The Politics of a Graduation Outfit

Exploring the clothing significance behind one of the biggest days of my life

Initial Disappointment

Recently, while I was searching on Google Drive, my business school graduation photos from two years ago appeared. I smiled and remembered how I couldn't find anything I liked when I first saw them. My eyes were squinting because of the bright May sun. The photographer didn't fix my graduation hood. My kente stole is lopsided. Looking at them from my desk in London, I loved them, especially what I wore. 

I had many expectations of my graduation outfit because business school was a period of life transitions. I was recently single from a long-term relationship and had moved from Brooklyn neighborhoods, Bushwick to Brooklyn Heights, the equivalent of Pabst Blue Ribbon to Sancerre. I had received an offer and worked at a top consulting firm, making over 2x my pre-business school salary.

These events all happened during years 2 and 3 of a global pandemic. I wanted my graduation outfit and the photos shared on social media to reflect this evolution, my “b-school glow up.” It was an ambitious goal, so it is understandable why I was disappointed. After receiving them, I shared a few images with close friends and family and buried them in a Google Drive folder.

While researching for this article, I was amused by how cultural identities appeared in graduation images, particularly in older ones, when Instagram, bejeweled mortarboards, and glossy graduation photoshoots weren't an option. In them, a graduate’s hair and accessories, usually the only items visible over a cap and gown, capture the moment in time and a graduate’s personal, celebratory style.

My relationship with fashion has changed over the past two years. Because of this, I can see how my graduation outfit reflected my identity and values.

Graduation Dress: La Réunion

I spent hours on e-commerce websites searching for a graduation dress. Because I work in fashion, I know my body type and preferred silhouettes, and I was surprised when trying on dresses that nothing felt good enough. Similar to what I imagine shopping for a wedding dress is like, I was waiting for that feeling of ‘the one.’ I received it when I tried on the brand, La Réunion.

I first heard of La Réunion when the brand Madewell collaborated with them (Former Madewell collaborations buyer Kristine Straker has an excellent Substack, Material Finds, which I highly recommend following). Brooklyn-based and founded by Nigerian-American Sarah Nsikak, La Réunion tells the beautiful, multi-dimensional story of the Black diaspora.

Their signature patchwork aesthetic reflects traditional African storytelling, the history of quilt codes during the Underground Railroad, and African Americans' handcrafted, generational souvenirs. According to La Réunion, each piece is hand quilted and made from recycled fabric sourced from designers working in New York City. The dress I chose celebrated my Black heritage while communicating other values important to me, including sustainability and supporting local, emerging designers.

I was attracted to the La Réunion because, in my research, I had seen it worn several ways, including casually with a t-shirt thrown over it or formally in heels. Because of its multifabric construction, it is heavier than an average dress. Whenever I wear it on the subway (I know, I know), I lift it dramatically so that me and passersbys don't trip. It reminds me of Carrie Bradshaw in Sex and the City, famously lifting her dress to run away from a forlorn suitor. 

In 2022, La Réunion was featured in the 2022 Metropolitan Museum of Art’s exhibition, In America: A Lexicon of Fashion, which celebrated eighty years of American style. I visited it and shot the photo below. In October 2023, I attended the opening of artist Jacolby Satterwhite’s commission for the museum’s Great Hall. I wore La Réunion.

Graduation Shoes: Rachel Comey

In my 13 years living in New York, I experienced many quintessential New York moments, including attending the Rachel Comey sample sale. When I was in my 20s, I was never into sample sales. The 2010s was the golden era of fashion blogging and street style, and I was turned off by sample sale’s long lines and ubiquity. 

However, during the pandemic, one of the things I vowed to do while sitting in leggings and watching the Sopranos was to go to sample sales if we ever came out of it. And I did.

I remember when I first discovered New York designer Rachel Comey. I was 24 and working for the now-defunct brand Maiyet in downtown Soho. My manager had previously worked with Comey and would go to her studio down the street to place personal orders from Comey’s latest collection. The exchange was the epitome of NYC fashion, and I couldn't wait to have that energy.

As the years passed, I continued to follow Comey from afar - window shopping in her stores and saving her trailblazing advertisements featuring diverse models in age, body type, and unconventional beauty. As a designer, Comey has a unique but relatable aesthetic. Harper’s Bazaar described her customer as “the cool babysitter you never stopped worshipping” or “the style equivalent of the visiting art professor you made a playlist for.”

In my 20s, I was more into high-waisted skinny jeans, crop tops, and slinky American Apparel dresses. As it does, style catches up to you at the right time, aligning with my ability to afford her pieces. When I started business school, I was 33 and purchased a pair of Comey earrings for orientation in a new era buoyed by my pandemic savings. Unfortunately, they were too large for my face and felt indulgent for Zoom.

A few months later, I went to my first Rachel Comey sale. There are articles and viral videos about the sale’s “cool girl” attendees. It is true. It takes a certain confidence to pull off Rachel Comey. She loves acid wash, oversized denim, textured dresses, and structural blouses, usually with a clog. Her aesthetic is a subtle statement piece and is a favorite of celebrities Tracee-Ellis Ross, Dakota Johnson, and  Rashida Jones. 

It was two weeks until graduation, and I was cutting it close to securing a final outfit. I hoped I would find something at the sample sale, preferably a dress or two-piece set, but a pair of sparkling silver foil heels caught my attention. The heels felt so special and representative of me: sourced from a New York designer’s sample sale on a hot New York summer day. The silver foil was blemished in some areas, and I liked that they had a brief life before me.

When I walked across the stage to accept my diploma, my parents told me my shoes looked golden, reflecting against the stage lights. Although I have a high heel tolerance, the shoe’s stiff construction butchered my feet. After graduation, with each wear, the foil began to fall off. Sometimes, there is a reason why items are included in a sample sale. I can't remember if they are in storage or if I donated them. I hope I still have them because of their meaning, but I understand if I decided to let them go.

Kente Graduation Stole

On May 14th, 2022, six days before my graduation, 10 African Americans were murdered, and three were injured in a mass shooting in Buffalo, New York. They were killed inside of a Tops supermarket. Tops was in a predominantly Black neighborhood and a majority of victims were senior citizens. It was a racially motivated hate crime and felt like another brick to the wall of domestic terrorism that plagued the United States.

My sorrow was acute because the attack made me think of my own parents. Both were in their early 70s and enjoyed going to grocery stores. If I call my parents on the weekend, they are usually coming from or going to the local Kroger’s or Meijer’s. Grocery stores and food markets, double as community gathering spaces. When I was growing up and when I visit home as an adult, I run into acquaintances from different areas of my life at the grocery store.

I had ordered a traditional kente graduation stole. I was undecided about wearing it, but after hearing about the Buffalo tragedy, I wore it in honor of them. 

According to NPR, patterned color fabrics, or kente, can be traced to the Asante people of the Akan kingdom, now Ghana. I grew up reading African folklore, including stories about Anansi the spider and the early origins of kente, which state that two hunters spotted a spider weaving a web and were inspired to recreate its patterns.

In the past, local royalty would wear Kente like a toga. It became symbolic when Ghana received independence from Great Britain in 1957. The prime minister of Ghana and a supporter of pan-Africanism (the movement to unify all people of African descent), Kwame Nkrumah, wore it on visits to the United States, including a meeting with President Eisenhower.

Kente cloth uses traditional Ghanaian colors red, black, yellow, and green. The first Kente Cloth Graduation Celebration happened on May 15, 1993, at West Chester University of Pennsylvania, when four professors recognized the need to honor the historical significance of Black students graduating.

Since then, it has become a symbol celebrating African and African American identity in the United States at graduations.

The Divine Nine, or the nine historically Black Greek-letter organizations, have also interpreted the kente graduation stole using their individual fraternity and sorority colors.

Conclusion

While applying for business school, I would visualize walking across the stage to receive my diploma in a pair of Gucci platforms. However, like many life lessons, once I let go of the meaning I wanted attached to my graduation outfit, it superseded my expectations. Once I could allow time between the moment and now, I could rejoice in its reflection of me.

Congratulations to the 2024 graduates, and remember, the only way is up.