Held in Oakland, California April 16-19, 2015, Queer Fashion Week (QFW) was a four day celebration of queer style created by Executive Producer Christine De La Rosa of FiveTen Oakland Events and Co-Producers Fallon Davis and Adjoa Courtney of the What is Butch? Movement. The event showcased over 25 designers and boasted an attendance of approximately 1,000 throughout the course of the week. Queer Fashion Week served as a platform to introduce queer designers and models to customers of all genders and sexual orientations. But, it was more than just about dollars and cents. The event used fashion as a springboard to facilitate conversations about gender identity, gender expression, intersectionality, and equality. And, our dapperQ crew was there to cover it all!
Left to right: Ryley Rubin Pogensky, Anita Dolce Vita, Lea Robinson, Nicky Cutler.
QFW’s participating brands included: Haute Butch; Show & Tell Boutique; Saannti; Size Queen Clothing; True Life Clothing; Immigreat Designs; The Lady Ms. Vagina; Sharpe Suiting; Note 2 Self; Sambi Fashions; Play Out; Shades Company; Stuzo Clothing; Inner Diva Styles; Sun Sun; Qwear Fashion; Out Play; Lady Lovers; Electrobaroque & Medium Reality; Thuy Custom Clothier; and Topher Adam. Style ranged from masculine to feminine, and everything in between and outside of. Several of these brands design masculine and androgynous clothing for all genders. While dapperQ has worked with many of the featured designers in some capacity before, others were introduced to us for the first time, making QFW a must attend event for savvy style bloggers and fashionist@s. Here are were some brands that dapperQ is keeping an eye on in 2015 (All images by Molly Adams unless otherwise noted):
1. HAUTE BUTCH
2. SAANNTI
3. IMMIGREAT (BOW TIES)
5. PLAY OUT (GENDER-NEUTRAL UNDERWEAR)
6. STUZO
7. OUTPLAY (GENDER-NEUTRAL SWIMWEAR)
8. LADY LOVERS
11. SHOW AND TELL CONCEPT SHOP
Image via Queer Fashion Week
Image via Queer Fashion Week
Photo by Lea Robinson
And, of course, one of our favorite runway moments came from QWEAR. While Qwear is a style blog, and not a designer, they curated a fun and fashion-forward collection, which featured one of our favorite models, Ryley Rubin Pogensky, on the runway:
About the photographer:Molly Adams is from Los Angeles and she takes pictures. You can find her on instagram @mollyktadams if you want.
I like how there are no Size Queen Clothing models pictured, but all other designers are……shame..
I included Size Queen in my Huffington Post Article. Not all of the designers made it to dapperQ’s list because dapperQ focuses solely on masculine attire per our original mission (sorta like GQ doesn’t really feature “womenswear” designers.)
Great job! Love it that my girlfriend was chosen for the OutPlay photo! 😀