North Star

05/08/2026

The tailoring of Brooks Brothers shirting is loosened and rearranged here into a gown. What was once created to structure the torso is remade for ease, movement, and creative self-expression.

04/20/2026

I keep returning to this painting by Eastman Johnson. A family in motion, suspended between danger and possibility. I asked my research assistant Christian Gines to reflect on it. In this essay, he explores blackness, fugitivity, and what it means to “steal oneself away.”

A RIDE FOR LIBERTY: FUGITIVITY AND THE BLACK IMAGINATION / CHRISTIAN GINES Painted by Eastman Johnson around 1862 and later titled A Ride for Liberty -- The Fugitive Slaves, the image captures a moment of self-emancipation during the Civil War. “Steal away, steal away, steal away to Jesus! Steal a...

03/30/2026

I’m interested in what happens when patriotic imagery is reworked and styled on black bodies. This babydoll dress is constructed from a pastiche of patriotic T-shirts, bringing those fragments together into a new form and a new statement.

03/27/2026

Carrie Mae Weems invites us to reconsider what the North Star has meant and what it continues to make possible.

ITERATIVE FREEDOM / CHRISTIAN GINES As a beacon for enslaved people making their way to freedom by the night sky and a symbol that later anchored Frederick Douglass’s The North Star, Polaris embodies a lineage of black liberation and meaning-making. Carrie Mae Weems draws on this legacy in her pho...

03/10/2026

.toussaint.marcel is wearing a shirt-dress made from five Brooks Brothers shirts sewn together. The top is a single shirt with the torso of another attached below to extend the length. The flounce panel is constructed from three additional shirts, creating a soft mermaid flare at the hem. The garment blends elements of a classic button-down shirt with the length and structure of a formal gown.

03/06/2026

A new section has been added to the North Star website called "Footnotes," which features original content inspired by the histories and behind-the-scenes details that inform the project. The first post, written by my former student Isael, explores the history of the brand's name North Star, tracing how the star came to symbolize navigation, possibility, and collective imagination.

COMPASS TO THE COSMOS / ISAEL ANDRADE Across cultures and millennia, people have looked to the night sky for direction. Among the stars, one has remained constant. In Hindi, it is called Druva, “the Fixed One.” In Lakota, it is called Wičháȟpi Owáŋžila, the “Star That Sits Still.” In P...

02/25/2026

The stage is set. Let the show begin.

09/05/2025

Upcycling a Navy uniform is a way of stripping the garment of its original power and changing its meaning. Once a symbol of militarism, it now becomes subversively femme, unsettling what uniforms are meant to signify and who they are meant to serve.

08/29/2025

looks experly styled this North Star piece, an upcycled from a Navy uniform. I added gingham pockets, a subtle homage and reworking of the American flag’s stripes, and a reflective strip down the back, a visual nod to the visibility and invisibility of working people of color. I also love how she paired it with a madras top and shibori skirt, bringing together her love of time-honored global textile traditions with my experimental DIY fashion project, which is meant to spark conversations about American identity.

07/28/2025

Summer’s uniform momentarily retired for a dip in the sea 🌊

07/25/2025

Even clothes take on the rhythm of the tide 🌊 Worn, rested, and returned 🩳