African Diaspora has been a crucial aspect of virtually every avenue of modern fashion, appearing in stores, online, and on runways, integrating the traditional look of African attire with today’s fashion for people of all creeds, races, and colors. One factor that has led to this insurgency and the embracing of traditional elements throughout modern fashion likely comes from many millennials who proudly have African heritage, wanting to showcase their African ancestry through artistic expression in fashion and beyond.
Africa’s Fashion Diaspora
This year, at the Museum at FIT, the interweaving of African American culture into modern fashion was put on display via Africa’s Fashion Diaspora exhibition. This innovative exhibition explored fashion’s role in shaping Black Diasporic cultures across the globe. It consisted of sixty ensembles and accessories, all from Black designers from all over the world, showcasing how African inspirations have been incorporated into fashion and overall black culture. The Black Diaspora connection has long been considered in art, literature, music, philosophy, and more. However, this unique exhibition is one of the first— if not the first— to look deeper into how 20th and 21st-century fashion designers embraced visual storytelling through fashion, interweaving it into today’s modern offerings.
Makes a Statement
Modern African American-based fashion often does more than share a cultural history or explore colors or unique patterns that carry meaning. Today’s fashion is more about making a statement, which has led to a significant correlation between fashion trends, Black Lives Matter and other social justice movements. It is, in essence, a case of life imitating art, imitating life. It’s circular in that many mimic the Black community, their fashion, their color choices and their culture, which in turn makes it more popular among the general population, even among those who don’t have that heritage.
Entertainers often embrace these meaningful fashion trends. For example, although it’s been a few years, the video Lemonade made by Beyoncé features several examples of African American fashion. Artists like her and others who embrace trends like Afros, goddess braids, and New Orleans Creole style only further promote the popularity of African American fashion. Sadly, many people miss the beauty and innovation of Black style overall, despite being surrounded by it in culture and fashion.
Examples of African American Inspired Fashion
While there are countless examples of African Diaspora throughout modern fashion, there are a few that have worked their way into the mainstream aspects of fashion. These can be found on models walking runways, in magazines, and throughout storefronts nationwide. Monogram prints exemplify an African-inspired trend that is found in modern fashion pieces. Monogram prints include personalized designs that uniquely combine symbols or letters in patterns. From high-end runway brands to the more basic store brands, there are offerings featuring monogram prints in some form throughout virtually all fashion. This trend was first popularized by Dapper Dan off the streets of New York, who put a twist on the way luxury brands like Louis Vuitton and Gucci typically highlight their brands.
African American Designers
Many of the storied and beloved Black designers of the 1920s and 1960s, despite not receiving the acclaim due them, are now appreciated and recognized for their culturally significant work. Zoot suits and flapper dressers, for example, in the 1920s were largely based on African American designs. According to Holly Alford of the VCU School of Arts, the zoot suit was a prime example of “how the Black community also utilizes clothing as a way of making statements and a way to be seen.”
As is true today with the statement-making aspect of fashion, designers in the past also embraced these movements and incorporated fashion among them, such as afros, dashikis, and all-black leather outfits of the Black Panther movement in the 1960s. The fashion associated with this movement was so embraced by the culture during that time that the actor who played Mike Brady even had an afro. All in all, fashion, especially when inspired by African American heritage, is about being seen. It’s about making a statement. It’s about standing out. It’s about sending a message without saying a word.
Sources
Information on Black fashion and the African Diaspora: https://www.bowiestate.edu/academics/colleges/college-of-arts-and-sciences/departments/communications/student-organizations-and-publications/the-spectrum/2023/four-fashion-trends-rooted-in-black-culture.php
Fashion exhibit mentioned and linked: https://www.fitnyc.edu/museum/exhibitions/africas-fashion-diaspora/index.php
Information on the trends of African American Fashion: https://www.bowiestate.edu/academics/colleges/college-of-arts-and-sciences/departments/communications/student-organizations-and-publications/the-spectrum/2023/four-fashion-trends-rooted-in-black-culture.php
Information on Black Fashion History: https://news.vcu.edu/article/2023/02/how-black-designers-models-and-musicians-have-influenced-fashion
Featured image courtesy of StockSnap on Pixabay.