You could say that Jari Jones has modeling in her DNA. Her grandfather, Billy Jones, was one of the first successful black supermodels in the 70s and 80s; by the time Jones was born, he had become a renowned fashion photographer. Jones, a black transgender femme, grew up in the studio and became comfortable in front of the camera, a skill that would come in handy when she modeled for Universal Standard’s Foundation campaign last October, which showcased their line of fashion basics in sizes 00 through 40 and saw her image erected in advertisements around New York City.
This February, just three months after Jones penned a viral letter addressing Victoria Secret’s transphobia for Essence, she would make history as the first plus-size transgender model to walk in New York Fashion Week, appearing in Gypsy Sport’s Fall 2019 show.
“I think I came into the industry [at a time when] stepping forward with your most authentic self was allowed and celebrated,” Jones tells them. “Huge figures in the trans modeling community, like Tracey Afrika, Ines Rau, Isis King and Geena Rocero, were all people I looked up to. They were successful and strong enough to come out and not only model but make huge pathways for girls like us to break down more specific barriers.”
LGBTQ+ models like Jones are continuing to break those barriers, but to say that high fashion is behind when it comes to including queer women is an understatement. Every season, theFashionSpot compiles a runway report that surveys the state of size, age, race, and gender diversity in the industry. Runway shows saw a step backward in Fall 2019 when it comes to representation for transgender and non-binary models, who accounted for only .77 percent of those who walked the season’s runways. The highest was a mere 1.23 percent, in Spring 2019. There are no quantafiable numbers on how many queer-identified models walk the runways, but queer women who work in the industry say isn't a lot of representation in general.
“I think it's the same reason why there are so few women of color and plus-size women visible in high fashion. Unless you fit into the kind of straight/white/thin paradigm that the fashion industry worships, you're really left out of the conversation,” says Gabrielle Korn, former editor-in-chief of Nylon. As a lesbian working in fashion editorial, Korn says she sees herself as a "feminist infiltrator," challenging heteronormative beauty standards that keep queer women from being visible and successful in high fashion. Korn says she has worked with a slew of queer photographers over her career, but even with trusted collaborators, operating within a flawed system can be a mixed bag.
“It can be isolating,” Korn tells them. “There aren't a lot of us. And fashion's definition of queerness is very limited. There are many times when fashion uses female queerness as a gimmick or a trend, which feels offensive. But working in this industry has been rewarding, too, because there's so much work to be done, and when you actually do it — when you improve representation and inclusivity in a way that is authentic and long-lasting — people pay attention.”
Among the openly queer women that have made fashion pay attention is Jenna Lyons. Her work over her 26-year tenure at J.Crew created an iconic aesthetic. The year after she became the brand’s president in 2011, she famously came out by thanking her girlfriend in an acceptance speech at Glamour’s Women of the Year awards. In 2013, the New York Times dubbed her “The Woman Who Dresses America.”
After founding her business in 1968, at the age of 24, German-born Jil Sander went on to create minimalist high fashion as part of her namesake brand for nearly four decades, garnering fans for her chic, often-androgynous designs (Rachel Maddow and Ellen DeGeneres among them). British Vogue hailed her as “Fashion’s First Feminist” for the way that she empowered women through her work. Though Sander hasn’t spoken much about her sexuality in public, she was one of the few lesbian designers featured in the 2013 exhibit “A Queer History of Fashion: From The Closet To The Catwalk” at the Fashion Institute of Technology.
Barbara Sanchez-Kane, a lesbian-identified menswear designer from Mexico, was named one of Vogue Italia’s top emerging designers to watch in 2015. She went on to show her first collection at Los Angeles fashion week and was named a finalist for a fashion incubator program in Milan. Sanchez-Kane's gender-bending work is inspired by her heritage and her desire to challenge heteronormativity, machismo, sexual oppression, and gender violence through design. Her 2018 NYFW men’s show, "Artesanal Sex Shop," featured primarily models of color.
While gay men account for many of high fashion’s household names, queer women like Lyons and Sander are still a rarity in the industry. Neither Lyons or Sander are currently designing, but there’s at least one queer woman at the center of fashion’s conversation about inclusivity: Becca McCharen-Tran. As the groundbreaking designer behind the architecture-inspired swimwear line Chromat, she's made a notable mark on the industry since her brand’s 2013 NYFW debut. Over the years, she has incorporated steel cages, wearable semiconductor light technology, pool floaties, and live plants into garments sent down her runways.
But it isn’t just McCharen-Tran’s designs that have made her a standout at NYFW; it’s the models she casts in her shows. She says she looks for people that embody confidence, strength and power. She’s found these characteristics in amputee Mama Cax, 56-year-old plus-size pioneer Emme, and breast cancer survivor and queer femme Ericka Hart.
As noted by theFashionSpot, Chromat consistently casts a majority of models who identify as people of color. Transgender women like Leyna Bloom and Carmen Carrera are Chromat runway regulars. And plus-size model Denise Bidot’s opening runway look in the AW2015 show has been displayed in museums around the world. Inclusion is built into the fabric of Chromat’s brand.
“Our sole mission is to create empowering garments for all bodies,” McCharen-Tran tells them. “The most important message I hope to share with the world is one of acceptance and the celebration of individuality. It sounds so simple, but it’s a daily act of defiance to be yourself when so much of what we see on our screens and in our world is about conforming to unachievable beauty standards."
Much like McCharen-Tran, Anita Dolce Vita has been queering NYFW for the past six years through her queer fashion-focused website dapperQ. Since 2013, the site has thrown parties and fashion shows during NYFW, with Dolce Vita recruiting independent queer designers to show their work on her runway. In 2014, on the five-year anniversary of the site’s birth, Dolce Vita had a line around the block for a sold out five-designer runway show at the two-story bar Avenue in Chelsea. The next year, she applied to host a show at the Brooklyn Museum; nearly 2000 people showed up. Brands such as Lena Waithe fave Stuzo Clothing, a QWOC-owned line that recently opened their first brick-and-mortar in Los Angeles, and bespoke suit company Sharpe Suiting are just a few of the queer-owned businesses that have graced the dapperQ runway.
“The show just kept getting bigger and more beautiful, and for me, I wanted to be more inclusive of femme identities, and so the audience started to evolve, and the designers started to evolve, and now we're at the point where we don't even have to apply to be a part of the show,” Dolce Vita says. “The museum has included it in their annual budget for programming every year now.”
Now approaching its sixth show held in conjunction with NYFW, the dapperQ runway has become known for showcasing the intersection of fashion, diversity, and activism. On September 5, more than 70 LGBTQ+ models strut the runway in looks created by 10 different gender-inclusive brands, including self-proclaimed “Caftan Queen” Travis Oestreich and LANDEROS NEW YORK, as worn by the iconic Billy Porter.
One of the most consistent brands on the dapperQ runway is gender-inclusive underwear line TomboyX. Without any prior fashion experience, the brand’s founders, Fran Dunaway and Naomi Gonzalez, created a $25 million company. According to an interview with Money, the married couple tripled their revenue in six months when they introduced boxer briefs for women.
“Neutrality in terms of color is often by default white; neutrality in terms of gender presentation is oftentimes masculine,” says Dolce Vita. “They’re changing that.”
Brands like TomboyX and Chromat are evidence that LGBTQ+ inclusion is good for business. Why isn’t the industry at large following suit?
“Well, I think fashion is political, right? It's a culture,” says Dolce Vita. “It's a language, a cultural construct. What one culture thinks is acceptable is different from another. Particularly in Western culture, anything that’s deemed more feminine is seen as inferior. I think that mainstream fashion has also been a kind of feedback loop, where mainstream fashion kind of goes, 'This is what ideal beauty is.'”
McCharen-Tran recognizes that her position as a queer woman at the helm of a high fashion brand is a rarity. She notes that the industry has been slow to include LGBTQ+ folks because most brands “are controlled, owned, and designed by cis men.”
“I'd love to see more QTPOC designers being celebrated for their designs and less for their identity,” says McCharen-Tran. “It’s encouraging to see the industry become more inclusive of and celebrate models of all different shapes, sizes, identities, and backgrounds. However, we won’t achieve true inclusivity until the decision makers behind the scenes — designers, photographers, financiers, editors, creative directors — are just as diverse and come from a range of backgrounds and experiences.”
“Queer women haven’t been brought to the table in fashion, I think, because they’re often at the helm of dismantling all of the bigotry and the fatphobia and the femmephobia [in the industry], the binaries and all of that," says Dole Vita. "And ultimately, men want to remain at the table to control women’s bodies."
Jones echoes this sentiment.
“I would suggest [that brands] get to know more LGBTQ+ folks, more fat folks, more disabled folks, people that you could not only put in your campaigns or on your runways but in your creative rooms as well," she says. "In high positions in your brand, too, to give insight on marginalized communities that you will be selling to.”
“I'd really like to see the current version of queer acceptability expanded,” says Korn. “Putting a tall, thin, white woman with short hair in a suit isn't queer visibility. Brands need to listen to us rather than checking a box off and saying it's diversity.”
Queer and transgender women and non-binary femmes working in fashion are still forced to bring their own seats to the table. For them, “diversity” and “inclusion” are not buzzwords that garner media attention, but genuine reflections of the identities they embody — one that’s still considered radical in the fashion industry.
“I’m looking forward to the day when inclusion in fashion isn’t press-worthy or notable," McCharen-Tran says. "It’s just the norm.”
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