Welcome back to Hi Femme!, dapperQ’s sibling visibility project celebrating the incredible contributions that stylish femmes make to the queer fashion landscape. For this edition, we’re featuring Alex Berg, a queer and bisexual video producer and on-air correspondent at The Huffington Post, where she covers LGBTQ issues, politics and culture. Recently, she’s been traveling around the country covering the election and hosting the bi-weekly segment #QueerTheVote, which analyzes politics through an LGBTQ lens. In her free time, Alex plays roller derby with the Gotham Girls Roller Derby league and mentors teenage girls in Girls Write Now. *All images by Maria Tridas.
Hi Femme: Can you talk a bit about how you define queer femme style and what makes it transgressive?
Alex: Queer femme style is about reclaiming femininity and challenging misogyny through fashion. As femmes, we are often presumed to be straight by the outside world, dismissed as not radical enough in our own spaces and frequently passed over by the media that most celebrates androgyny. In a culture that deeply mistrusts and devalues femininity, to be femme is to challenge the status quo.
Straight people don’t believe that we’re queer.
Queer people don’t believe that we’re queer enough.
Femme style is so transgressive that they can’t even wrap their minds around it.
Hi Femme: How would you describe your personal style?
Alex: My personal style is punk-meets-professional. I wear a lot of vegan leather, red, black and animal prints, usually with a bold lip and bangs. I like to mix high and low, pairing designer pieces with inexpensive items. If my outfits could talk, they’d say something like “I rode a motorcycle in heels to this interview with a congressman.”
Hi Femme: Who are your fashion icon(s)?
Alex: Hard femmes and bad bishes throughout history, including exploitation film star Tura Satana, Betty Page and Grace Jones.
Hi Femme: What item in your style arsenal can you not live without?
Alex: A leather jacket and red lipstick.
Want to learn more about Alex’s femme style and feminist contributions? Follow Alex’s website, Instagram, and Twitter.