02/26/2026
To The Women Before Us.
A while ago, I started reading about African and African American dress practices in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. And in times without number, I’ve seen evidence of black women as seamstresses, textile artisans, embroiderers, and even in remarkable ways, as fashion icons and innovators. Thankfully, scholars have documented these experiences, allowing us to better understand and appreciate their lives, expertise, and overall contribution to fashion, dress, and material history. In Black History Month, I choose to see the beauty, light, and contributions of these workers who, willingly and unwillingly, shaped black fashion thoughts and practices. African and African diasporic histories are intricately woven together by long transnational relations, and through garments women have told their stories of common grid and resistance better than traditional archives. As we boast of a common ground with deep respect for our cultural heritage, we owe it all to the women before us; the matriarchs who picked the cotton, spun and dyed the yarns, threaded the looms, wove the fabric, and sewed the garments. In most cases both women in Africa and the diaspora worked under unpleasant conditions and they have proven to be our precious gifts.
As a researcher and designer, agency comes to me in several ways. And it is through the passion and sense of duty that I have enacted a snippet of these stories with a smock fabric, distressed knitted fabric and embroidery. This creative project is an ode to the gift that gave and keeps giving, the gift that recorded our history in material form, and the gift that takes our history to the masses in unconventional ways. Thank you for keeping our dress practices safe, passing them on to our reach, and shaping our history in the process! To weavers, designers, and other garment workers who continue to provide us with contemporary contexts to hone our historical discussions, thank you for provoking our thoughts. Happy Black History!
Photography
Belle
Dress
