Arts & Entertainment
D.C. Fashion Week disappoints
2011 men’s collections mostly inaccessible
The presentation of the men’s collections at last weekend’s D.C. Fashion Week suffered from a late start and insufficient direction.
It was disappointing to observe the lack of direction, which ran far too long for a men’s fashion show. Yet, despite the show starting late (name a fashion show that has started on time except for Tom Ford’s), and an awkward introduction of vendors who set up tables near the entrance, all was not lost.
Two designers — Top Rank and Ray Vincente — celebrated masculine allure with confident doses of color and texture at the show, which was held at the Washington Post Conference Center in downtown D.C.
Top Rank focused on an elite military look that conveyed the idea of uniform as an important aspect to menswear and coincides with the theme that designers in Milan presented a few weeks ago for Fall/Winter 2011. The highlight pieces were the four pocket coats and ankle-sweeping greatcoats: clean-lined, autumnal colors such as classic camel and earthy olives with military-styled gold buttons to mimic a minimal silhouette.
But in a season otherwise noted for tailoring, you didn’t find it here. The designers could have expanded their collections to include aviator jackets and parkas and should have added more hardware trim on the coats to finish on a solid note.
A more urban look came into play with box-plaids, autumnal browns with shades of pine green and cool grey in Ray Vincente’s collections that incorporated velvet, wool and cotton jersey long sleeves into this classic casual sportswear look. A low draped cowl hood added a decorative and functional signature, and on one garment a funnel neck enhanced the urban, contemporary approach that the designer was attempting to craft.
These two designers had in mind a young, but very real and insightful man and thoughtfully translated color and fabric choices into silhouettes that were not ridiculously un-wearable. Mesmerizing it wasn’t but at least it was accessible compared to the other five designers that night.
The rest of the show was a more of a plea to other emerging designers in the city (or anywhere for that matter) to provide a sartorial direction that Washington desperately lacks.
Whitman-Walker Health held the 38th annual Walk and 5K to End HIV at Anacostia Park on Saturday, Dec. 7. Hundreds participated in the charity fundraiser, despite temperatures below freezing. According to organizers, nearly $450,000 was raised for HIV/AIDS treatment and research.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
The Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington performed “The Holiday Show” at Lincoln Theatre on Saturday. Future performances of the show are scheduled for Dec. 14-15. For tickets and showtimes, visit gmcw.org.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
Books
Mother wages fight for trans daughter in new book
‘Beautiful Woman’ seethes with resentment, rattles bars of injustice
‘One Day I’ll Grow Up and Be a Beautiful Woman’
By Abi Maxwell
c.2024, Knopf
$28/307 pages
“How many times have I told you that…?”
How many times have you heard that? Probably so often that, well, you stopped listening. From your mother, when you were very small. From your teachers in school. From your supervisor, significant other, or best friend. As in the new memoir “One Day I’ll Grow Up and Be a Beautiful Woman” by Abi Maxwell, it came from a daughter.
When she was pregnant, Abi Maxwell took long walks in the New Hampshire woods near her home, rubbing her belly and talking to her unborn baby. She was sure she was going to have a girl but when the sonogram technician said otherwise, that was OK. Maxwell and her husband would have a son.
But almost from birth, their child was angry, fierce, and unhappy. Just getting dressed each morning was a trial. Going outside was often impossible. Autism was a possible diagnosis but more importantly, Maxwell wasn’t listening, and she admits it with some shame.
Her child had been saying, in so many ways, that she was a girl.
Once Maxwell realized it and acted accordingly, her daughter changed almost overnight, from an angry child to a calm one – though she still, understandably, had outbursts from the bullying behavior of her peers and some adults at school. Nearly every day, Greta (her new name) said she was teased, called by her former name, and told that she was a boy.
Maxwell had fought for special education for Greta, once autism was confirmed. Now she fought for Greta’s rights at school, and sometimes within her own family. The ACLU got involved. State laws were broken. Maxwell reminded anyone who’d listen that the suicide rate for trans kids was frighteningly high. Few in her town seemed to care.
Throughout her life, Maxwell had been in many other states and lived in other cities. New Hampshire used to feel as comforting as a warm blanket but suddenly, she knew they had to get away from it. Her “town that would not protect us.”
When you hold “One Day I’ll Grow Up and Be a Beautiful Woman,” you’ve got more than a memoir in your hands. You’ve also got a white-hot story that seethes with anger and rightful resentment, that wails for a hurt child, and rattles the bars of injustice. And yet, it coos over love of place, but in a confused manner, as if these things don’t belong together.
Author Abi Maxwell is honest with readers, taking full responsibility for not listening to what her preschooler was saying-not-saying, and she lets you see her emotions and her worst points. In the midst of her community-wide fight, she reveals how the discrimination Greta endured affected Maxwell’s marriage and her health – all of which give a reader the sense that they’re not being sold a tall tale. Read this book, and outrage becomes familiar enough that it’s yours, too. Read “One Day I’ll Grow Up and Be a Beautiful Woman,” and share it. This is a book you’ll tell others about.
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