Our first introduction to type can have a profound influence on us. For Colman Domingo, it formed his connection to his type, his cultural heritage and his highly effective mindset as a Black man in America.
For the fashionable crowd gathered on the Metropolitan Museum of Artwork for the morning preview of Superfine: Tailoring Black Fashion, the Costume Institute’s Spring 2025 exhibit, the Rustin Oscar nominee revealed how three males in his life had a connection to type that helped kind his personal. It’s in tune with the exhibit’s theme, Black Dandyism, which explores how Black males have used type to outline and elevate themselves over the previous three centuries. Impressed by Monica L. Miller’s 2009 ebook Slaves to Style: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Id, the exhibit was born in honor of the late former Vogue editor-at-large André Leon Talley.
“I discovered about type from three gents in my household: Clarence, my stepfather, Colman Domingo [Sr.], my pure father and Derek Domingo, my brother,” Domingo shared, earlier than breaking down how every helped him carve out the blueprint of his type.
From his stepfather, Clarence, Domingo discovered that onerous work—on this case, as a flooring sander—might result in one thing stunning. Whereas the work was backbreaking, it was definitely worth the payoff, together with that paycheck, come the weekend. Domingo’s stepfather would take his mom out for the night, wearing “sharp fits, good footwear and an extended Black trenchcoat,” which Domingo’s mom gifted to him when his stepfather handed.
From his beginning father, Colman Domingo Sr., the Sing Sing actor discovered {that a} signature type would all the time depart an impression. “Considered one of my favorites was him carrying all white, very tight Italian trousers, hugging his hip,” he recalled, stating that Coleman Sr. paired with a white turtleneck and a canary-colored accent. It has been an inspirational search for his son. “I beloved the best way he confirmed up. When he confirmed up, he confirmed out.”
Rising up, his brother Derek would covet the garments he noticed in trend magazines. Though the household didn’t have the funds to purchase these dream gadgets, their mom might recreate appears they may solely dream about with a little bit bit of cloth and patterns. Domingo remembered her phrases of trendy knowledge, “You may all the time have type, type doesn’t price a lot.”
Domingo gave deference to his fellow Met co-chairs, Lewis Hamilton, A$AP Rocky, and Pharrell Williams, alongside Anna Wintour, and praised the type innovators who got here earlier than him: Leon Talley, Dapper Dan, Sidney Poitier and so many others.
From the lads who guided him on his type path, Domingo is taking it full circle. He shared how his brother doesn’t pay a lot consideration to type today. “However on occasion, like lately, remind him of the individual he was once,” he said, including how he’s opening that world up once more for his sibling, a world completely captured within the 12 areas of Black male trend offered on this exhibition.
Domingo ended his ideas on Black males and magnificence with a quote from George C. Wolfe: “God created Black folks and Black folks created type.”
Superfine: Tailoring Black Fashion is on show on the Metropolitan Museum of Artwork in New York Metropolis, from Could 10 via October 26.