Vogue USA 09.2021

Lives SallyRooney overnight household names of its two newcomer stars, Daisy uncanny resemblance to Edgar-Jones with her eyebrow-grazing Edgar-Jones and Paul Mescal, who naturally adore her. “I want to chestnut fringe and the same doleful eyes). And she has become consume everything Sally Rooney forever!” says Edgar-Jones from really rather famous. the set of her latest film, in New Orleans. “She is so lovely and so The F word, as her new novel will attest, is much on her mind. incredibly intelligent.” Joe Alwyn, the British actor set to star in It does not sit easily. “There’s a level at which I’m using the book the upcoming adaptation of Conversations, is similarly smitten. in some way to explore emotions that I may not even be aware that “Sally’s mind is just so brilliant,” he says, “testing the boundaries I’m going through,” says Rooney, later alluding to “a kind of how we love, how we are able to love, how we are able—or not— of psychological toll” her success has taken. Rooney is a writer to function within structures that we have been taught. And her who “can only” draw on her own life and milieu for material refusal to tie things up neatly or offer definite solutions. I love that.” (“imaginatively limited” is how she describes herself, archly) and is Suffice it to say, if people were excited for Normal People, they well aware comparisons are going to be made between her and are positively frothing at the mouth for Rooney’s latest, Beautiful Alice, one of her protagonists, a wunderkind novelist in her late 20s World, Where Are You, published this September. But on that who has moved from New York to a quiet Irish coastal town, afternoon three years ago, none the wiser about what lay ahead, where she is wrestling with her new status as a celebrity author. Rooney felt “uncertain.” In fact, she thought maybe she didn’t “There is a sense of having lived a lot of life very quickly, in have another book in her. “Did I say that?” she exclaims today, her quite a compressed sort of time frame,” says Rooney of the past lively County Mayo accent rising an octave. How long, in reality, few years. “I think the book dramatizes some of those challenges.” did the uncertainty last? “About three months,” she says, laughing. The story centers on Alice and her best friend, Eileen, a It is another warm afternoon in early summer, but this time longtime staffer at a Dublin literary magazine, and their respective there are hundreds of miles between us. She is in her new home in on-off love interests (this is, after all, a Rooney novel), Simon, rural west Ireland, near to where she grew a parliamentary adviser, and Felix, a warehouse up in Castlebar—a quiet market town on the worker. But as ever with Rooney, plot is almost beside the point. The meat of the matter edge of the peaceful flat expanse of Lough “There’s a level at which Lannagh—while I am in East London, both is the chapters given over to the best friends’ grounded by the pandemic. Rooney has I’m using the book lengthy philosophical email exchanges, in returned to the setting of her childhood from a in some way to explore which they thrash out their thoughts on the big stint in New York, and before that, 10 years emotions that I may issues of their age and generation: ambition, in Dublin. Now afforded considerable status as not even be aware that relationships, identity politics, sex, motherhood, the favored chronicler of her often city-dwelling friendship, the impending destruction of the generation, she nevertheless finds that living I’m going through” Earth. “Aren’t we unfortunate babies to be born in the luscious Irish countryside, with rabbits when the world ended?” writes Alice to Eileen. and birds outside her window, suits her. “It’s What is it about Rooney’s novels that get nice to be surrounded by nature and to feel a little bit enclosed by under the skin? “When I look at my own reading life, the books that that,” she says. “It gives me mental space to do what I like to do.” I’ve felt completely swept away by are set among the landed gentry Rooney is, unsurprisingly, a first-rate conversationalist (in 2013, in 19th-century Britain, which I really don’t identify with at all,” says while studying English literature at Trinity College Dublin, she Rooney, considering why her work resonates, its ability to traverse won the European Universities Debating Championships—and it age and nationality. “But I care about [those people] very much if shows). She is open and charming, a master of self-deprecation, they’re in a Jane Austen novel or a George Eliot. I guess what a but most comfortable talking in the theoretical—while she can draw novel can do is take you to a particular social world and particular you in, she can also create distance at will. One senses this is part relationship dynamics that play out in a way that makes you self-preservation in the face of a spiraling public persona, part an feel like you’re standing in the doorway, looking in and observing inability to believe her mundane day-to-day life in and around exactly what’s happening.” Castlebar could be of fascination to anyone. “You might imagine— If her first two novels were about the transition from adolescence I’m sure you don’t imagine, but one could imagine—that I was to adulthood, Beautiful World is about the next phase, “when attending glamorous parties in London,” she says. “I have not left you realize some of the doors have closed behind you.” Much of the the country or seen anyone at all for over a year.” For Rooney, novel is concerned with what makes for a successful, meaningful an ideal week is filled with “flowers and trees and working,” while life—whom does the culture value and whom does it dismiss?— weekends are for seeing “friends for walks and coffee.” questions newly pertinent in the age of coronavirus and its essential I search her study for visual markers of the stratospheric success workers. And it asks how any of us are able to live, have children, she has enjoyed in the intervening years, but given she is a self- or be happy when faced with potential political and environmental identified Marxist, that isn’t exactly Rooney’s style—dressed in a Armageddon. Is Rooney, like so many, preoccupied with doom? taupe crewneck sweater, she is nearly camouflaged against the “Of course, very much so,” she says. “Me, my friends, my family bare, beige walls of her home. Occasionally, though, there is a flash all feel enormously anxious and afraid....Would I have bothered of a slim gold band on her ring finger, a marker from an intimate putting in all these long, thoughtful emails expressing feelings lockdown wedding last year to her longterm partner, John Prasifka, about various issues if I thought that everything they were saying a math teacher whom she met at university a decade ago. There was really stupid and pointless? Probably not.” At points in have been other changes, too. She recently turned 30, and her Beautiful World, Rooney’s characters question, she says, “whether once-bobbed hair now sweeps her shoulders (in fact, she bears an novels themselves are worthwhile in this moment.” Rooney >14 8 146 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

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Lives SallyRooney doesn’t have an answer, only her “attempt at a realistic portrait of novels has been money. “That is something that I did not have how people who are deeply concerned still manage to eke out before that I now have, and that has made my life easier in every some kind of existence. And at the end of the day, [the book] is still imaginable way, as of course having money does.” Rooney’s very much about sex and friendship and family life,” she says, Marxist politics have long featured in her fiction and on her Twitter “and the everyday mundane questions that are, also, the origin and account before she deactivated it (“When I first started going the propagation of human life.” around talking about Marxism,” says Eileen in Beautiful World, “people laughed at me. Now it’s everyone’s thing”). As a teenager E nniscrone was unseasonably quiet for the last day of May. and young woman, she felt Ireland’s major political parties had The small seaside town on the west coast of Ireland is nothing to say to her, though now—after the legalization of usually abuzz with holidaymakers, but tourists had yet same-sex marriage in 2015 and the 2018 referendum that legalized to descend for bracing dips in the North Atlantic and abortion in Ireland—she’s feeling more optimistic. “There’s a afternoons in the amusement arcade. Aside from a group of lot more real debate and disputation going on in a way that feels locals litter-picking on the beach, few would have seen Rooney substantial and challenging and exciting,” she says. as she walked through the long grass in the dunes, preparing Her country is famously going through a particularly fertile to have her portrait taken for Vogue. Which is, of course, just literary period, with many new young women writers—Naoise the way she would have liked it. “I’m just so Dolan, Megan Nolan, Niamh Campbell, awkward at things like that,” she says of being among others—being inevitably touted as the photographed. “It’s very much like”—she “new Sally Rooney” for their 21st-century laughs in exasperation—“I don’t know what to coming-of-age tales of sex, love, and work. do with my hands.” Next April Rooney’s sister-in-law, Catherine As a child, Rooney would spend summers Prasifka, will publish her debut novel, None here with her family—it’s “one of a very small of This Is Serious. “When you look at how number of towns that I amalgamated for literature has developed in a broader historical the fictional setting of the book. I love it there.” way, there are [always] groups of writers She grew up a 40-minute drive away, with who are in conversation with each other,” says her two siblings and parents. Her mother ran Rooney. Of course they will cover similar the local arts center, while her father was a ground. “Exchanging letters…going to the technician for Ireland’s state-owned telecom same cafés…reading each other’s work.” company. Theirs was a bookish family; her That’s certainly how Flattery and Rooney got parents were voracious readers but had no to know each other. After being introduced literary connections. “Neither of them were by the editor of The Stinging Fly, a prestigious remotely success-orientated,” Rooney told Dublin literary magazine Rooney would me when we first spoke. “They were just happy edit for two issues in 2018, the pair would meet for their kids to be happy, and if one of us for coffee and exchange work. “I definitely wanted to be a literary novelist or whatever, it think one of the reasons Ireland does so well is was like, ‘Well, whatever makes you happy, we have a scene that encourages and supports darling. Pursue your dream.’” THE GREAT DEBATE writers,” says Flattery. “And it’s not closed off. “I think that Sally’s someone who has written THE CHARACTERS IN ROONEY’S NEW I never feel intimidated.” all her life, regardless of whether it is published BOOK EXAMINE WHAT FICTION IS FOR. For years, Rooney was a fixture on its or not,” her friend and fellow Irish author nonstop schedule of book launches and poetry Nicole Flattery tells me. “I imagine not writing would be strange nights. When she went to New York as a Cullman Center Fellow to her.” It’s true Rooney completed her first (unpublished) novel at the New York Public Library in 2019, it was “the first time I’d at 15 and joined a creative-writing group, but school was never ever been outside Ireland for more than a month or so,” she says. her thing: Adolescence, a dislike of authority, and homework put “I was homesick, which surprised me actually. When I was a paid to that. It wasn’t until her early 20s that she started writing teenager, I thought, you know, I can’t wait to go live in New York,” properly, so to speak, and with gusto. While completing her master’s she whines in her best precocious-teen voice. “Well, it turns out thesis in American literature, she composed 100,000 words of I could wait, and did wait a long time. And then when I got there, Conversations in three months. Although she didn’t foresee a life I wanted to come home. Even though it’s a beautiful city.” as a novelist: “I just lived every day, getting up in the morning, As borders started closing in spring of last year, Rooney and stumbling my way through writing my book, and trusting that John made the decision to return home. “We’re both very close everything would be fine,” she told me in 2018. “I had no plans for to our families,” she said. “It felt important to be here.” Lockdown having a career.” When literary agent Tracy Bohan of the Wylie has inevitably narrowed life, but Rooney’s day-to-day hasn’t Agency read an essay Rooney published in 2015 about being on a changed all that much. Every morning, after her husband goes to debate team, she asked if she had a manuscript. The following teach at a nearby secondary school, she makes herself a coffee © 2021 MACMILLAN year, Conversations sold in a seven-way auction. and breakfast before doing a sudoku puzzle or going online to play It would be easy to assume that Rooney, like her Normal People chess—then retires to the couch to write. (“I do have a kind heroine Marianne, comes from a wealthy background, which is of study studio space where I can sit upright and not ruin my not the case. The single biggest change to her life since writing her posture,” she says, “but I like to lie on the CO NTIN U ED O N PAG E 3 4 0 148 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M







TELLING TALES This trio of looks in the Installation Studio is centered on patchworking and quilting techniques. from far left: Adrian, 1947; La Réunion, 2021; Ralph Lauren, 1982. Photographed by Stefan Ruiz. Sittings Editor: Alexandra Gurvitch. Looking at Us The new two-part exhibition on American fashion at the Metropolitan Museum’s Costume Institute does more than tell us what we wore: It reveals who we are. By Janelle Okwodu. T he most ambitious exhibition to date 2020 10th-anniversary collection bears takes on a new verve. “It was important from the Metropolitan Museum of the phrase, and it greets visitors from the to open with that,” says Andrew Bolton, Art’s Costume Institute kick-starts threshold of the Anna Wintour Costume the Costume Institute’s Wendy Yu Cura- with a question: who gets to be Center. It’s a query every immigrant must tor in Charge. “It tackles this notion of american? A red, white, and blue silk sash consider—but shrouded in golden light acceptance and belonging, which recent from the grand finale of Prabal Gurung’s at the outset of a fashion retrospective, it events have brought to the fore. Of >15 4 152 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M



course, these are questions that have always AMERICAN PERENNIAL color and marginalized groups— been present—but there are moments Florals can be sweetly pastoral—or slyly, and though it serves as a retro- in history when they’re more resonant subversively romantic. Two perfect examples spective, the show’s observations and resounding.” on the Great Hall Balcony: left, Adolfo, about national identity are rooted 1973–74; right, Marc Jacobs, spring 2020. in current concerns. “It was almost “In America,” the museum’s two-part ex- impossible to do this show without ploration of all things made in the U.S.A., is a a splash on Monday, September 13, closing looking at it through the lens of yearlong celebration spanning three centuries out New York Fashion Week with a gala politics,” says Bolton. “There’s no of fashion. The first part, which includes cochaired by Timothée Chalamet, Billie Ei- art form that addresses the politics pieces from such American standard-bearers lish, Amanda Gorman, and Naomi Osaka— of identity more than fashion.” as Ralph Lauren, Donna Karan, and Calvin with Tom Ford, Instagram’s Adam Mosseri, Klein alongside the current vanguard of mil- and Anna Wintour honorary chairs.) Language is the core theme lennial talent, opens on September 18, with of the exhibition’s first install- part two opening on May 5, 2022. (While “In America” echoes the work Bolton has ment, “A Lexicon of Fashion.” the pandemic forced the cancellation of last done expanding the Met’s archives to in- Bolton credits 2020’s social- year’s Met ball, “In America”will debut with clude more contributions from designers of justice movements with prompt- ing him to reexamine the topic of terminology—particularly when tackling such important issues— since, in the 20 years since the museum’s last overview of Amer- ican fashion, discussions around style have changed. “American designers are at the forefront of conversations around diversity, inclusivity, sustainability, gender fluidity, and body positivity,” Bolton says, “and the framework of the show enables us to focus on the younger designers who are engaging thoughtfully and deeply with those ideas.” Recent Central Saint Martins graduate and LVMH Prize finalist Conner Ives was a toddler in Bed- ford, New York, the last time the Costume Institute explored Amer- icana, a theme that animates his work. (Ives’s graduation project, The American Dream, deals with feminine archetypes culled from pop culture in the states.) When he saw the announcement of the Cos- tume Institute’s new exhibition, “I was giddy,” he says. “My collec- tion was built around the concept of forgotten American designers—people that had such a rich, influential history, but when you mention them to a fashion student nowadays, they ask who you’re talking about. You have to stop and think, Oh, my God—there were scores of people that came before me.” Ives’s modernized debutante dress—employing deadstock, vintage fabric, and recycled-plastic floral paillettes—now illustrates the beauty of hopefulness in “Lexicon.” After months spent indoors during the pandemic, Bolton toyed with organizing the exhibition as a kind of high-tech house inspired by Witold Rybczynski’s Home: A Short History of an Idea—but >156 154 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

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shoehorning designers into categories tied “We approach exhibition space in the show speaks in the same way, allowing the BLAINE DAVIS. to places such as the kitchen or office proved same way we approach cinematic space,” viewer to make associations.” limiting. Finally, inspiration came from an says Valentino. As with an actual quilt, the unexpected source: Reverend Jesse Jack- right textiles made all the difference. “We’re The exhibition also shines a light on Amer- son’s speech at the 1984 Democratic National trying to create a patchwork mentality,” Val- ican talent during a moment when such sup- Convention. “America is not like a blanket, entino explains, “but keeping it modern.”He port is necessary. The economic fallout of the one piece of unbroken cloth, the same color, and Crowley worked primarily with mate- pandemic hit the fashion community hard, the same texture, the same size,” he told the rials associated with filmmaking. “Scrim, particularly independent creators. “We all audience at San Francisco’s Moscone Center. silks, duvetyne, and velour were our archi- share the tribulation of having to create a col- “America is more like a quilt: many lection while constantly checking your bank patches, many pieces, many colors, READING THE PAST many sizes, all woven and held to- “The beauty of American fashion is its account to make sure you can pay gether by a common thread.” heterogeneity,” says the Costume Institute’s your staff,” says Hillary Taymour of Collina Strada, whose vibrant “The act of making a quilt cel- Curator in Charge, Andrew Bolton. work is also featured in the show. ebrates the notion of community “Creativity can counter some of that is so strong in America,” says tectural base,”says Valentino, who employed the negativity—and as artists, we’re Bolton, who adds that quilts also a few Hollywood tricks to fool viewers’ eyes. supposed to be contributing to our connect ideas about family and “One of the big metaphors that go through culture. This show takes people out about repurposing and recycling. both parts of ‘In America’ is perception— of their heads for a second.” “Each square is a different design- changing how we look at things. We’re er, who represents a specific quali- rethinking American designers and iden- That transportive sensibility is ty of American fashion.” tity in the United States, and visually we’re something Christopher John Rog- trying to incorporate other ways of seeing.” ers is hoping to experience when Approximately 100 pieces from he sees the exhibition’s quilted set 80 or so labels and designers range Crowley and Valentino have also added a pieces in person—including a volu- from joyful 1994 Anna Sui dress- sensory component with embroidered details minous magenta plaid-silk taffeta es to Christian Francis Roth’s that pop up throughout the exhibition. look from his fall 2020 collection 1990 “Rothola” dress. Naturally, “Embroidery has this tactile quality—there’s chosen by Bolton to reflect Ameri- the show features quilting and a three-dimensionality to it,” says Valentino. can exuberance—a quality Rogers handcraft prominently: Holly- “The way we understand language is often associates with the work being pro- wood costumer turned designer through a sentence or a phrase, and the duced by many of his peers. “We’re Adrian’s 1947 dress, for exam- seeing people from all across the ple, references the floral designs country make evocative and emo- found on traditional hand-sewn tional work that isn’t predicated on American quilts. Placed with traditional ideas about what Amer- the upcycled patchwork pieces ican clothes should look like,” he from Nigerian-American textile says. With its mile-wide skirt and artist Sarah Nsikak’s brand, La multicolored hues, his ball gown is Réunion, and a custom piece from an appropriately delightful exam- Emily Adams Bode made from a ple of the dynamic, independent vintage quilt, Adrian’s look feels fashion the exhibition is meant newly relevant. Floral styles also to highlight. get the full-circle treatment. Adolfo’s silk eveningwear, a staple of nights out in the That “common thread”that Rev- early ’70s, fits right in with the sumptu- erend Jackson referred to in 1984—unifying ous closing number from Marc Jacobs’s issues such as health care, education reform, spring 2020 collection, a play on the botan- and housing—remains relevant today, as ical theme taken to its extreme with giant does the idea that pluralism is the root of watercolor petals. American society. For Bolton, the statement captured what he was trying to achieve. “I Tying everything together meant con- grew up [learning about] the concept of the structing a space that immerses viewers American melting pot, which implies that we in history—a task that fell to production are all blended together and assimilated,” he designers Shane Valentino and Nathan says, “but what Jackson suggests is that our Crowley of LAMB Design Studio. Hav- identities and experiences are woven together ing dreamed up a neo-noir Texas for Tom into this multifaceted whole that preserves Ford in his 2016 film Nocturnal Animals the uniqueness of our respective heritages and blown up a Boeing 747 for Christopher and voices. The beauty of American fashion Nolan’s more recent sci-fi thriller Tenet, the two are also adept at pushing the design is its heterogeneity.” @ envelope for the Met—from 2008’s “Super- heroes” show to 2015’s “China: Through Part One, “In America: A Lexicon of Fash- the Looking Glass.” ion” is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Anna Wintour Costume Center from Sep- tember 18, 2021, to September 5, 2022. 156 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M









Join us this fall, when The New Yorker Festival newyorker.com/festival returns with both live and virtual events—an @NewYorkerFest #NewYorkerFest eclectic mix of conversations, performances, and experiences, featuring the biggest names in politics, literature, film, music, art, and pop culture.

The Body Shop INT ERIO R: Y ELLOW, G RE EN AN D BLUE COUC H, 2018. RH IN ESTO NE , AC RYL IC, OIL AN D GL ITTE R O N CANVAS MOUN TED O N WOO D PANE L, 84 X 96 I N . ; AUGUST 1977. 20 19. R H IN ESTO NES, ACRYLIC AND OIL PAINT ON CANVAS MOUNTED ON WOOD PANEL WITH NATURAL OAK FRAME, 86 X 72 X 3 IN. COURTESY OF THE ARTIST/© 2021 ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK. Mickalene Thomas—whose new work will be exhibited in five galleries simultaneously this fall—is a remix artist who embraces the high and the low. By Dodie Kazanjian. W hen Mickalene Thomas was although she will show at Lévy Gorvy, the year she was born) to 1977. “The Jet Cal- growing up in New Jersey, gallery does not actually represent her—nor endar was advertised as the first ‘Black Is she kept telling her family does anyone else. “The idea of representa- Beautiful’ calendar, shifting the magazine that she was going to move to tion is old,” she tells me. “I think it comes away from Eurocentric beauty standards,” Europe. “Here she’s talking about Europe with the notion of ownership, and I will not she says. “So what I’m doing is reimagining again,” she remembers her cousins teasing be owned.”Thomas is defiantly independent Jet’s representation of African American her, saying, “Girl, you don’t know about no and unflinchingly herself. For the last decade women as objects of desire by composing Europe.” She’s been there more times than she has lived in Brooklyn’s Clinton Hill, the figures within ornamental tableaux to she can count since then. This fall, 31 mon- walking distance from her 5,500-square-foot exhibit Black female empowerment.” Her umental new works—including collage-like studio in the rapidly developing Navy Yard reimaginings take the form of very large paintings of magisterial Black women area. “Most artists who’ve come to Clinton paintings, in which images from Jet’s ar- and social-political “Resist” pictures—are Hill have gone,” she says, “but I’ve stuck it chives of nude or skimpily clothed Black appearing in New York, London, Paris, and out. I’m really hoping to create a commu- women interact with an array of other forms Hong Kong as part of an exhibition collec- nity around here for artists.” She has two and materials—including oil and acrylic tively titled “Beyond the Pleasure Principle.” miniature labradoodles (Puma and Toast) paint and rhinestones. She started putting At the age of 50, Thomas is one of the most and co-parents a young daughter from an rhinestones in her paintings when she was dominant and fearless artists of her gener- earlier relationship. The curator Racquel at Yale’s M.F.A. program, with the idea of ation. The New York Times’ critic Roberta Chevremont, her life partner and muse, has combining Seurat’s pointillist dots and ver- Smith, looking back on Thomas’s 2012 two children of her own. nacular bling. Embracing both the high and mid-career survey at the Brooklyn Muse- the low, she’s a DJ remix artist who’s looked um, wrote, “No Manhattan museum had The work Thomas is making for the New closely at the work of the great collagist Ro- the nerve to do a show that questioned so York and London shows is a series she calls mare Bearden, who had looked closely at many different norms.” “Jet Blue,” based on the pinup calendars Matisse and Manet. that Jet magazine published from 1971 (the The four locations where Thomas will “Mickalene is more than an artist,” says show this fall are all part of the Lévy Gorvy INSIDE STORY Christopher Bedford, director of the Bal- gallery empire. (She’s also showing 10 new Thomas’s work intimately depicts domestic timore Museum of Art, where Thomas works at Nathalie Obadia, her longtime has transformed the museum’s neoclassical Paris gallery.) She left her previous deal- interiors and corporeal figures. left: east lobby into what she calls “Baltimore’s er Lehmann Maupin three years ago, and Interior: Yellow, Green and Blue Couch (2018). living room”—based on the kind of >16 4 right: August 1977 (2019). 162 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M



row-house interior she grew up with in the films, videos, installations, murals, and per- Thomas responded with a monumental re- RESIST, 2017. RH INESTO NES, AC RY LIC, G OL D LE AF, AN D O IL STIC K O N CANVAS MOUNTE D ON WOO D PANEL , 8 4 X 108 IN .; ’70s. “She’s an activist, a commercial photog- formance works. Happy Birthday to a Beau- versal of Manet’s Luncheon on the Grass, the COURTESY OF THE ARTIST/ © 2021 ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK. rapher, a designer, an agitator, an organizer, tiful Woman, her short film about her mother, painting that shocked the 1863 Paris Salon. a curator, a public figure, and a writer.... In premiered two months before Mama Bush’s Instead of two clothed gentlemen picnicking her conception, being an artist today is not early death in 2012. in the woods with a naked woman, Thomas one thing but all of those things.” offers three of her chic Black models in the “I love everything about the Black female same pose, clad in rhinestone-studded sun- The idea of being an artist didn’t really body,” Thomas tells me. “There’s always dresses and looking us straight in the eye. As kick in until she was in her early 20s. “I more to discover and explore.” There’s a she has said, “I love the fact that now when learned at a young age, watching my grand- wood-paneled corner in her studio where she you google Matisse or Manet or Courbet, mother and the women in my family, how sets up a domestic interior in boldly clashing I’m right up there with them.” to persevere,” she says. “They had resilience, patterns and colors, a different one for each just in the daily grind of being Black people sitting—1970s decor on steroids. She often She has excluded men from her picnic, and in America.” As a teenager, she quit high uses the same models, and they all look you from much of her practice, but not from her school and moved to Portland, Oregon, with straight in the eye and exude confidence and thinking. Four years ago, she began working her girlfriend to avoid telling her mother she was queer. FACE OF CHANGE on a series that she calls “Re- (Her father, she says, was not Thomas’s Hong Kong show will include several sist,” which deals with the bru- part of her life.) In a visit to talization and dehumanizing of the Portland Art Museum, new iterations on this 2017 work, Resist. Black and brown people from she came upon an early work the 1960s to the present. Paint- by Carrie Mae Weems, called self-awareness. They own the space; they’re ing on top of silk-screened Mirror, Mirror: a photograph not odalisques subject to the male gaze. The collages of archival images of a Black woman holding a titles of Thomas’s works are just as brazen: from the Civil Rights era to mirror up to her face and DoYa Think I’m Sexy and Hot,Wild, Unre- the Black Lives Matter move- confronting a fairy godmoth- stricted. Thomas has said her muses have ment, she builds multilayered er. The caption underneath “beauty, a little uncertainty, perseverance, visions that she doesn’t hesitate reads: “Looking into the mir- and a sort of hunger. All of the stronger qual- to tell you were inspired by the ror, the Black woman asked, ities I feel I possess. I guess I look for myself work of Robert Rauschenberg. ‘Mirror, mirror on the wall, in these women.” In a conversation with “This is my first social-political who’s the finest of them all?’ Carrie Mae Weems in 2015 she said, “I have body of work,” she says. The The mirror says, ‘Snow White a deep desire and sensuality for women that’s first Resist appeared in a 2018 you Black Bitch, and don’t inescapable. So perhaps I’m just as guilty as three-artist show at the Seattle you forget it!!!’” a man for my reasons for wanting to look at, Art Museum, alongside Rob- photograph, and paint women.” ert Colescott and Kerry James “It spoke to me,” Thomas Marshall. “I was so honored says. “It’s so familiar to what I Thomas has also mined art history for sub- to be chosen for that show,” know of my life and my family. ject matter, from Matisse and Manet to Hock- she tells me. “These artists cre- I’m that person. I know that person. It was ney and Bearden. In her version of Courbet’s ated a platform for artists like me to freely saying, ‘This is your life.’ That reflection was Origin of the World, the nude female genitalia make whatever the fuck I want to make.” so profound that it woke me up. I thought, are her own. When the Museum of Modern The Baltimore Museum of Art commis- This is what I want to create. Whatever this Art asked her a decade ago to make a paint- sioned Resist #2, and she is working on five artist is doing, I want to do that. I’ve always, ing for its 53rd Street restaurant windows, new ones for her show in Hong Kong this in my work, been chasing that one moment.” fall. “Mickalene has made some beautifully designed, well constructed, highly decora- Thomas finished high school in Portland, tive, just fabulous pieces,” Marshall tells me. then went to Pratt Institute in New York City. “Some of those paintings are as beautiful as She spent time as an exchange student at paintings can possibly be.” Southern Cross University in Lismore, Aus- But Black women remain at the core of tralia. Pratt led to the Yale School of Art, Thomas’s work. “Mickalene took the ‘luxe, where she got her graduate degree in 2002. calme, et volupté’ of Matisse and crossed Her work at Pratt had been abstract, but at it with the glue-gun aesthetic of queer life, Yale she took a photography class with David and married that pairing to the 1970s Black Hilliard, and that changed everything. He domestic interior, all the while centering suggested she photograph her mother. Black women,” says the curator and writ- Thomas’s relationship with Sandra Bush, er Helen Molesworth. “The results have known as Mama Bush, had been extremely been ravishing.” close but often troubled. Mama Bush had Does Thomas think she’s achieved any- struggled with drug abuse; she went into thing on the level of what Mirror, Mirror did rehab and became a practicing Buddhist. for her? “No,” she says. “The effort is there. Thomas’s photographs of Mama Bush, her The courage is there. And the skill is there. My first muse, introduced the Black female body hope is that my work has the same impact. as her primary subject in many mediums and forms—photographs, collages, paintings, That’s why I keep making art.”@ 164 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M











Bright TANGERINE Future DREAM Lipstick is back—and Froseth wears actor Kristine Froseth neon-orange is ready to mouth off. lipstick by makeup artist Dick Page. NINE YEARS AGO, A TEENAGE Givenchy dress. Kristine Froseth went to a casting Hair, Ilker Akyol. call at an Oslo mall with two Photographed by friends, “for the heck of it,” and Cruz Valdez. was signed by a local talent agent Fashion Editor: on the spot; a few months later, Max Ortega. she found herself in a Prada campaign shot by Steven Meisel. PRODUCED BY RYKER ALLEN AT MINI TITLE; Her acting career manifested SET DESIGN BY MARCS GOLDBERG. DETAILS, SEE IN THIS ISSUE. through similar happenstance. “It was pretty much just another lucky moment,” insists the New Jersey–born, Norway-raised model, now 24, who stars in Amazon’s fall ballet drama Birds of Paradise. “Physically it was pretty challenging,” Froseth says of the grueling workout schedule (barre, Pilates, gyrotonics, cardio) required to accurately portray a young dancer vying for a spot in the elite Opéra National de Paris. Joining the body-positive set of Sharp Stick, Lena Dunham’s secretive feature- length directorial effort, which filmed during the pandemic, offered a completely different experience, Froseth says—as did embracing “a lot of curls, a lot of hats, and really tight skirts” to play a young Betty Ford in Showtime’s highly anticipated The First Lady, out next spring. The constant shape-shifting is slightly foreign to Froseth, who spent most of lockdown barefaced in sweats with her family in Norway. “I’m very much trying to figure out what my identity is when it comes to makeup,” she admits, revealing that she’s hoping to “amp things up” with bolder looks, such as this masks-off pop of tangerine lipstick, as the world begins to reopen. “It’s just good to see people smiling again.”—zoe ruffner 170 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

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NEW SILHOUETTES member of the Resistance. As clockwise from Justine Picardie relates in the far left: Catherine Dior new biography Miss Dior: A during World War II; the Story of Courage and Couture New Look, photographed (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), in 1947; Catherine and Hervé des Charbonneries Catherine’s life then took after the war. another unexpected turn: By 1941, she had joined the Resis- tance, using the code name Caro. A recent novel by Chris- tine Wells, Sisters of the Resistance (William Morrow), imagines the lively underground circuit that surrounded Catherine in Paris at this time. Caro was arrested in 1944 and, after being repeat- edly tortured by the Gestapo (she never betrayed her comrades), was sent to a French prison that had been commandeered by the Germans. A frantic Christian appealed to the Swedish diplomat Raoul Nordling, who attempted without success to have Catherine released into his care. Instead, that August, she was delivered to the women’s concentra- tion camp, Ravensbrück, only to be transferred to further abysmal camps: Torgau, Abteroda, and finally, in 1945, to Markkleeberg. As the Allies approached, the detainees were sent on a death march, from which Catherine managed to escape. Apart from testimony she delivered against her torturers, she almost never spoke of her trials. When Dior debuted his history-making New Look collection on a cold winter day in February 1947, it was in a room scented with Miss Dior—a perfume, as he imagined, that “smells of love.” As lore has it, the fragrance obtained its name when, in the middle of a meeting between Dior and his muse and colleague Mizza Bricard, Catherine walked into the room. “Ah, here!”Bricard exclaimed, “Miss Dior!” The same name would be given to a strapless “mille fleurs” evening dress, first shown in 1949. Meanwhile the real Miss Dior built a quiet life away from Sister Act the world of fashion, living on her farm in A new biography takes a look Provence and selling flowers—alongside at the heroic, patriotic, and quietly des Charbonneries—at Paris’s historic flow- influential Catherine Dior. er market, described by a giddy American On paper, Catherine Dior is an unlikely heroine. Born into the prosperous Dior family in 1917, the youngest reporter in 1954 as “an enchanted garden of five children, she seemed destined for a decorative existence. But when the family’s fortune suddenly van- under the vast glass domes of Les Halles.” To this journalist, the mar- ished due to failed real estate ventures, a life of leisure seemed far less inevitable. In 1935, the teenage Catherine moved from the ket was a colorful, sunlit bubble, but the Dior siblings knew that the family’s stately home in Granville, Villa Les Rhumbs, to a dilap- idated farmhouse in Provence. She soon escaped to live with her reality was messier, that it’s no easy feat to conjure life from soil—or older brother Christian in Paris, selling accessories for a fashion house while he peddled his sketches. cloth. For all the soft romanticism of the New Look, it was achieved When World War II broke out, the siblings returned to the South with a rigid inner architecture. When her brother died in 1957, Cath- of France and grew vegetables that they sold in nearby Cannes. It was there, after Christian had returned to the capital in search again erine was named the “moral heir,” responsible for safeguarding his COVER: © 2021 MACMILLAN. NEW LOOK: © ASSOCIATION of the “atmosphere of chiffon,” that Catherine would meet and fall WIL LY MAY WALD/ADAG P, PARIS 202 1. ALL OTHE RS: in love with Hervé des Charbonneries, a married father of three and artistic legacy—a task she approached with great meticulousness, pre- COLLECTION CHRISTIAN DIOR PARFUMS, PARIS. serving the contents of his home down to his pack of playing cards. Despite shunning the spotlight during her life, Catherine is now being ushered into it—not just with these new books but in a flora- inspired spring 2020 collection from Dior’s creative director Maria Grazia Chiuri that was dedicated to Catherine and a 2021 bag deemed “the Caro.” Picardie’s book is of the moment, too, celebrating an unsung hero at a time when female influences are earning new acclaim. Nonetheless the elusive sister may remain largely unknow- able. Unlike her brother, Catherine never wrote her memoirs, pre- ferring to let her actions speak for themselves. When she was asked by a young veteran about her wartime experiences, her mantra was simple: “Love life.”—laird borrelli-persson 172 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

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Flying Solo A new global generation of independent designers is letting their creativity soar. THE PHRASE “LEAP OF FAITH” must be indel- ibly imprinted on the mind of just about every young designer who has decided to go it alone with their own label today. Let us count the mine- fields you need to navigate to let your own partic- ular fashion flag fly: You can experience the sheer joy of making exactly what you want—but you’ll need to work day and night to ensure it’s being made in ways that are accountable and respect- ful. Your clothes can say something about the world—or about your world—yet there’s also that little voice in your head asking if you should be making anything at all, given the environmental predicament we find ourselves in. But here’s the thing with this new generation of independent talents: They don’t shy away from creativity in the service of self-expression, and they still aim to answer some of life’s thornier questions. (That’s not to say that fashion’s major- league players aren’t grappling with the very same things—they just usually have a ton of support and resources to help answer them.) For >176 RAISING UP America’s Collina Strada is just one of 27 international labels being celebrated by Vogue. For more, go to Vogue.com. Photographed by Gordon Von Steiner. Fashion Editor: Jorden Bickham. 174 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

A CENTURY OF STYLE FROM LEFT: ANTHONY COTSIFAS; JASON SCHMIDT; OBERTO GILI From editor-in-chief Amy Astley and Architectural Digest, AD at 100 celebrates the most incredible homes of the past century, showcasing the work of top designers and offering rare looks inside the private worlds of artists, celebrities, and other fascinating personalities. Marc Jacobs, Jennifer Aniston, Diana Vreeland, India Mahdavi, Peter Marino, Kelly Wearstler, Oscar Niemeyer, Axel Vervoordt, Frank Lloyd Wright, Elsie de Wolfe, abramsbooks.com/AD100

THE U.S. SPAIN TAIWAN IT’S A BIG WORLD OUT THERE Work from a trio of labels around the globe— PRODUCED BY KELLY McGEE; SET DESIGN, KYLE HAGEMEIER AT MHS ARTISTS. SPECIAL THANKS TO PLEASE SPACE. New York’s Peter Do (above), Córdoba’s Palomo Spain (top right), and Seivson from Taipei (right) bring personal and idiosyncratic flourishes to the forefront. In this story: hair, Mustafa Yanaz; makeup, Jen Myles. Details, see In This Issue. these indies—on all points of the global map— fashion is a solo high-wire act where the only way to look is forward: in terms of gender identity, craft, representation, community, sustainability, and, last but never least, making utterly thrilling and audacious clothes. To celebrate them, the editors of all 27 edi- tions of Vogue around the world nominated their home-turf favorites. On these pages you’ll find those working in the U.S. (Peter Do, Col- lina Strada), Asia (Seivson from Taiwan), and Europe (Córdoba’s Palomo Spain)—while on Vogue.com you’ll find these designers plus a host of others in a video and portfolio featuring such talents as Maximilian (United Kingdom), Yueqi Qi (China), and Del Core (Italy). And so as we reenter the world—as we see theater curtains rise, or board a plane, or step into the office—let’s adopt (better yet, buy and wear) some of their style-affirming daring.—mark holgate 176 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

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Go Time With an expansive New York flagship and her first product line—a kit of travel-ready essentials—facialist Joanna Czech is ready for liftoff. THIRTEEN YEARS AGO, JOANNA CZECH realization: She needed a bigger space—and Beginning this month, The Kit will appear NIGEL SHAFRAN. VOGUE, 2020. left her celebrity-favorite spa in Manhattan’s better products to travel with. in the retail space at Czech’s new 2,300-foot Washington Heights neighborhood before SoHo studio, where she will also curate moving to Dallas for love. When she decided “My clients travel nonstop. It’s ‘We are fashion and lifestyle items while offering her to return to New York, in 2019, she initially going to Colorado and then Cabo,’ or ‘We signature treatments against a backdrop of thought the 400-square-foot penthouse are climbing Everest, then going to India.’ decorative molding and custom millwork. “I space at The Webster would suffice. “If peo- So I was thinking about something that hate going to ugly spas,” jokes de la Renta’s ple even remember me,” she thought at the helps between climates, too,” Czech says of Kim, who has collaborated with Czech time, “one room will be enough.” It wasn’t. her debut product collection, The Kit. The on custom cashmere socks and blankets, The current wait for an appointment with seven-piece range draws from Czech’s expe- which will be featured along with elevated the Polish-born super-facialist is six months. rience studying chemistry and arrives in a basics from brands such as James Perse metallic navy pouch with a seat-belt clasp. and Phillip Lim. Other highlights include a To be fair, Czech never really stopped (The idea was “Prada nylon,” Czech reveals collagen-and-elastin-boosting LED light bed coming to the city, even once she opened of the design, “but it ended up being more that Czech calls “a piece of art.” her eponymous flagship studio in Texas. like a Moncler jacket!”) Facial wipes and a “I would ship my machines from Dallas bio-cellulose hydrating mask—in-flight “At first I was having nervous breakdowns every month,” recalls the petite blonde, who essentials—are joined by a pH-controlling because no one was traveling,” the 57-year- follows her devices. In New York, she would toner; two serums, one to soothe with hyal- old says of the precarious timing around see regulars including model Amber Vallet- uronic acid, the other to brighten with both the studio opening and the products’ ta and Oscar de La Renta designer Laura stabilized vitamin C; and two moisturizers, launch. But the formulas are just as good at Kim; in Los Angeles, she would make house a water-based cream and a cocooning balm. home as they are on the go. “Everything she calls chez Kardashian. Czech estimates that recommends always works. She just knows she flew 30,000 miles in the month leading FLIGHT ATTENDANT my skin—she knows everyone’s skin,” says up to the pandemic alone. So when lock- Czech’s seven-piece collection is formulated Kim Kardashian, offering an endorsement down forced her to stand still, giving her and sized for on-the-go use. Photographed that will likely add at least a few months time to rethink her business, Czech had a to that wait list.—celia ellenberg by Nigel Shafran, Vogue 2020. 178 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M



THE ART OF SCENT It’s not every d perfumier with Amaffi doesn’t The credo of th house conclud best, we are fo client” and Am that bold claim fragrances unp no water diluti no synthetic m are distilled fro plants—as per The fougère In an ultra-rare e the agar tree; a olfactory equiv announcing a V

ious use takes apocryphal oleon’s the emperor’s woman so magnetic, e alone wear is just as at the brand’s chase of an emonial York City on 57th w,” features and a private scents. bottles… flacons are by master nce, and gree and akingly set table with a cap invisibly al bottles’ nt comes e for the ways having t all this ense of paca accord go mingling ash on the s—voilà: onate dance.

the museum’s costume cura- tor Sophia Serrano tracked down missing garments: “We get a clue who to call, and that person tells us to call some- one else.” A quick ring to Mr. Mackie himself allowed the museum to verify this gar- ment’s provenance. After the five years (and several false starts) it took for the museum to be constructed, its final profile is impressive: A giant steel globe designed by Renzo Piano will host a 1,000-seat theater; a terrace that slices through the top of the soaring sphere offers an expansive vista of the Hollywood Hills. Next door, the historic 1939 Saban Building (an Art Deco Streamline Moderne marvel) houses the museum’s galleries. The total footprint is around 300,000 square feet. “There’s just never been anything like this,” says University of Chicago professor of cinema SKETCH IT OUT and media studies Jacqueline Stewart, also the museum’s chief artistic and programming offi- left: Film paraphernalia from cer. No other institution, she explains, operates Frida will be on so intimately with the makers of the art it exhib- display. below: its. The museum, of course, is run by the very The Renzo Piano–designed same Academy that hosts the Oscars—and in structure. the wake of recent criticism, both the museum and its members are looking carefully at their past. “We’re trying SKETCH: FRIDA, 2002, JULIE WEISS COSTUME DESIGN DRAWINGS COLLECTION, MARGARET HERRICK LIBRARY, ACADEMY OF MOTION PICTURE ARTS AND SCIENCES. POLAROID: COURTESY OF MIRAMAX. MUSEUM: ETIENNE LAURENT/EPA-EFE/SHUTTERSTOCK. to narrate these histories accurately,” Stewart continues, “and that includes stories of struggle.” A gallery celebrating The Wizard of Oz, for example, will examine at the mistreatment suffered by Judy Garland during the making of that movie, while the ever-evolving Stories of Cinema exhibition will feature galleries guest-curated by the likes of Lights, Camera, Spike Lee and Pedro Almodóvar. Two extensive off-site archives will Exhibition inform all of this work, and a sense of perpetual inquiry is paramount Los Angeles’s new Academy Museum looks at the past and future of cinema. to the museum’s programming: At its education center, which will offer youth workshops in moviemaking, a tiny desk once used by Shirley Temple for on-set schoolwork greets visitors. “Hopefully, the museum will create a filmmaker for tomorrow,” says Carter.—lilah ramzi L ast year, when costume designer Ruth E. Carter joined a task force for the soon-to-open Academy Museum in Los Angeles, she was given a mission: to help procure several iconic cos- tumes whose whereabouts were unknown. Among them was a pin-striped suit designed by Bob Mackie for Lady Sings the Blues (1972) that had been auctioned off. The B embroidered on the suit’s breast pocket stood for Billie Holiday, but the suit was made for Diana Ross in her Oscar-nominated big-screen debut. That ensemble is just one of 39 that will be on display at the muse- um’s inaugural permanent exhibition, Stories of Cinema, a show that will cover cinematic (and sartorial) terrain ranging from Jeff Bridges’s mud-colored Big Lebowski bathrobe to the twinning evening dresses worn by Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and the bridal ensemble worn by Salma Hayek in Frida. Carter—whose own Oscar-winning work for Black Panther will also be on display—explains the imprecise science through which she and 182 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

WRITTEN BY TOBY MARLOW & LUCY MOSS

Circular Motion Beauty’s next frontier? Maximum payoff with minimal environmental impact. H ow many of us are holding on to pumps and caps—but not droppers. A salesperson rifles through my KENNETH NOLAND. MYSTERIES: ECHO AGAIN, 2001. ACRYLIC ON CANVAS, 48 X 48 IN. a pile of cosmetics empties, sim- past, a triggering experience akin to having your clothes sized up at THE KE NN ETH N OL AN D FOU NDATIO N/ARTISTS R IGHTS SO C IET Y (ARS ), N EW YORK. ply waiting to “do the right thing” a consignment shop. What was ultimately accepted could fit inside a when disposing of them? I’ve heard single sandal’s dust bag. I take what remains downtown to Nordstrom, rumors of beauty editors’ storing suitcases where its partnership with TerraCycle provides brand-agnostic boxes full of moisturizer tubs and lip-gloss tubes that accept products from any retailer, at all of its nationwide loca- in their New York apartments, too informed tions. The experience is decidedly more user-friendly: The bin is full to throw it all away but too busy to figure (a promising sign!), so they offer to take my bag for me—no specific out how to ethically disappear the waste. qualifications, like scrubbing my own garbage, required. Months of living in isolation in my Chicago town house brought me to the brink, with But like “green beauty”—a vague term that’s often diluted (and containers squirreled into every crevice—a debated)—circular beauty is similarly flawed as a concept. The microcosm of a much bigger problem: In real goal, according to Crawford, is to move beyond recycling. “It’s 2018, an estimated 120 billion units of cos- actually about reducing the amount of raw materials that need to metics packaging were produced globally, only a fraction of which be constantly extracted, processed, produced, and transported,” she made it to a recycling facility. After a year of self-soothing via online says. Crawford works directly with brands such as Dermalogica and shopping, one can only imagine 2021’s damage. Burt’s Bees—both of which are available through Loop’s program with Ulta—to promote programs that hygienically clean, refill, and “Think of all of the plastic compacts, jars, caps, and pumps,” says redistribute existing packaging. “Our minimum threshold for a Mia Davis, vice president of impact and sustainability at Credo, the package is 10 cycles, and often a really durable material like glass can standard-setting clean-beauty outfit with 10 nationwide locations, go around up to hundreds of times,” says Crawford, who is hoping pointing out that the majority of beauty products are made of to increase compliance with a similarly seamless fulfillment plan: plastic that isn’t actually recyclable. Most of us, Davis continues, are Loop x Ulta products arrive in a padded tote that can be refilled “wish-cycling”—or “tossing stuff in the curbside bin and hoping with empties and then picked up directly from your home. Color for the best.” But retailers are starting to take responsibility, finding cosmetics are not currently part of the program, which should send ways to divert, say, my empty jar of Glow Recipe face cream away a message to other brands. A world in which my Milk Makeup Kush from landfills and into capable hands. Brow Gel arrives at my door only to be retrieved and refilled when I’m done with it doesn’t sound half bad. —arden fanning andrews “People really are frustrated by the lack of transparency on how to recycle packaging,”says Heather Crawford, vice president of marketing and platform for Loop, an ambitious refilling program that partnered with mega beauty emporium Ulta earlier this year on a nationwide e-commerce site featuring 11 brands. Other retailers are following suit. In June, Credo eliminated single-use products and introduced a program for hard-to-recycle packaging. When I work up the courage to transport my haul there, I learn that a points system for empties means that customers are asked to bring in only a dozen precleaned, smaller-than-a-yogurt-cup-size containers at a time. (Clear glass, they suggest, goes in your curbside bin.) They’ll accept any number of TARGET AUDIENCE Spurred on by sustainability-minded shoppers, beauty retailers are starting to take responsibility for the environmental cost of doing business. 184 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

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THE BIG IDEA HAIR, YAN N TU RCH I. MAKEU P, H IRO MI UE DA. P RO DUC ED BY FARAG O P ROJECTS. DE TAILS, S E E IN THIS ISSUE . Model Amar Akway wears an oversized parka from Xuly.Bët’s fall 2021 collection. Photographed by Oliver Hadlee Pearch. Fashion Editor: Carlos Nazario. The X Factor For decades, Lamine Kouyaté has been a champion of sustainability—and Paris’s stealth superstar. Now fashion is finally catching up with his label, Xuly.Bët. By Laird Borrelli-Persson. LAMINE BADIAN KOUYATÉ IS BETTER KNOWN for his love editors, and customers increasingly on the lookout for both joyous of color—and his use of wax prints and stretch fabrics—than and conscious clothing, it seems that the world is finally paying for his long-standing commitment to what he calls “making great attention to Kouyaté’s work. (Xuly.Bët is available at xulybet.com.) things with less.” For 30 years, though, this pioneer of sustainable fashion has been doing just that under the label Xuly.Bët (a Wolof That’s a welcome development for the 58-year-old designer, who expression meaning “Keep your eyes open”). Now, with buyers, spends seven days a week in his studio in a Brutalist concrete building in Ivry-sur-Seine, on the outskirts of Paris, making dynamic >18 8 186 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M



dresses and bodysuits with stretch tulle or an assemblage of Lycra scraps—all connect- ed with his signature red vein- like overlock stitching. “The body is something we can celebrate, not hide,” Kouyaté said on a recent virtual walk- through of his fall 2021 collec- tion, which is twinkled with metallic Lycra leggings, Afri- can prints made into parkas and jackets, fuchsia suiting, an upcycled-and-retailored trench, and solid knit dresses that go with everything. Making body-con looks for women of all shapes and sizes is nothing new for Kouyaté, who has always had an inclu- sive view of beauty. Around the same time that Azzedine Alaïa was creating second-skin looks using the distinctive Tati check, Kouyaté was shopping the same bargain store for ma- terials to make into one-off wonders that were accessi- ble to all women—including outer-arrondissement Pa- risiennes; immigrants; and in the liminal space between cultures. above: The label made a splash approached tailoring, cutting pattern pieces in in the October 1993 issue of his room and having them constructed at the local B orn in Mali, Kouyaté is one of seven broth- Vogue. above right: Designer immigrant community center. After he spent two ers. “When we were young, we were really Lamine Kouyaté in 2020. years self-learning, Xuly.Bët was launched in 1991 open to the world,” he says. “When I grew with two pop-up happenings: The plan was to up in Bamako, everything came from the outside: images, debut with an all-black collection presented in the Jardin des Tuileries music—we would listen to music from London, from the United outside a Jean Paul Gaultier show, but the bus carrying the models States, from everywhere.” So many of the garments available at the was stuck in traffic and arrived hours late. Kouyaté had better luck local flea market were American that it was nicknamed “Broadway.” the next season, presenting his white collection outside in the Tuileries Wearing hand-me-downs and customizing secondhand garments before the Chanel show, with models carrying boom boxes. was a way of life that Kouyaté brought with him from Africa to It was a sensation that generated a lot of press and a flurry of France, where he studied architecture and came to admire Frank orders. Some journalists associated Kouyaté’s work with Belgian Lloyd Wright, whose work, he found, “was about how we can do deconstructivism; others saw in his tops made of nylon stockings things with less and have a respect for the environment.” the nouveau pauvre look of grunge—yet Kouyaté’s work was, and Despite Kouyaté’s love for metallics—the shiny pieces in his fall is, both disruptive and utterly unique: While remaining rooted in collection were inspired by the foil that wrapped his mother’s favorite African cultural traditions around dress, it dialogues with Western Quality Street chocolates—his work is grounded in bohemian ideal- or Parisian ones. A wax print, for example, might be tailored into a 1993: ROXAN NE LOWIT. 2020: ALF RE DO PIOL A. ism. “The faith that feeds us is like love; that’s for sure,” the designer woman’s pantsuit—like the one that Viola Davis wore for a recent says. Let’s not forget the funk, though: “Funkin’Fashion” is, says late-night television appearance. Kouyaté, the spirit of the collections, and the phrase reflects his love As Kouyaté has always played by his own rules, his work hasn’t of music—particularly the deep grooves of Jimi Hendrix, which, the always intersected with the fashion system, though the designer feels designer suggests, helped him to create his own universe, one in which a special affinity with Yves Saint Laurent, who, he says, “was one of African and European traditions meet and mingle. (When he’s not the first to really bring out modern women, especially Black wom- designing or listening to Hendrix, Kouyaté will likely be playing guitar en like Katoucha and Iman; it brought something forward about himself—or cooking mafé and poulet yassa for his friends and family.) women’s emancipation.” By creating clothes that mold to the forms Kouyaté came to fashion in a roundabout way: Asked to design of real women of all ethnicities and sizes, Kouyaté frames concepts a secondhand shop for a friend, he suggested she fill it with compli- like freedom—and beauty and movement and fashion—in ways that mentary fashions of his own design. Utterly untrained in the craft, expand our understanding of what all of that can be. @ 188 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M



Family Stone After a decade of cooking for the art world, chef Mina Stone turns to her own lineage for inspiration. I n the early aughts, then–fashion designer In November 2019, Stone opened STATION AGENT STONE: ZACK DEZON/THE NEW YORK TIMES /REDUX PICTURES. BOTTLE: COURTESY OF FENTY. FLOWER: S LOBO/GETTY IMAGES. Mina Stone struck up a side gig as a chef her first restaurant, Mina’s, within Mina Stone in the kitchen at her restaurant to support her eponymous clothing line. MoMA PS1 in Long Island City, A few events later, she found herself with Queens. Stone, who is half Greek at New York’s MoMA PS1. an invitation to cook a 40-person dinner at and grew up spending summers at Gavin Brown’s downtown Manhattan gal- her grandmother’s home off the Artists”—further helped Stone unpack lery. “I had no idea about the art world,” coast of Athens, wanted her café why we rely upon the comfort of cooking. Stone says—nor had she ever made dinner to look and feel like an all-day ta- “I had kind of lost it in the hustle and bustle for so many people. “I looked up recipes verna. But after just four months, of opening a restaurant,”she says. Now, with online and multiplied them by 10.” The par- the pandemic shuttered the joint. Mina’s and MoMA PS1 reopened, Stone ty served as a seductive introduction to a Like so many of us, in quarantine has happily returned to cooking thoughtful new scene: “I remember Blondie was there, Stone looked to family and friends, and the dinner parties in the museum’s courtyard. and I was like, Where. Am. I?” She started recipes and reflections she collected became “What Mina does is bring people back to preparing all of Brown’s gallery dinners, and her new cookbook, Lemon, Love & Olive Oil their humanity,” Fowle says. “You just feel her elegant, unfussy approach caught the (Harper Wave), due out this month. Stone taken care of.”—jessie heyman attention of the Swiss artist Urs Fischer, who describes the book as a “journal,” but it feels invited Stone to cook daily staff lunches at more like a family scrapbook, weaving to- his Red Hook, Brooklyn, studio. “We were gether memories of her yiayia (“My yiayia happy guinea pigs,” Fischer says. Stone’s made the best food, every summer, out of meals became an attraction in themselves. a toaster oven,” she writes) with summers “If you could get the lunchtime slot for a spent at a chickpea festival on the Greek studio visit, you were in luck,” says MoMA island of Paros. “For me, food helps pro- PS1 director Kate Fowle. In 2015, Stone cess pain and nostalgia and all the things partnered with Fischer to publish her first you miss,” Stone says. A pandemic inter- cookbook, Cooking for Artists. view series for MoMA—“Cooking With Bottle Drop Rihanna gets Fenty into the world of fine fragrance. ” the hitmaker jokes of what turned into an Jacques Cavallier-Belletrud says of the perspective-shifting time he spent with the and Paris into a sensual blend of magnolia, musk, tangerine, blueberry, Bulgarian singer herself, a true testament to the transportive power of perfume.—akili king AHEAD OF THE CURVES The magnolia-spiked eau’s custom amber glass flacon nods to its gender-neutral appeal. 190 SEPTEMBER 2021 VOGUE.COM

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Fair Game Fashion Fair Cosmetics was once the most influential Black beauty brand in America. Now, with new owners and new formulas, it’s back to reclaim the market it helped define. By Marley Marius. I n 1966, before she moved to Paris and became a muse to Karl packing list—two pairs of slacks; one pair of low-heeled shoes; two Lagerfeld and Anthony Lopez, the model Pat Cleveland received cardigan sweaters; one dark skirt; two blouses; fold-up slippers for a letter at her family’s Harlem apartment from Eunice W. Johnson. the bus—and the warning that any model who missed a bus departure The cofounder of the Chicago-based Johnson Publishing or skipped a curtain call would be responsible for a hefty $25 fine. Company—which produced the influential magazines Ebony and Jet—was officially inviting a then 16-year-old Cleveland to join the “The Fashion Fair was the most beautiful, glossy, glamorous thing “traveling troupe” participating in that year’s Fashion Fair. A kind you could have done in 1966, traveling around America and putting of mobile runway show, Ebony’s annual trademark event brought on these shows,” says Cleveland. Of course, there was an element of highlights from the Paris collections to cities and towns across Amer- danger to the journey too, especially as it reached the Deep South. ica via Greyhound bus. With as many as 187 shows during a 12-week But Cleveland is still quick to credit the Fair with jump-starting her run twice a year, Johnson engaged the fashion-mad yet largely over- fashion career—and her acuity with makeup. “We would take >194 looked Black middle class, giving them access to Yves Saint Laurent and Valentino Couture that was impossible otherwise—and she ran WATCH THE THRONE a tight ship. Included in Cleveland’s invitation was a spartan suggested Actress KiKi Layne has signed on as the face of the brand’s revamped look. Photographed by Tyler Mitchell for Vogue, January 2019. 192 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M

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taupe eye shadow and different colors of brown and mix it with a shortly thereafter. By the end of 2019, after acquiring Black Opal, COURTESY OF PAT CLEVELAND. regular liquid eye foundation to make the colors to go on our faces, a mass-market skin-care-and-makeup line for women of color with because they didn’t exist,” recalls the now 71-year-old, who, as part her friend and fellow Johnson Publishing alum Cheryl Mayberry of the tour, was responsible for her own “cosmetic supplies.” McKissack, Rogers and Mayberry McKissack raised the funds with the help of a minority investor to buy Fashion Fair too, laying the By the early 1970s, the Ebony Fashion Fair had become an insti- groundwork for a Black-owned beauty empire with big plans. This tution. But the women who walked in it—confronted by an industry month, the pair is relaunching the brand with updated white-and- that dealt in foundation shades of porcelain on the lightest end of gold packaging that will arrive on counters at Sephoras nationwide, the spectrum and olive on the darkest—were still mostly improvising when it came to their makeup. So in with If Beale Street Could Talk star 1973, Johnson Publishing launched KiKi Layne as ambassador. Fashion Fair Cosmetics, successfully developing a makeup line exclusively “To be part of the beauty brand for Black and brown women with that first made space for us and chocolatey bases and golden under- catered to us and made us feel that tones, all wrapped up in pretty pink we were special, that’s what I’m all boxes. Carried exclusively by major about,”says Layne, who will next ap- department stores, it quickly became pear in Don’t Worry Darling, Olivia a standard-bearer for luxury Black Wilde’s highly anticipated sopho- beauty, its advertisements fronted by more directorial effort. Fine will also the likes of Cleveland, Diahann Car- return, this time in an official brand roll, Aretha Franklin, and Natalie capacity, which he will juggle with his Cole (and printed in the pages of other role as Vice President Kamala both Ebony and Jet). Harris’s go-to makeup artist. And Cleveland will be back too, as part “I’m from Chicago, so I’ve always of a forthcoming digital campaign. known about Oprah, Michael Jordan, “There are very few brands that are and the Johnsons,” says Sam Fine, a known enough to be launched again; makeup artist who has counted Be- that are loved enough to even be giv- yoncé and Iman among his clients. en the chance to be rediscovered,” Seeing the Fashion Fair display at Fine says, noting that the products’ Neiman Marcus was “mind-blowing” second act will appeal to die-hard when he was growing up, Fine admits: fans and newcomers alike. “It’s like “To see a Black brand and Black the Tina Turner story; you know women represented behind the cos- what I’m saying?” metics counter was just a way for me to even begin to dream.” More than T he approximately 70-piece 1,500 stores carried Fashion Fair by collection reworks Fashion the late 1980s, later growing to some Fair’s classics, such as its 2,500 across the globe; the brand cream-to-powder makeup raked in close to $60 million in sales and foundation sticks, for an era in 2003 alone. But as power players when shoppers are eager for trans- like Estée Lauder and L’Oréal began parency, particularly when it comes producing inclusive makeup lines of to what they’re putting on their skin. their own, and Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty made expansive shade ranges “We’re making sure that the ingredients are cleaner than ever,” the rule rather than the exception, Johnson Publishing—facing a insists Mayberry McKissack. Fourteen lipsticks, including iconic similarly evolving media landscape—could hardly afford to keep shades such as Sepia, Chocolate Raspberry, Ole’ Orange, and Pure Fashion Fair in stock, much less make it competitive. Plum, are now formulated with hydrating sunflower-seed oil and rosemary-leaf extracts; both the loose and pressed powders include Fine was brought on in 2013 to design a capsule collection for nutrient-rich rice-germ extract to protect against environmental the struggling company, but it wasn’t enough to right the ship. By aggressors, including air pollution and blue light; and a new primer 2015 disgruntled loyalists had taken to Twitter to lament the brand’s uses peptides to help reduce hyperpigmentation, a common issue for absence from shelves; then the hoarding began, straining an already people with dark complexions. compromised supply chain. “I don’t think that people fell out of love In a saturated marketplace, Rogers and Mayberry McKissack— with Fashion Fair, but they couldn’t find it,” says Desirée Rogers, who both grew up watching their mothers use Fashion Fair—are the CEO of Johnson Publishing from 2010 to 2017. “You have to firm believers that a brand’s narrative still means something. They’re have the product available for people to purchase, and if you don’t betting that people, fed up with insta-brands, want the real thing: a have the capital, it’s hard to keep up.” But Rogers never gave up on brand with nearly 50 years of history and a track record of serving the brand, even after Johnson Publishing sold Ebony and Jet to a the community before inclusivity was just good business. They may private equity firm in 2016, with Fashion Fair filing for bankruptcy be onto something. “I feel like Fashion Fair is putting her crown back on,” says Rogers. “The queen may have taken a little break, but PAST PERFECT she’s putting on her gown and her high heels, and sitting back in that The new collection reworks Fashion Fair’s classics, which were once fronted by throne. So watch us reign.” @ the model Pat Cleveland, who will return in a forthcoming digital campaign. 194 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 2 1 V O G U E . C O M