What Is The Twin Cities' Black Fashion Week MN Scene Like?

It is difficult to be black in the Twin Cities. And to be black, a dandy, and educated makes for a small circle. The fashion community of Twin Cities is small, and cliquish. So the branch for blacks, and brown folks is even smaller!

Natalie Morrow, known for the years-old Twin Cities Black Film Festival marks three years of fall Black Fashion Week MN. The collaborates with Tim and Thom Navarro who are known for the Black Hearts Ball, to use their respective event production talents, and social networks. They want to make a stand and statement about the value and beauty of blackness and brownness. The fashion and beauty industries struggle with this!

Above: the panel discussion among designers and producers

This fall Black Fashion Week MN held several events after Fashion Week MN closed in late September. The small crowd that came to its A List mixer at the Moxy Minneapolis Downtown says that the initiative is too new to have a strong reputation. Fifteen people may have watched the panel conversation or spoken as a part of it when it ended. Half of these may have been black.

Black Fashion Week MN may be sitting on the precipice of going from "almost nothing to almost something," to quote the film Deep Cover. So it struggles to attract many people to some of its events.

But the furnishings and the urbane artistic soft lighting at Moxy's Minneapolis Downtown was a bright side. These embraced the blackness and brownness!

When you're black or brown in the Twin Cities you struggle to find clothes that you would want to wear. And, in Minnesota, the stoic Scandinavian and German cultures which began and dominate it, like quietness. Hell, they seem to prize it! Mysteriously, to call attention to yourself through clothing is often to be rude, selfish, or both. But Minnesota "nice" precludes most people from saying this.

Above: the audience.

So the Twin Cities tend to frown on flamboyant and vibrant displays of style and personality. This may help to explain why the men's boutiques that offered vibrant and flamboyant swatches and fabrics may all be gone.

So a fashion initiative where blackness in its many hues is hugged and loved may be necessary. Maybe in a few years Black Fashion Week MN will be a haven for style-oriented blacks, and brown folks?