Shayne Oliver, the mastermind behind the meteorically popular Hood By Air, continues his reign as a boundary-pushing designer this past Sunday with his fall 2014 collection. True to HBA form, the casting was a mix of men and women, the clothes combined street with logo with suit culture, and the front row was a menagerie of Internet celebs, alt icons, and on-the-cusp zeitgeist stirrers. Zippers, saturated graphics, and a minimal color pallet stomped its way down the runway while models donned overly-fake hairpieces and androgynous beauty looks.
It’s the latter part, the beauty, that defines HBA’s aesthetic. Oliver doesn’t just buck traditional womenswear runway codes — he aggressively throws a bright, bold finger up and puts it on a projector screen for the rest of the world to see. His collection is void of any gender to the point that it doesn’t matter what sex is walking toward the flashing lights. This season, Oliver took that notion and duckwalked all over it — literally.
At the end of his show, a group of topless male dancers in wigs paraded out, posed, and began voguing. It was a trip to say the least. The ambiguousness of ball culture exploded on the runway with each head whip, death drop, and pose. Like Rick Owens‘ stomp-the-yard scene in Paris, Oliver’s finale was a powerful disruption to the mundane final walks of Fashion Week.
“It’s a new level of HBA: a raw beauty and rugged glamour. It brought me back to the days when I was in the ballroom scene, how raw that was and finding every possible way of getting dolled up. I recreated that in the collection through suede, leathers and shearlings. I wanted to do something what was new in a non-new context.” said Shayne Oliver
XEX was able to exclusively ask Vogue Choreographer Dashaun “Lanvin” Wesley a few questions about the dynamic performance.
How did the idea of having NYC voguers be apart of the hood by air finale? What was Oliver’s vision?
The original vision came from Shayne Oliver’s short film Co-directed by friend of HBA and Been Trill‘s Matthew Williams is called “FUCCBOIS,” for his Fall/Winter 2014 collection and according to HBA designer Shayne Oliver is dedicated to “all the FUCCBOIS who shred the status quo with aggression and lush energies.
The voguers that performed was from various houses from NYC & Atlanta, how did you go about assembling the crew? What did you look for as far as style?
After reviewing the theme for Olivers collection and the concept the run of show, I wanted the audience to feel that there were models emerging from the shadows. I tasked with looking for slim to average build voguers that could allude to the image of models and that could also perform with high energy. Some of the performers were requested directly by Shayne being that he familiar with some of the outstanding voguers and ball participants.
Vogue Femm is a unique mix of spontaneous movement & key dance elements. Did you guys have free range to move as you pleased or was choreo requested for the runway?
Again the idea came from Shayne’s fashion film FUCCBOIS where hes in an array of colored wigs and whipping them for the to a very dark and aggressive beat. The voguers were given the liberty to choose their own movement with goal being the visual of the hair and flips and whips.
What was the crowd’s initial response when the first “Dush/Beat dropped and the hair started to spin.
Initially when the crowd saw bare chested guys emerge through the fog from back of the runway the crowd was still. When the first wig started to spin and trickled down to the last guy swinging his wig the crowd started to understand that this was going to be a finale like no other. From the catwalks and dips the crowd began to pull their phone out record and scream in excitement as the vogue dancers began to annihilate the stage with a voguing performance.
The art of vogue performance has been inspiring the fashion culture for years, how did it feel to be apart of an unfiltered ballroom x fashion moment.
My goal as a vogue dancer is to bring the art of vogue performance to a platform where opportunities can be endless. I am so thrilled to have been apart of the historic finale for the Hood By Air Fall/Winter 2014 collection. I hope this performance can open minds in the fashion industry & illustrate the potential Ballroom Culture has to share.