I’ve been getting into heated debates in the office for months now about whether or not D.C. is a fashionable place. When you think of fashion, Paris, Milan, and of course New York City come to mind. Fashion Week in those cities dominates headlines year after year, attracting celebrities, high-profile designers, and the press alike. 

But when you start talking fashion in D.C., the first thing most people mention is conservative clothing worn by buttoned-up, stuffy politicians or Capitol Hill staffers, or consultant bros dressed for the office. 

But that’s not the image I had in my mind as I prepared to move back to the D.C. area in 2022. Before that, friends and family told me — no, warned me — to upgrade my wardrobe because, as they said, D.C. loves to show out. I knew that D.C. folks could dress, and that they could dress extremely well. I just needed proof. So in keeping with my constant quest to prove a point in the most extra way possible, I went to find the most fashionable folks in the city at DC Fashion Week in late February to learn what makes our region’s fashion unique.

“We have a fashion week?”

When I mentioned to colleagues and friends that I was going to DC Fashion Week, almost every single response was, “We have a fashion week?” It’s a not-so-hidden gem in the city if you’re in the know and have an interest in fashion and style.

There are other fashion shows in the region, including Indie Fashion Week and the District of Fashion runway show. But for the past 18 years, DC Fashion Week has gathered local and international designers twice a year to display their work. Originally, the show was a full week long, but in order to keep production costs down for designers and vendors, this year they combined the shows with multiple categories in one day.

“This is definitely a fashionable city,” DC Fashion Week Executive Director Ean Williams told me when we spoke ahead of the shows. “When we come to work … we dress appropriately for that; but when we’re doing our special events and our nights out of town or going to the theater or the opera or whatever gig or fashion show, Fashion Week, you’ll see the fashion styles there.”

For those in the industry, the D.C. fashion scene can be an incubator for talent, providing opportunities for aspiring designers, models, and stylists looking to get their foot in the door in a more accessible space than top markets like New York. Williams notes that although New York and L.A. are better in terms of agency options and compensation compared to regional fashion weeks, spaces like DC Fashion Week are still great launchpads for models and designers early in their careers.

“Many of the models and designers that do DC Fashion Week build their confidence, and they go to New York,” Williams says. “They can bring that experience back and share with others and get a real feel. But hands down, they get a high return on their investment with us.” 

Williams says there are plenty of success stories with models who started here in D.C. going off to build careers internationally. He says the first male winner of America’s Next Top Model, Keith Karlos, was featured in DC Fashion Week before he won, and D.C.-based model Nyle DiMarco won that reality show competition as the show’s first deaf contestant.

“A lot of superstars, they do all the other major platforms: Project Runway, the now defunct DC BET, Rip the Runway. They’re featured in international publications like Vogue and Elle; this amazing talent is based right here,” Williams says. 

Plenty of that talent was on display — both on stage and off — at the Autumn/Winter 2023 show I attended last month. Ahead of the main shows, an Emerging Designers show featured many designers from D.C., Maryland, and Virginia.  Sunday’s show was a mixture of international couture, menswear collections, and an honorary runway for designer Eileen Bleyer, a local milliner (hat maker) who passed away in 2022.

The designers involved in the couture show cover a wide spectrum. Diversity can be an easy buzzword in any industry, but I was impressed by the different cultural representations from places like China, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Burkina Faso, and Cameroon.

Highlights at the show for me were Alek Risimnic’s Menswear capsule collection and the closer of the night, Ean Williams’ own Corjor International collection. Much of Risimnic’s pieces were exquisite, with clear attention to detail, but his final piece, a pink suit with a cape of roses, drew a gasp and applause from the crowd.

Williams’ pink and gold pieces had my jaw on the floor. I was enamored with the large hoop skirts on one gown, along with his signature of the evening: form-fitting “breastplates” that seemed molded to the models perfectly. 

What makes D.C. fashion?

Athletes, rappers, and even political figures all wear high fashion in different ways here in D.C. But more than anything, music — especially go-go — shapes style in the District, says Alexis Howard, who designs the D.C.-based line Etta Grove Footwear.

“When I was growing up here in D.C., it was like slouch socks and Reebok Ex-O-Fits with the velcro, or New Balance, which is still, well, big in the U.S.,” said Howard, who showed her collection as part of DC Fashion Week. “It was kind of like, if you didn’t wear that like you were a ‘bama.’” 

Howard says D.C. has been shaped by urban streetwear, with Universal Madness on Georgia Avenue being a prime example of a store that provided those styles (and made a return in 2017), along with the now-shuttered Up Against the Wall in Georgetown.

But while D.C. fashion is heavily influenced by streetwear, it isn’t limited by it.

“The fashion is versatile here. Thigh-high boots or leather pants or faux leather pants, crop tops, the community varies,” Howard says.

Back in the day, style was more focused on the brands attached to fashion, Howard says. But now, she says the fashion culture is more inclusive of individuality, and everyone isn’t clamoring for the same brand name.

There were plenty of fashion enthusiasts in the crowd at the DC Fashion Week couture show on its final night, some dressed in their own haute couture, others in more neutral clothing. Unlike more widely covered fashion weeks in other cities, attendees here ran the gamut, from local bloggers who had been covering the event for years to a couple looking for a more adventurous date night.

Lana Rae, a wardrobe stylist to Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and his family, was in attendance. With an eye-catching pompadour hairstyle and wearing a shimmering metallic train, Rae was there as a guest — though she hosted the Men’s International shows a few years ago. Rae has been plugged into fashion in D.C., Maryland, and Virginia as a stylist for 18 years — even earning a stamp of approval from Oprah herself — and sees the fashion landscape as a mixture of influences and cultures. 

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CpNXp3rA9-F/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

“I hate the word melting pot because it sounds cliche, but it’s a melting pot,” Rae says. “A mixed bowl of just creativity and art and beauty and fashion, and to me, fashion is like art in motion.”

Black contributions to D.C. style

The other major influence several attendees mentioned is one my family and friends referenced in singing the praises of D.C. fashion: Black people are at the heart of what makes the city’s fashion unique.

“I would say creative, individualized, and Black as fuck – well, the original D.C.,” said attendee Jennifer Omekam–who could have been a model on the runway with her hot-pink dress and blonde hair–when asked what make makes D.C. fashion unique.

“Having been a native Washingtonian, being here all my life, being here before gentrification started, you get to see the culture grow in different ways,” she said. That culture dates all the way back to the New Balance and 990s to the present day, Omekam says, adding, “I just feel the Black culture has helped elevate this city as well as our Black sense of style.”

And that Black sense of style is still reflected in D.C. today. Howard pointed to  The Museum DC as a great example of a shop carrying on the streetwear legacy of Universal Madness and other stores.

I’m a girl who loves sparkles, and so when I spotted Jennifer Frazier in a gorgeous white sequined gown, and her date Octavia Carson in a handsome tuxedo, I was determined to ask what they make of the D.C. fashion scene. They were attending the show as VIP guests, and both live in Silver Spring now, but Carson is a transplant from Michigan.

“As an outsider coming in here, I immediately notice that D.C. people aren’t afraid to add different colors and patterns to their style, and they like to mix like a soulful African American style with like legit African fabrics, colors and things like that,” Carson says. “And they’re not afraid to push the boundaries with hair color, big glasses, big jewelry, like I never seen that before, from the West Coast to the Midwest. D.C. does that real well.”

Carson was right, and I knew I had more than proved my point about how fashionable the city is. From hair to accessories to clothes, everyone on and off the runway brought their own unique sense of style to the space, and all were gathered to celebrate both international and D.C. fashion.

Bummed you missed out on Fashion Week, or interested in diving deeper into the D.C. fashion community? DC Fashion Week happens twice a year, and their next show is set for Sept. 22 – 24, 2023.