Few Black designers within the West bear the burden and luck of continuous their household’s legacy within the enterprise. Charlie Casely-Hayford is considered one of them. He follows in his father’s footsteps, the late Joe Casely-Hayford, a London tailor whose method was steeped in heritage and modernity. Joe’s designs had the precision of Savile Row haberdashery and the creativity that has been thriving in London for many years. Having handed away in 2019, his son accepted the British Style Council’s posthumous Particular Recognition Award on his behalf in 2023, which honored Joe’s cultural contributions to the menswear business.
Charlie, 38, is the inventive director of the Casely-Hayford tailor he and his father established in 2019. (Previous to his involvement, he was a pupil on the Courtauld Institute of Artwork finding out artwork historical past.) He’s dressed the John Legends, David Beckhams, and Benedict Cumberbatches of the world, he’s even gotten the eye of Drake as nicely. The model’s runway exhibits, between the autumn seasons of 2014 and 2017, had been daring. They had been stuffed with eye-catching coloration combos, summary prints on coats, and clear historic references. “However over time, we’ve turn out to be extra restrained,” Casely-Hayford explains over a Zoom name.
Certainly, neutral-toned ready-to-wear predominates the label’s choices, which embrace handmade and made-to-measure tailoring. However which years of the model’s historical past will Charlie draw from in his contribution to the Metropolitan Museum of Artwork and Costume Insitute’s exhibition “Superfine: Tailoring Black Type”? It’d be nice to see a bit of little bit of each: the garments within the earlier collections had been covetable for his or her fearlessness; at the moment, they attest to Charlie’s appreciation for the subdued.
Beneath is an edited dialog between ESSENCE and Charlie Casely-Hayford. The dialog spans household and vogue along with the importance of the Costume Institute’s forthcoming Spring 2025 exhibition “Superfine: Tailoring Black Type” and a hero jacket made for sipping.
Designers’ work tends to overlap with their dwelling life in a roundabout way. Has that been your expertise?
[Yes], and I believe it’s particular as a result of it’s cultural quite than vogue for vogue’s sake. In case you can weave in tradition in such a pure method that it’s part of your world, there’s one thing for folks to seize onto or attempt for. It goes deeper than the floor stage of the transiency.
Quite a lot of modern vogue is pressured, and I believe, “You realize, the buyer isn’t silly. They will see that there’s no authenticity.” You’re shopping for into the tradition, which is imbued and woven into the tapestry of the clothes. There’s no separation.
I agree.
In our retailer in London, we make numerous wedding ceremony fits for purchasers, and it’s great that you’re a a part of the happiest day of somebody’s life. There’s one thing intangible [about that], one thing greater than the clothes itself.
What are you able to inform me concerning the sipping jacket you designed in collaboration with Aberfeldy which is at the moment a hero merchandise for Casely-Hayford?
The collaboration with Aberfeldy felt pure as a result of each manufacturers share this deep respect for craftsmanship, heritage, and storytelling on the basis, as a father and son story. And that was an essential start line. In creating the garment, I envisioned one thing that may replicate the heat and richness of Aberfeldy whisky whereas inviting folks to savor the second—even for myself, pondering of my early twenties after I first began working with my dad. It’s about taking time to replicate. This jacket epitomizes embracing and enhancing the second of sharing.
The British Style Council granted your late father the posthumous Particular Recognition Award in 2023. How did that really feel?
It was an honor to expertise it, and [to] obtain the award on his behalf.
What’s the importance of the Costume Institute’s forthcoming exhibition for you, as a designer and as a Black man?
Enormous. It’s formed very a lot by my dad being within the tailoring world and this concept of dressing up and dressing impeccably; all the things I noticed by way of the best way my dad went about his day-to-day life and the significance and delight he took in his clothes. It’s not nearly aesthetics, it’s concerning the cultural id behind it.
I hope to see designs [in the show] that delve into the historical past of Black dandyism from 18th-century abolitionists to the Harlem Renaissance, whereas additionally embracing modern interpretations. It’s going to open the doorways by way of conversations that haven’t essentially been had however should be had.
Which historic figures come to thoughts while you consider Black dandyism?
Whenever you have a look at somebody like James Baldwin, that’s the sort of dandyism that I gravitate in direction of, as a result of there are ranges of flamboyance in his playfulness. It’s barely extra understated, with a gorgeous emphasis on tailoring and parts of feminism. I’ve drawn an affinity to his dandyism by way of my private fashion.
What do you make of André Leon Talley’s legacy?
André Leon Talley set the bar. After I consider André, I consider stretching notions of actuality and the boundaries during which one can gown. He gave language to a brand new freedom.
How does your work communicate to the themes that could be explored inside the Costume Institute’s forthcoming exhibition, or Black dandyism extra usually?
I hold utilizing the phrase flamboyance as a result of there’s a flamboyance to dandyism; it’s barely outlined by that. Then I take into consideration my notion of my dad’s work within the early days, whilst we started working collectively—there was a restraint. Whereas you will have dandyism as an excessive on one aspect, [the Casely-Hayford brand] has at all times approached it via this distillation and restraint. Our home DNA has been outlined by that. Our dandyism is extra understated than the normal notions of how folks understand a dandy to be.
Not all Black dandies gown spectacularly.
And there’s a stage of vainness that I personally wrestle with. I can communicate on my father’s behalf and say he would have been the identical, and we’ve most likely indifferent ourselves from that excessive. It’s been fascinating over the previous few months because the preliminary press launch got here out. Everybody has gravitated in direction of that. Hopefully, the exhibition reveals the various layers of the Black dandy over a long time and centuries.
