Traditionally, fashion education has been exclusive to the privileged and elite, bunkered within the ivory towers of elusive academia. However, North Carolina A&T State University alum and fashion historian Shelby Ivey Christie is changing that one educational resource at a time.
Christie is the founder of Haute Heritage Publishing, a publishing company committed to dismantling barriers to entry into the fashion industry, particularly for people of color and other marginalized communities.
“We’re a publishing house dedicated to creating fashion-based content and resources that spotlight Black and brown contributions to fashion,” Christie told EBONY.
Christie has over a decade of leadership experience working with big industry names, including L’Oréal, Nike and Vogue.
However, the true essence of her impact is best encapsulated through her erudite social media presence, where she regularly produces some of the most analytical and thought-provoking bon mots related to fashion history.
From discussing Sarah Jessica Parker’s vestiary homage to Elizabeth Keckley to spotlighting lesser-known Black designers, apprising audiences of the intricacies of fashion history and how it impacts society en masse, is something social media users have grown to expect and earnestly request from Christie, aka, @bronze_bombSHEL on Twitter (now X). Whenever a new sartorial turf war arises or a Black-centric Met Gala theme is released, Christie is the people’s champ of Black fashion history and costume design.
lol thank you sis! I’m ready whenever the Costume Institute is https://t.co/8v24vFwPQU
— Shelby Ivey Christie (@bronze_bombSHEL) October 9, 2024
The creation of Haute Heritage is a tactile extension of her knack for dissecting fashion through a sociopolitical lens.
“It’s a culmination of all my passions and work. My passion for history and how fashion intersects with race, class, culture, and politics, as well as my work to make fashion and history more accessible through fun and engaging storytelling,” she said.
Haute Heritage’s premier product, the Black Fashion Legends ABC book and flashcard deck, is an educational resource for the next generation about the industry-disrupting Black superstars who have catalyzed the fashion industry.
“The Black Fashion ABC book and the matching flashcard set are for children of all ages, people with children in their lives and adults who want to engage with fashion, who are fashion enthusiasts,” explained Christie.
The book highlights industry powerhouses like Dapper Dan, Naomi Campbell, Ruth E. Carter, Christopher John Rogers, Virgil Abloh, Kwame Brathwaite and June Ambrose, who wrote the foreword for the book.
“It was a huge honor, just for her to want to be involved, to see and understand my vision, to want to have a call to action to a younger generation of creatives,” said Christie.
“Her foreword spoke a word of encouragement into them to plant those seeds and tell them that if they want it, there’s a place for them here in this industry,” Christie added.
Opening up the world of possibilities for the next generation is at the crux of Haute Heritage’s mission, and Christie hopes that through publishing, she will broaden collective associations with notable Black figures in history.
“For Black History Month this year, my hope is that children see these figures, and we start seeing more André Leon Talley costumes, more Black History Month projects on Dapper Dan, and not just the well-known, prominent political figures that we see,” said Christie.
This plan will surely be brought to fruition as Haute Heritage scales and reaches libraries and reading centers, a pillar of Haute Heritage’s mission. “Everyone can’t get to New York, right? So these products make it so that children and young people who are outside of New York can have access to fashion stories, can engage with the fashion industry and have this book and these flashcards in their hands. Fashion week can come to them,” said Christie.
Connecting kids who live outside of the traditional epicenters of fashion is not just important to Christie; it’s personal.
“I was a kid who grew up far away from New York City, in North Carolina, and there are many people who love fashion and want to engage with it, but it’s really hard to do because of the geography,” explained Christie.
Haute Heritage is changing that.
Black Fashion Legends ABC Book
Price: $30
Christie, a proud graduate of North Carolina A&T University, knows what it’s like to traverse some of the most esteemed spaces in fashion where the exclusion of Black people is not just commonplace — it’s intentional.
But she has no hesitations in agitating the industry, especially when it comes to the mistreatment or erasure of Black figures. And what is accountability if not passion persisting?
“I think my purpose is to innately be a disruptor and an agitator. A part of my life’s work is to innovate and stand in the gap,” said Christie.
Her tenacity makes her foray into the world of publishing a little less challenging, even though, according to a study by Lee & Low Diversity, only 5% of publishing houses are owned or staffed by Black people. But her tenure as an industry force has more than readied her to take on this next chapter.
See, the seeds for Haute Heritage were first planted in 2020, during the racial reckoning that swept the nation and, albeit briefly, turned the fashion industry on its head with social media black squares and pointed initiatives sprouting like wildfire.
“The industry was having the conversations that I had been having on my platform for maybe two or three years by then, and I saw that they were listening,” she said.
Her impact and intentionality in calling out the industry’s glaring gaps were finally being acknowledged on a large scale. But she knew there was still more work to be done, IRL.
Christie said, “I couldn’t continue to sit behind the keyboard and point my finger. I’m going to get in the field and do it myself. I’m not going to continue to say, ‘Oh, why isn’t Dapper Dan getting this?’ ‘Why isn’t André Leon Talley getting this?’ ‘Where is Misa Hylton in this conversation?’ I will do it myself.”
Now, the internet’s favorite historian is on her way to becoming fashion’s favorite publisher.
“I have a commitment through my publishing house to always be a good steward of our stories and our history.”
