BLACK FASHION MUSEUM^TBA

Brownstone Archives is researching costume design in Black American television, film, and theater.

Brownstone Archives began in 2020 as a hobby-ist Instagram page dedicated to sharing screenshots and “fashion commentary” on the 1994 sitcom “Living Single”, created by Yvette Lee Bowser. The costumes are timeless, dilligent, and harken back to a time when costuming and styling in television was a vehicle through which black subcultures and independent designers were dispersed.

Now, this archive works to:

Highlight costume designers, costume workers, designers, archivists, and artisans who work at the intersection of storytelling and Black American fashion.

Examine how Black American subcultures and stylistic codes are communicated and disseminated globally via TV and movies; focusing primarily on the mid eighties through the late aughts.
Compile a visual and chronological timeline detailing the history of black costume design from the mid eighties through the late aughts.

Brownstone Archives is powered by Hermetic State and featured in DC-based magazine Demystification.

Geoffrey Holder’s costumes for Timbuktu! by Al Hirshield for Stagebill 1978

LIVING SINGLE

THE WIZ (play) ^NEW

BLACK FASHION MUSEUM^TBA

Brownstone Archives is researching costume design in Black American television, film, and theater.

LIVING SINGLE

THE WIZ (play) NEW

BLACK FASHION MUSEUMTBA

Brownstone Archives is researching costume design in Black American television, film, and theater.

THE WIZ (play) ^NEW

BLACK FASHION MUSEUM^TBA