Telfar’s 20th Anniversary Show: A Celebration With a Message

NEW YORK — On Saturday afternoon, the front of Telfar’s flagship store was packed with exceptionally attractive and fashionable people of various skin tones, body shapes, ages and gender identities, smoking joints and chatting.

While it may have looked like an average SoHo Saturday, the crowd was, in fact, a carefully curated group, set to walk in Telfar’s first runway show in three years, which doubled as a celebration of its 20th year in business.

Some of the 200 models walking the show had a history with the brand, appearing in its e-commerce photos or freelancing as creative collaborators; for many, walking for Telfar marked their runway debut. But others weren’t models at all: Telfar founder Telfar Clemens’ longtime collaborator Ian Isiah, also known as New York Shugga, for instance, walked the runway in a sleeveless white and gold top while walking alongside his mum and dog. Clemens’ own mother, Hawa Clemens, walked the show in a pale blue polo dress. Fellow indie designer Raul Lopez strutted down the alley in a matching pale blue elongated button-up and pants. The audience, meanwhile, was filled with friends of the brand, from celebrities like Solange Knowles and musician Kelela to fellow designers like former Diesel creative director Nicola Formichetti. It almost felt like a family reunion: actor Indya Moore and art curator Kimberly Drew shared a long embrace before the show started.

The group’s diversity — and their familiarity with one another — reflected Telfar’s ethos, where all races, sizes and gender identities come together to express themselves freely.

“Most brands try to dictate what the wearer should be,” said Justin French, a Brooklyn-based photographer who was invited to the show as a friend of the brand. With Telfar, “people can bring themselves to it,” French added.

Community has become an enduring buzzword for brands seeking to win customer loyalty and grow via word-of-mouth endorsements. Telfar’s two decades in business has served as a playbook for doing so, turning its ideology into a successful, globally-recognised independent label. Founded in 2005 as a genderless fashion project by Clemens, the brand penetrated the zeitgeist in 2014 when it launched its cult $150 to $250 vegan leather totes with its TC logo, dubbed the “Bushwick Birkins,” which reached a new peak when they went viral in 2022 after Beyoncé name-checked the bag on her “Renaissance” album that year.

Telfar’s growth has been fuelled, in part, by strategic partnerships, such as an ongoing tie-up with Ugg, and events like a pop-up at the New York-based discount chain Rainbow in 2022. Its innovative approach is all the more notable considering the fact that the brand has had no official financial backers, save for a $400,000 grant from the CFDA Vogue Fashion Fund in 2017.

The logo-driven collection the brand presented on Saturday illustrated Telfar’s evolution into a household name, while retaining its roots as an irreverent critique of mainstream fashion. The line ranged from cheeky smiley face motifs on dresses and accessories meant to look like disposable shopping bags to structured denim outerwear and hoodies and matching sets featuring the brand’s signature “I Love New York” print, where the Telfar mark replaces the heart in the iconic logo.

It was both reminiscent of the brand’s past and indicative of its present, which has seen the brand embrace more conventional industry practices: In the last year, it launched real leather bags for as much as $1,540, hosted a pop-up in Selfridges in London and opened its first retail store in New York.

But Telfar’s not abandoning its rebellious spirit, especially when few brands are taking strong political stances amid threats to immigration rights and diversity, equity and inclusion.

Two days before the show, the brand broadcasted a pre-taped model search on Telfar TV — its 24-hour streaming network — where viewers voted for the hopefuls competing to walk in the show. The hour-long program was more sociopolitical commentary than a play on “America’s Next Top Model.” Among challenges where contestants engaged in catwalk battles, voguing standoffs and a poetry slam, Isiah, a regular Telfar TV host, posed the question, “Are you completely satisfied with everything in the world right now?” It was as much a casting call as a plea for a paradigm shift: “Trans people, queer people, Black people; We are the models,” a contestant named Facts on Fire said during the broadcast.

The brand’s inclusivity was on display at Saturday’s show: Men rocked pencil skirts and sarongs with jelly sandals in the shape of the brand’s logo, while a same-sex couple in coordinating green wide-leg pants and billowy button ups held hands as they walked. There was also a group of models wearing cut up tees, polos, skirts and sweats in an army green camo print — a subtle but charged political gesture as the US enters a war in Iran and various protests break out in American cities.

The presentation reaffirmed that anyone is welcome in Telfar’s world — so long as they’re willing to challenge the status quo, a message that continues to grip the brand’s longtime supporters.

“Telfar is someone who is active in organizing spaces, queer spaces … it’s opened up my mind in terms of what it means to be a designer,” said Jazmin Jones, a filmmaker who attended the show. Jones has been a fan of the brand since 2020 when she purchased her first pair of $150 Telfar earrings.

She added: “If I am going to have a logo on, as someone who doesn’t like wearing logos, it feels good to wear the Telfar logo and to be like “It’s not for you, it’s for everybody.”