It's 7:20 AM and I'm sitting on a bus parked beside Madison Square Garden in the blistering cold. I'm feeling mostly unsure. Everyone is hyped to be a part of the Yeezy Season 3 fashion show and to witness a colossal album release—but to be honest, I'm not a huge fan of Kanye West or a lot of the thoughtless things he says. His music offends people, but I came because they are paying $100 for extras, which I found out about through a friend in casting. Plus, I figured, it's an experience.
When I started scanning the crowd, I realized everyone is brown—all 1,200 of us. Some openly wonder if we're part of weird political statement. (You can never, ever discount Kanye; you just can't.) A long, hippie-haired white guy with a badge announces, "We're taking away your cell phones...all cameras and recording devices...and we need you to sign some forms."
About an hour later we find ourselves in New Jersey. The bus unloads into a warehouse filled with tonal clothing. They tell us to take our things and stuff it them into garbage bags. They took my Marc Jacobs weekender, and mouthed "no" to my vintage silver cuffs. Even worse, they warn, "We aren't responsible for any lost items." Next, they divide the boys from the girls. A stylish European looks me up and down, muttering, "You're small," and tells another in camouflage to hand me the "shorts." I hold the knit panties up, grimace, and ask for something, anything for coverage, snagging some thigh-high stay ups. Another man hands me industrial-thick socks; another offers Adidas sneakers; and a woman with a camera tells me to pose: "cheese!"
It takes another hour for everyone to get dressed. Soon I'm running—in knit shorts—through frigid air with my garbage bag of personal belongings to a bus parked far, far away. Another girl has it worse. She's wearing a brazilian-cut bodysuit with no stockings and no jacket, just her bare flesh hitting the cold. In Kanye's world, a girl like her should rough it. Why? She's got curves and a four-star peach.
By noon our bus was sitting outside Madison Square Garden once again. There, Alek Wek is glowing in a cropped red fur, smoking. She checks us out and says between drags, "I love seeing ALL THIS CHOCOLATE." Walkie-talkie people urge us through more checkpoints, where they take our bags of clothes and hand us teeny packets of fruit snacks and oranges to eat. We're allotted our first bathroom break. I feel like a prisoner.
"You're up next for processing," I hear. I pray it's hair and makeup. Twenty of us are gathered, shoved into lines, and escorted several floors to a long, broad space filled with loads of models, including Insta-hottie Lukas Sabbat, and yes, hair and makeup people. I'm handed several scoops of coconut oil and told to make sure every inch of exposed flesh shines. Someone smoothed my ponytail and another removed my chipped manicure. More serious-faced pictures. A drop-dead model signed to Click grimaces, "I thought at least—at least—they'd contour."
Around 1:30 they began serving lunch. A Jamaican boy complains that his Subway sandwich is soggy, and the bottled water's too warm. "My water needs to be ice cold!" he says. I pass as protest. I know what lies only a block away and I know if I could somehow sneak past the guards armed with walkies, I could have more options at Penn Station— like warm pizza, Cinnabon rolls, and green tea lattes. That is, if I could brave the cold and find a stranger kind enough to buy me food because I no longer had my wallet.
Someone with a microphone shouts for us to walk from the seats to the stage. The AC's more potent down here; all the girls are shivering. A photographer annoyingly encourages us to strip off "any extra layers"—especially the ladies, if we're hot. "No!" I want to shout. "We. Are. Not. Hot." Another laughs at our sullen faces, "I can tell which ones haven't eaten." An NYU law student with wavy, inky hair mutters back, "it's not the food." It was more like everything. "I heard they wanted to rub dirt on us but they didn't have the time," she groans.
The only happy face I encountered was a bubbly teen. She says she knows Kanye personally, and so I ask, of course, "Why are you doing this? He didn't give you free tickets?" "Oh, I could have sat in the front row. My dad and Kanye are best friends, and he's producing all of this. I wanted to be in it because it's going to be so cool." (Here stands another bamboozled fan.) "I heard the album. He finished it on Tuesday and it's so hot, like, just so, so, hot..." Now she's vibrating giddy. Her curly mohawk sways as she freestyles something I've never heard before. "This is 'Feedback' from the new album. Isn't the beat sick?" Supposedly, she chills with Kanye all the time because he invites her, a high school kid, everywhere so she can watch him and the whole crew—including Travi$ Scott and Future—work. He even hands her the mike so she can flex from time to time. I'm incredulous. Kanye? Generous? For no reason?
"He's given me my dream. This is my dream..." She puts one hand on my shoulder. "Kanye is the coolest guy. People don't know...You know Ian [Connor, former stylist to Wiz Khalifa who famously lit a cigarette during the season 1 show] wasn't supposed to smoke during the other show. But, he's like that. Just does what he wants."
Another oily face asks, "Kanye didn't freak out?" Most designers would kill if someone smoked near their samples.
The mohawk girl shakes her head, "Nah, nah. I'm telling you: Kanye's chill."
Finally, our leaders explain the concept for the show. "You guys are supposed to be Rwandan refugees." Oh, ok. This is why everyone is brown, and greased up, and barely-clothed. I'm starting to get it.
"So, you can't smile during the performance. Or dance. Move NATURAL, so not too slow or fast and don't all do the same thing at the same time. You're living, trapped, in a camp. (Was everything before this moment to get us into character?, I wonder.) Sometimes you might sit or stand, or walk around. But no yawning. Live, you know? They tell us it's all going to be so great. "The energy, the energy..." they chant.
An hour before the show is supposed to start, crew members cover us in sheer, champagne-colored tarp. Remember the parachute game in gym class? When you all have to stand under ballooning polyester, each palm holding the edge until all at once, the class is revealed? It was just like that. As the crowd filed in, we could sort of decipher through the gossamer the thousands of faces. Those of us closest to the rim of the stage whispered to the others (we weren't allowed to talk) "OMG! It's Kim and North. I think I see Jay-Z. Is that Kendall or Kylie?"
The crew is playing good music and we wonder if it's the new album, and if Kanye's coming out to wish us well. He didn't. Supposedly, he's shy in person, painfully shy. So, even if he did walk over, like he did during the rehearsals, he'd never say a word.
Anticipation laces the air, and I confess, I'm excited—or as everyone else is saying, lit. The word of the day is "lit." People described a lot of the jackets as "lit." The Mohawk girl claims the new album is "lit." In fact, the whole show, supposedly, is "lit".
Models are already on stage and I dig the Fifth Element body-stockings and latex-like boots. Everything is more wearable than the seasons before. I see Matthew Dolan and Vetements in each pair of cropped, oversized trousers. In general, things are starting to look up—like the girls with bell-shaped bellies bared in midriff tops, and dimpled thighs looking soft, womanly, and friendly, exposed under short shorts. It's less about sexy and more about body acceptance.
Finally, the champagne dome comes down, revealing our refugee world. I hear Kanye and see him on the jumbo screen, but I have no idea where he is. Initially, we're too scared to move. It's exhilarating: the music, the smoke, the teeming rows watching us. A few "models" start to step out of place. It begins with a hip shift; then someone sits, a pair of legs go for a casual stroll. We fall into character.
To be honest, I lost all track of time. I resisted, but ultimately, got sucked in, and was so focused on being a part of this bigger, cooler thing—Kanye's world. I witnessed the Nike rant and Taylor Swift shout out, and in the presence of everything. But what stuck out was a family cheering on their son.
I witnessed our camp transform into something more than just music and a fashion show. I'm not sure what we were saying in our silence, but I'd guess it was something like we (and you) are beautiful.
After the show, one Jersey girl complained about the casting—not everyone was pretty. Many participated because they honestly needed the money. Lots of the "models" were counter-culturally beautiful. But that was the point: stripped of everything, in colors of the flesh, all humans are one. The quote of the night for me was when Kanye said, "I just wanna bring as much beauty to the world as possible." And I think he did.
