Join us as we sit down with Darnell-Jamal Lisby, the first fashion curator at the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA), just days before the 2025 Met Gala and the opening of "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style" at the Costume Institute.

As a fashion historian, Lisby helped organize CMA’s iteration of "The New Black Vanguard: Photography between Art and Fashion" and curated the exhibitions "Egyptomania: Fashion’s Conflicted Obsession" and "Korean Couture: Generations of Revolution." Prior to joining CMA, Lisby worked at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, where he organized programming for the museum’s first virtual — and best attended — symposium, “Fashion, Culture, Futures: African American Ingenuity, Activism, and Storytelling.” Lisby holds degrees from the Fashion Institute of Technology, including an MA in fashion and textiles studies: history, theory, and museum practice and a BS in art history and museum professions.

This year’s exhibition, guest-curated by Monica L. Miller and inspired by her seminal work "Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity,” explores the history of Black dandyism and the intersection of fashion, power and identity.

Our fascinating conversation with Darnell-Jamal delves into fashion as a political statement, the evolution of Black dandyism throughout history, and the boundary between cultural appreciation and appropriation as Black style and culture is celebrated and promoted as part of the “Superfine” exhibition.

Connect with Darnell-Jamal Lisby: Instagram and LinkedIn

Dr. Jonathan Michael Square: Instagram and Website

Professor Susan Scafidi, Founder and Academic Director, Fashion Law Institute and author, Who Owns Culture: Appropriation and Authenticity in American Law

Kimberly Jenkins, The Fashion and Race Database

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