I’m really looking forward to this year’s MET Gala. Red Carpets are the one time I think it’s fun to judge other people’s clothes - or in this case, their costumes.
Who’s the best? Who’s the worst? Who’s the most out-there? And given the theme of this particular event it’ll also be interesting to see who turns out to be the most racially inappropriate, of course.
No matter what colour it turns out to be, it’s not called a ‘red carpet’ for nothing.
During the lead-up to the show there’s been a ton of talk about black style icons and fav black dandies. Of my fav contemporary black style icons is Tyler, the Creator who hasn’t been mentioned often enough during this run-up in my opinion.
Of my fav’s from the past I’d have to include Gordon Parks, who’s hardly been mentioned at all - despite having worked for one of the events main stakeholders.
To say Gordon Parks had an illustrious career would be an understatement.
Through the 50s and 60s, as a Vogue and also a LIFE magazine photographer, Parks covered and supported the Civil Rights movement - creating classic portraits of everyone from Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King.
Gordon Parks also captured the black style of everyday people in a way that still resonates today.
But Parks actually defined black style in the 70s with his groundbreaking film Shaft.
Along with the great Melvin Van Peebles film ‘Sweet Sweetback’s Badass Song’, ‘Shaft’ starring the former Ebony Magazine model Richard Roundtree became the catalyst and provided much of the template for not only the blacksploitation genre of film but also the decade-defining detective-car chase movies (along side Steve McQueen's 'Bullitt') that rescued Hollywood from virtual bankruptcy too.
He also wrote music which is possibly one reason the Shaft soundtrack, featuring another style icon Isaac Hayes - become a genre defining classic, and is also one reason movie soundtracks are regarded as an important marketing and revenue asset to any film release today.
With ‘Shaft’ not only did he write and direct the film he also based the image for character Shaft around his own wardrobe, using his personal tailor to create the look.
The black leather trench coat and black roll neck sweater? That was all Gordon Parks.
Throughout the decades and his various careers, Gordon Parks was also one of the most stylish and elegantly dressed men around, despite being the one behind the camera rather than in front of it.
He mixed Italian, English and American style principles with his own creating something familiar but unfamiliar, refined but also easy, relaxed but also with a kind of inherent toughness that seemed to whisper ‘don’t take me for granted’.
While so many people seemed to suffer a severe attack of cognitive dissonance when Pharrell’s LV Cowboy inspired collection strutted down the catwalk, I immediately thought of Gordon Parks and how he owned that look in a way that few would dare to question.
Whether it was a zoot suit style in the 50s or the Ivy inspired style of his later life, Parks never seemed to turn a collar down or put a foot wrong and so I believe he deserves major attention during the current Black Dandy celebrations.
