costing like so much money, and it's just completely kind of it hasn't completely left the culture, but it's definitely something that now it's a lot more mainstream and has lost you know, I think a lot of people kind of don't really think about the fact that black women kind.
Of did it.
Even more recently, I would say something like something we've seen on social media, like the whole clean girl aesthetic where it's just like a white shirt, pulled back hair with the bun and like hoops and you know, just like very like minimal style. There's been a very big outcry on social media where black women are like, we've been wearing that for years, Like black girls love a pulled back bun in some hoops. Like it's just like so classic of a fashion aesthetic.
You know, you know what I did.
But I feel like the mistake that the fashion industry makes it. I don't know if it's the fashion industry of the fashion magazines, like, I don't know if it's the designers and the magazines. Would they present it as here's the new thing. You could just go, we're doing a thing, but when you go, this is the all new craze, Like wait a minute, now, this isn't the new craze. This is an old craze that you just discovered right with your late ass.
And we saw that happen with streetwear. I think that's what's going on currently. Like you see all of these brands are currently everybody wants to be in streetwear, and it's like, where did streetwear come from the streets, which was typically black and brown people?
This is what they we were wearing.
To go back to what we were talking about, you know a second ago with the nineties, how black people were remixing mainstream brands is now what the mainstream brands make, and we don't.
Get the credit for that.
Like the way that the rappers were wearing there's stuff in the nineties, just black people living in various like you know, all over the States. The way that they were wearing things was not how they were modeled, right, So it's just very interesting that now that is the style you even think about, like baggy jeans becoming now mainstream, which has been very.
Interesting, or the torn up jeans, distressed the distressed jeans. Yeah, Well, after the break, we're going to have an opportunity to sit down with two wonderful, wonderful people who have been at the forefront of not only black fashion design, but also trying to change the industry to get rid of all of these blind spots that we've just been talking about. I'm excited to get down and sit down and talk with these people. This is beyond the scenes. We'll be
right back beyond the scenes. Welcome back now. I just had a wonderful conversation with Chelsea Williamson, and it's always good to have your own Chelsea, but I think it's time that we add some more people.
Let's make it more fashion y. Is that a word.
Let's up the fashionness of this and really get into the granular issues within the fashion industry for black women and black brown people as a whole. We are joined by the CEO of Harlem's Fashion Role Brandis Daniel Brandis. Welcome to the show. How you're doing.
I'm doing great?
Thank you so much for having me, spectacular.
I'd also like to welcome the editor in chief at The Cut and chief at The Cut and founder of the Black and Fashion Council. Please welcome Lindsey. People's Lindsey. How you're doing?
H I am good?
Thank you so much for having me.
All right, so let's get right into it. So Lindsey and brandis. Let's talk a little bit about your journey breaking into the fashion industry, you know, because there's already hurdles in general just with fashion, and then there's hurdles when you're black, and then there's more hurdles when you're a black woman. This is a mostly white industry. Branded,
let's start with you. What were some of the things that you knew were coming and what were some of the more unexpected hurdles once you actually got into it.
Yeah, no, thank you for that, Royce.
So I moved to New York with a dream of working in luxury fashion. I was working in apparel production for a company that did all the production for Victoria's Secrets, and so we were kind of behind the scenes, but I was really looking to how can I work for one of the brands that I absolutely love. And I can't even tell you how many resumes I sent out.
How many people I reached out to, and never.
Got even an interview with any of those brands. So, you know, I always believe though, like challenges are a great way to reroute you to where you're supposed to be. And so now I get to work with a lot of those brands and partnerships. But back when I first came to New York seventeen years ago.
I got crickets.
Let's also real quick, let's talk about like this idea that you're going through this and then you start talking to other fashion designers, like what were other black fashion designers? What were they saying? Was it just like yeah, good does that be? Or was it also like a figure it out? Was there any sense of alliance amongst black women?
So again we're talking seventeen years ago when I first moved here, and so at the time, people didn't want to identify as black in fashion because they didn't want to be stereotyped. They didn't want to be boxed in. They didn't want to not get opportunities because people knew that they.
Were black, and it was a real thing and a real challenge.
And so a lot of times it was how do I enter into this industry in a way that is very nondescript, where I can, you know, go in do a great job, but not really bring this part of my identity with me. That's really what I felt in
the beginning of being here. It was really tough because the industry was brutal actually Lindsay did an article on it a few years ago, but it was brutal for black people in this industry, and so, you know, we just didn't talk a lot about race, which is you know, I'm fast warning a bit, which is why it was so hard to start a company that supported black designers, because no one wanted to put that out really into the to the public view.
In this industry.
Lindsay, let's talk about that article real quick. I want to get into your beginnings and how you came to New York. But first you wrote that article for The Cut. It was called Everywhere and Nowhere what it's really like to be black and work in fashion. Just tell me the day where you were just like, you know what, everybody got to know what the hell going on? Suffer in silence, and then just one day you was like, damn it, I'm gonna open up Microsoft Word and I'm
just type until I came type no more. And you went around and interviewed people from all these different facets of the fashion industry. Just talk to us a little bit about what inspired that article, on what you discovered and those through those interviews.
Yeah, I mean I saw so much of what Brandis was talking about and always admired what Brandis was doing, but I felt like she was one of the few people doing it. I felt like there wasn't that much help for black people in fashion. There were a few initiatives, a few things that people wanted to talk about, but it really wasn't something that I think people were okay
with bringing to the forefront. And I'd actually had the idea to do that piece when I first started the cut, so I didn't end up doing it till like four and a half years later actually, but I had pitched the idea actually when I started and it got shot down.
So it was something that I always wanted to do it just you know, took life and time to be able to actually do and by the time that I wanted to do it so much to change the industry that I think people felt like there had been some advancements that were very public facing, but a lot of black people were still really internally frustrated and feeling like, oh, you know, all these magazines are putting black people on the covers of magazines and wanting to patent back, but
the black people who work at this publication feel terrible, you know, are treated terribly. And I think that for me was a point of you know, if I'm going to do this and I'm going to hustle this hard, this industry needs to be more sustainable for black people.
You spoke to a number of black people for this article. How many people did you feel were true allies in this cause? Because you know, and I cannot compare entertainment to fashion, but I just do know that there are some black people in entertainment that are all about respectability politics.
And just hit you better, calm down. You're black, you can do black. Let's going back out there with the white fel.
Like, did you have any instances or conversations like that while researching this article or just your fashion journey in general?
Yeah, I mean I actually when I had first moved to New York, working three jobs, exhausted, I used to do these women of color and fashion lunches in my apartment for all the young black girls who were also assistants in entry level.
And it was not fancy at all.
I lived in a very tiny apartment, but it was probably thirty of us squeezed into like a really small living room and we would.
Just talk about free COVID days.
I remember the good old days when you could just put yeah.
A long time ago now, but this was when I was an assistant and to like twenty twelve ish, and then we would talk about a lot of things of how we all would deal with something very differently, and one of the ones that I remember so clearly was a few of us had been called the N word by WHY colleagues on set, and we all had very different opinions of how we wanted to deal with it.
And I always felt like, and still feel like, like, I I love what I do, and I'm very fortunate to do what I do, but I don't love it enough to be disrespected, and I don't love it enough to I think tolerate a lot of behaviors that I think other people will. And I made that decision really early on that I wasn't going to assimilate or code switch, and that if I was going to do it, I was going to do it my way or just wasn't going to do it at all.
I'm very just all or nothing person in general.
But I think that it also made me realize that ALI shit really is only important if it's active, like it has to be people really speaking up and joining together, and I think doing it in a way that is actually sustainable for other black people as well, and not just for yourself. So it doesn't really matter if you're like, you know, I'm okay with someone not me, obviously, but if I'm okay with someone calling me the end word, you do realize that that's going to happen to another
black person. Because if you stand there and don't say anything, and you say, well, I need this job and this is fine, and I'll, you know, I'll just suck it up, then that means that they think that behavior is okay, and they think that they can also treat another black person like that, And that, to me is just completely
against my own moral code and integrity. And I think that it also just puts black people, I think, in a really tough position because if we don't have the connections, we don't have the generational wealth, we don't have all the things. It was really fascinating, I think, to have that conversation because everyone was just so desperate, and so everyone kind of came at it at different places and
not even from a judgmental situation. But I think then I knew and made the decision like either I'm doing this my way or I'm not doing it at all.
Okay, So then to that point, Brandon, So I want to ask you in one second year, just what your thoughts are on what some of the other hurdles that are currently faced by black people within the fashion industry. But first, lindsay, let's backtrack three jobs. What else was the struggle like when you first got hit? Where'd you come from? The team's Midwest is in the research doc, But I want to get granular, like where not Midwest?
Now, I'm from Wisconsin.
Not exactly the fashions, love the filannel, lots of good filannel in Wisconsin, but not a fashion epicenter. You recognize that. So you bounced to New York with a rent It's quadruple. Just walk me through those early days in New York as you were trying to navigate those hurdles.
I mean, I laugh now, but I just cried so much during that period that I think I'm shocked that I even honestly stayed because I was just honestly mentally drained and emotionally exhausted. And I'm really proud of myself when I look back on those days. But even I think now it just allowed me to build up affortitude to be able to handle things now that I probably thought I would never be able to handle.
But I yeah, I mean I worked.
You know that at that time you only got paid nine dollars an hour working in the closet at night. I was always changing mannequins for different stores.
So like the store that.
I made me over the day, are you at least working in something fashion? The mannequins are fashionists, But are you like in and around print in any like, what was the day job?
What were the day job?
Yeah, I mean the day job when I started in what we call the fashion closet is just you know, you are assisting all of the fashion teams. So you could be going on shoots, You could be merchandising and organizing clothing. You could be doing check ins and returns of items that are coming in for shoots, like sitting on sitting in you know, in the very back of creative meetings, all of that. So just getting a look at to how the covers and all of the fashion
shoots are made. But I think even then I felt, honestly, I think it was the exhaustion of you know, working at night. I would always leave teen Vogue during the day and then I would go work at night of changing the mankins or freelancing for another stylust. On the weekends, I always waitressed Saturday and Sunday. But it still wasn't enough. Like it was it was enough to like pay my bills, it wasn't enough to really do anything else. And there are a lot of situations where you know, and brandis
knows this. Like so much in fashion, is also how you dress and how you appear. That is also such a big part of the social currency of being able to talk with people, to be able to feel like they think that you're at least good enough to be in the rooms. And so a lot of times I would get really frustrated in the early days because I would always outwork other people. But it really wasn't necessarily about me outworking other people. It was about them, you know,
having certain connections or you know. I would intern with girls who would wear full chanelle every day and I couldn't compete because I was wearing gap and that was all that I could afford. And that was the social currency in the way of you know, when your boss see someone wearing Chanelle, They're like, oh, my gosh, I love that outfit. And then they are like, oh, you should style this thing because you have great style, when really what they have is, you know, elitism and classism
and other advantages that I just didn't have. And so it's quite frustrating, and it's really expensive to be able to want to work into fashion, to dream about working in fashion.
It's really expensive.
So then to that point, brandis what do you think of some of the other barriers that black and brown people deal with when they enter the fashion industry and have things like social media and direct to consumer movement created another point of entry for them.
Yeah, can I go back real quick?
Roy too Plant.
When Lindsay interviewed us for that article, it was like a therapist that called me and said, how do you feel? I think I kept Lindsay on the phone for over an hour because because no one had ever asked me how it felt to be black and fashion.
And I remember talking.
To Lindsey about what was it like interviewing all these people? She interviewed like one hundred people and everyone felt the same way. So this was hours and hours of her listening to people of color and how they felt, particularly black people, and how they felt working in passion.
So Lindsay, thank you for that. I needed them.
Okay, But then let me ask you, why did you agree to do the interview? Because she interviewed a hundred people. I know, if you interviewed a hundred, then Lindsey, I know at least another fifty to sixty decline to participate because they probably scared of backlash and being on the record talking about racism and the industry that don't I don't want the white people to see my name in it.
I can do it.
Can you talk to me? But I won't get my name? No, I need your name because it gives legitimacy. So brandis, why did you agree? Why weren't you scared into being silence on speaking on race.
It was a few things, and there were some things that I even edited with because.
Of where I knew I was going.
But one of the things was Lindsay did my very first interview with the cut and I never forget when people are part of my beginning journeys.
And also I felt like this was a conversation that.
We really weren't having in fashion and the fact that I could be a part of it, or that she even asked me to be a part of it really felt like an honor for me to be able to voice that because it's been up until that article, these were conversations we were only.
Having with each other, and I kind.
Of felt like, finally, this is going to be an article that everyone in fashion and retail are going to have to read and decide whether they want to reckon with this or not.
So for me, it was an honor to be a part of it.
So then to that point, brandis when you had an opportunity to speak in just this years and years of PTSD and everything you'd gone through just starts vomiting up. What are some of the other hurdles and obstacles for black and brown fashion designers or black and brown people
in the fashion industry period that they're dealing with. Because if you don't have the Chanelle outfit off the rip to be in your internship, that means you ain't got money, which means you probably can't get an investor because they don't want to invest in you because they look at your clothes and decide your clothes you don't dress nice. So how do I know that you know how to make nice. So what were some of the hurdles that you think are still out there?
Yeah, so I work with designer black designers mostly, and some of their hurdles were not having access to mentorship because this is a hard business.
Most black people don't come from a family where they've.
Got, you know, an auntie who was as whole designer, So there's like no one that you can really go to besides other designers who are also trying to figure it out.
Part of it was financing.
How do I even get the money to be able to set up a website? Because again, this industry is so based on aesthetics, So if you go to a designer's website and it doesn't look like it compares with.
Another non black designer in that space, people are judging you based on that.
A lot of times it was them trying to get in stores, but retaellers saying, you know what, this designer, I don't think that they are really fit. I don't think our consumers will really get it. A lot of times they were told to water their styles down. I had a designer who has a very clear aesthetic of like what her brand looks like, and one season she came.
Out, I didn't even know those were her clothes.
And the reason she had done that was because she had met with white buyers who had told her that she needed to make all these changes to her collection in order to be considered for their store. I mean, honestly, Roy, I could go on and on about the challenges for black designers, but I think it kind of goes down to financing, opportunities, access, and really they're not being a very clear intention initially. That's changed a bit for the industry to really support black designers.
Are there options, like when we just talk about fashion school, what are the options for someone that is still in the Midwest who cannot afford the move to New York? Or is that the first hurdle that you have to overcome to even get to all it. It's like, Mario, you got to beat this boss and then you can face the bosses of racism and colonialism and lack of investors and nepotism and financial barriers, et cetera, et cetera.
I'm so happy you bring that up because that's a big barrier. So you know, again, most people are going to college, or first black people going to college or first generation sacond generation student. I couldn't have told my mom, I'm going to fashion school right out of high school, you know, like A, who has the money for that? B?
What job are you going to?
You know, it's really about how do we set up the next generation to win? And that's hard for us to wrap our hands around as you're looking at all the systematic challenges we've been through as a people. And so you're right, the first barrier is design schools. If you look at the percentage of you know, design students in schools like Parsons, in schools like Rizby, who is one of the top schools, in schools like.
SCAD, it's it's so tiny.
It's probably less than five percent of the students that are there. Some of them is less than one percent. So you're absolutely right, that is the first barrier. That's why, you know, we've started to do a lot of work with HBCU fashion departments because it's like, how do we get these students prepared and ready to compete with students
who have graduated from these top fashion institutions. You know, So there's oh my goodness, when we start to peel back the layers of all the challenges and why the challenges exist and get to like the systematic root of it.
It's it's hard, it can feel overwhelmed.
I love that you're kind of smiling, but this is this is a.
Lot, it's a lot.
I'm smiling because I have Lindsay on here with me, and she.
Knows exact really what I'm talking about, exactly what she's talking about.
And when you start peeling about the back the layers, it's so much.
But you know, you got to start somewhere.
And I think that's you know, Lindsay with Black and Fashion Council and be Harlem's Fashion on Icon three sixty.
I think we both said.
We don't know how we're going to tackle all this, but let's at least start.
Yeah, after the break, I want to get a little bit deeper into solutions. We have talked about all of the hurdles. How do we dominate the hurdles. We'll try and figure that out with our guess next this is beyond the scenes, all right, So we've talked about the hurdles, let's talk a little bit about the solutions and progress.
Now.
Thank you all for being on with us today because you see what I consider to be performative social justice versus what is actually quantifiable real stuff. So, Lindsey, you had this fall fashion cover for the Cut, and you had Megan thee Stallion and you had Megan Markle on that. Yeah, we did a CP time a while back on The Daily Show where we celebrated the history of black models like Naomi Sims, who they told her she was too dark, and then it was Tracy Africa Norman who was a
trance model. So you have these mile markers of progress, But is that smoking mirrors or are we really making progress to some degree in the fashion industry when it comes to being aware of racism and needing to do something to fix it.
Yeah, I mean I think that there has been progress.
Like I don't want to negate that because I think there's been so much incredible work that people have done. But I do think that a lot of the changes that we are talking about it's just an infrastructural change. It's stuff that's been going on for generations and generations, and it's going to take a really long time for it to change. So I think that there has been a progress. I think a lot of things still stand.
It's just that people are very scared to talk about them, or they figure out a way to honestly just leave fashion and say, you know, I just don't want to deal with this anymore, and maybe start something on their own, or just end up doing something I think a little bit different in fashion, but every part has its own unique problems obviously, and what brandis was referring to, you
know how black designers have very specific issues. I think at Editorial we have very specific issues that like we just have not really decided to tackle.
A lot of times.
And so, you know, I'm really grateful to be able to run a publication and to be able to yes, do those front facing things of having both Megans on the cover, and I'm incredibly proud of that, and that's amazing, but it is also very who'sive behind the scenes, and every little thing that we do is inclusive and intentionally really thoughtful to make sure that it's not just a front facing thing that we're doing to say that we put somebody in the cover, but from the people that
I hire, from people who are editing texts, that people who are shooting everything, to people that we commission for things, to hiring people on staff and not just freelance, so that you get notifications about this person doing something the publication. What we're talking about is a holistic change, and I think that is just going to take a long time.
How do you all, well, I guess if you want to get what you've already kind of answered this question. You have answered this question to a degree of what you all are doing to hold the industry accountable in terms of progress.
But also.
Is it difficult to hold an industry accountable while still operating within it.
I think the only way to really hold it accountable is to be.
Operating within it.
It's hard to from the outside if also from the outside, and I am at outsider, but if I was from the outside trying to affect change in passion, it would be really difficult to do. One of the things that I do is try to keep it on the front of people's.
Minds, of brand's minds. So all the time I.
Am having conversations about race and passion, about some of the challenges that designers are still facing. So for example, there's been so many department stores who now are carrying
black designers. So what they do is they open the door, they allow the designers in but what I've said to them is there has to be a program in place to make sure that you can sustain them, because they're not coming from the same resources, so they can't deal with your net sixty terms, and you may have to pay them a deposit upfront and if you want to keep them, and by the way, if you don't want to keep them, basically what you're saying is you don't
want to grow because when you looking at gen Zers, the racial equity, it's so important to them. So if brands want to last in the future and they want to attract gen z, which if they want to grow, they have to attract them. They have to be willing to do the things that are needed to make sure that these designers can actually keep showing up in this
department store. I read something on Bloomberg recently that twenty five percent of black people say they shop from black people frequently, black brands frequently, and under thirty five that jumps to forty percent.
Well, that's a big deal, and that's a lot of money that's represented here, and so brands have to find a way how do we make sure that these designers can come in and stay in And so it's just having listening.
To the designers, hearing what their challenges are, and then as I'm meeting with brands, which I probably have about meetings with like ten brands a week, making sure that I'm communicating this to them so that basically I can, you know, help to give the designers avoids inside of these brands.
Lindsay, talk to me a little bit about when we talk about accountability for these brands. The emphasis for the Black and Fashion Council, which I don't want to call it like the consumer report on whether or not you're doing the work you claim to be tweeting about working and doing, but I know it's a public report to track these things. How do you quantify, you know, from
a data standpoint, how are you quantifying this? And what has been the response you've seen from the companies that decided to, you know, be a part of this project.
Yeah, I mean for Black and Fashion Council, a lot of it is by co founder of Sandria Charles runs a PR firm.
Obviously I'm an editorial.
We started to just get on zooms with a bunch of people like brandis to say like what can we collectively do a little bit more of to push the industry to actually be held accountable, and I think that a lot of it was like we wanted to create safe spaces for you know, black people in fashion to be able to just you know, have fun and to
be able to have a sense of community. So we do our own like seasonal dinner for all you know, the senior level and people on the board a black and fashion consul, but then we also did one for younger people in fashion to be able to have fellowship and find the community at SOHO works last week. We always do our showroom at IMG at Springs Studios where they already have all the shows, and that really helps
all the young designers get exposure. We set up you know, press appointments and buyers and all of that for them, and so it's been cool to see young designers start in the showroom and then be able to build enough to have their own show, which is incredible like Theophilia, and I like, I'm so proud of all of them.
Every season we do our job fare, which is free for students, and we do that you know, twice a year to just work with HBCUs and community colleges to get all the kids just more exposure as far as different jobs that they can do outside of being a stylist and the flashy stuff that they may see. There's a ton of from jobs in fashion that I think you just don't know about if you don't come from fashion.
And then obviously we have our directory, which is all we've partnered with Color of Change on which basically works to not let the companies say, like, we only use this photographer because we've.
Known him for a very long time.
So it's an industry wide, vetted directory of you know production, you know set production photographers make up all of that that all the companies can use. And so part of it was that we wanted to provide a lot of these resources first to be able to not give companies the excuse. And then the Corporate Equality Index is really our way of saying, like, now we've provided all of these areas in ways in which you can rise the occasion of making changes, how are you actually doing that?
And I think for a lot of the companies, it's been forcing them to get out of the habit of doing the things that they've always done. And we got really nitty gritty with companies, like even you throw a company holiday party, who's catering it every year because it's probably your friend who you've been booking for the past
ten years. Like being not really to the naity greet people because I think also a lot of brands, and especially because when we had started it, it was during the pandemic, and so a lot of brands were like, well, like, we don't have more money to donate, or we don't have more money to hire to make our company more inclusive.
But literally every little thing that you do.
You should be interrogating and saying, how can I be more inclusive in this? How can I step outside of my comfort zone? And I think just making the brands understand that it's okay to be uncomfortable and that's actually a good thing when you're out of your comfort zone and being challenged to do something differently.
I know we don't have a lot of time left, you know, in brandis I did want to for sure recognize the Icon three sixty fund that you started as an effort to raise funds for designers of color, and you also support black college fashion departments. I wish you would have been around when I was at FAMU back in ninety six, still wearing chaps up top and Tommy Hill figure pants. I did not know you couldnot wear clashing it. No one told me. Okay, no one told me.
But I would love to talk about Harlem Fashion Row before we get out of here, because I want to end on this. I want to end on The question to both of you really is about what words do you have? You know, what do you feel in terms of the future of the fashion industry, and what would you say to young black people who are trying to enter the industry.
Brands.
I'll start with you because I feel like Harlem Fashion Row does a great job of connecting and I know you also set up these big retreats for people of varying stages along their career journey to meet in Parlay. But talk a little bit about Harlem Fashion Row and then I'll ask the question to you, Lindsey.
Yeah.
So I love the work we're doing with Harlem's Fashion Row.
We're really acting as a bridge between designers of color, mostly Black designers, and brands, and so we're doing that through events, collaborations, brand strategy, and pipeline programs like the HBCU summits that we do. But my goal really Roy and what I think is going to like shift everything is to.
Build an endowment for black designers.
You know, we don't have any endowments for.
Black people in Passion, and we were able to give away a million dollars to designers a few years ago, and now we're getting ready to launch a new business initiative where five percent of that money is going to
go back to fund Icon three sixty. Because until we get something set up where you know, designers never have to worry about how they're going to finance their collections and they never have to kind of be thinking about, you know, how do I go and pitch investors because quite frankly, black designers rarely ever get investment dollars, you know, from fund So we have to figure out how do we do this ourselves, and so we're working on. My goal is to lead this industry with a twenty million dollar.
Endowment for designers of color, and.
Everything that I'm doing right now, I'm thinking about how how do we make that happen.
You can make it nineteen million, give me a million, make a nineteen million, got be twenty.
Perspected.
But now that's a goal so that we can have something that is sustainable in perpetuity, because this conversation is cyclical.
It's happened every twenty to thirty years.
If you go back and look in history, Lois Alexander Lane was doing the work I'm doing with hfr Or back in the seventies. So the conversation keeps happening every few decades. So we have to figure out how do we set up something that lasts and in perpetuity.
And lastly, Lindsey, what do you hope to see in the future of fashion for black and brown? And what would you say to young black people who are trying to enter the industry and you know, see all see the mountain that they have to start climbing.
Yeah, I mean, I think my goal is that there doesn't even need to be as many dei rolls honestly for companies, because it should should just be intrinsically something that we all have to do. It should not be something that companies make a special department for and gives out,
you know, all the rules and regulations and guidelines. Like I think that in a perfect world it would be part of a company, but it wouldn't be a driving force of saying this is the only way that we have to be inclusive because I think a lot of times, especially for big companies, a lot of those initiatives just sit with human resources and it doesn't actually help when
you work it. Like especially fashion magazines, a lot of those things don't really trickle down and they kind of stay at the top and in the air, but you
don't actually feel them when you work there. And so my goal would be for it to be you know, if there's a you know, amazing photographer that a publication likes to work with, but they happen to be really racist, that publications are able to say, you know what, that doesn't align with our value system and we have to let you go and we can't work with you anymore
because that's just intrinsically important to us. And that's not just something that you know, sits on an HR tablet and something that we say we care about d I, but we really don't.
That's really my goal in the industry.
But I think as far as young people, I just always encourage them to really be hungry for this work.
I think you have to really really love it.
I mean, we Brandis and I smile because I mean brandison Is, She's the original gangs. She's been doing this forever and you have to kind of smile and do it. But also Brandis loves it, like she loves working with
Soues designer. She is so passionate about it. And I think you have to because it's not easy and it is really hard, and I think I want to see young people really love the work and have, you know, very specific goals in mind, instead of being so focused on how it looks on social media and you know, how how much attention, how many likes, all of that, all of that stuff, you know, fades to the background and it is not important, but doing the work always is,
and that's really what's going to help the next generation.
So well.
I cannot thank you all enough for this wonderful conversation. I will end this with the words of the Great Beyond Sanders. If you look good, you feel good. If you feel good, you play good. If you play good, they pay good. Thank you all so much for making people look good so that they can feel good and go about their lives accomplishing all of the dreams that they've set out for themselves. That's all the time we
have for today. Thank you to our guest Chelsea Brandison Lindsey, and thank you listener for going beyond the scenes with me.
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