North Star

06/11/2026

Center stage to backstage

05/26/2026

When I sent Arti Sandhu a North Star shirt I designed, I imagined it would be styled, photographed, and shared as a reflection of our shared interest in fashion as a form of storytelling. What I didn’t anticipate, but deeply value, was the conversation that followed.

The shirt features an American flag on the back, a symbol I’ve been working to reclaim through my practice. For me, the flag is not only a contested emblem, but also a site for questioning, reimagining, and resistance. Arti received the shirt, found that it fit beautifully, but ultimately felt she could not wear it. Her hesitation didn’t stem from a lack of interest, but from a complex relationship to the flag as someone who is now a citizen of the United States, but still negotiating what attachment to the American project means.

Rather than resolving that discomfort, Arti chose to sit with it and to write about it. What follows is a deeply considered reflection on fashion, symbolism, identity, and the political stakes of what we choose to wear (or not wear). I’m grateful to Arti for transforming this moment of tension into a space for dialogue.

THE SHIRT I COULDN’T WEAR / ARTI SANDHU I could not wear the shirt, but I wanted to document it while it was in my possession. What we wear and what we refuse to wear can carry ethical, political, and personal meaning. It is easy to assume that fashion influencers will wear whatever is sent to the...

05/21/2026

Tailoring taken apart and stitched back together into something entirely new. Three blazers, one silhouette.

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...