The groundbreaking new fashion project strutting into the V&A next week
Gender diversity has always been a staple within the fashion industry, with androgynous models being featured heavily since the mid-sixties. The clothes we wear are an integral part of how we express our identity, especially when it comes to our gender identity. When we get out of bed in the morning and pick out the day’s outfit, jeans or pleated skirt, military boots or patent leather pumps, we’re constructing an identity as a short-hand for expressing who we are to the people we encounter.
Aesthetics are also integral to queer identity. From the punk movement, to the super-machismo leather chap fetish aesthetic of the early eighties, to our current moment of street-style meets colour and kitsch. These styles are all too often appropriated by major fashion houses. When it comes to queer culture there is still a case to be made for their sacrosancticity. It’s about time queer designers and models were thrust in front of their own cultural productions, and fashion is the perfect vehicle through which to do so.
The London Queer Fashion Show will provide a runway on which 11 LGBT+ designers will show their creations. Walking will be a cast of 100 models from across the queer spectrum, celebrating the diversity and multiplicity of the queer community. One year after its launch, it’s time for the terrible twos, serving drama and empowering members of the community through artistic creation and expression. Designers both established and emerging will be showing their latest collections at the Victoria and Albert Museum of Childhood on 21st September, with hundreds of attendees from within the community.
Modelling the collections will be icons of the London queer scene, from performers like Rain Dove and Marnie Scarlet to activists like organiser of UK Black Pride Lady Phyll and trans activist Kenny Jones, empowering all gender identities, sexualities, races and bodies to walk the catwalk. London Queer Fashion Show CEO Robyn Exton spoke out on the importance of the event, stating how “the hunger for representation that the queer community now demands is finally being met”. He’s proud to share that “If main stream labels aren’t able to reflect our identities, then we will do it ourselves.”.
Designers Showing:
Bull and Dagger, Plus Equals, Poca London, Vytoldas Miliauskas, Yodah Williams, Cause Perdue, Cochevelou, Danielle Clarke, Rickielee Drayford, Livia Rita and Not Applicable.
The event is at The Victoria & Albert Museum of Childhood, at 7pm, September 21. Head over to londonqueerfashionshow.com for tickets.
