“She Was Talking About Ballroom Culture. That Changed My Entire Life.” – Vogue

Growing Up, Coming Out is a series of personal reflections from queer American designers, released every day this month.

I grew up in a suburb outside of Toronto. There were no queer people at all. The first personal encounter in my memory was my mom had an uncle who was gay. He lived in downtown Toronto and he was a therapist and a psychiatrist. My mom would talk about this guy and I was really intrigued about his lifestyle. All I heard was that he lived in downtown Toronto and was “gay” and “therapist” and I was like, “That is so cool.” 

Madonna was the window to the world I wanted to be a part of. For the first time in television, it was the only way that I could possibly see gay people. I saw them in the “Vogue” video, which changed my entire life because I saw these gay dancers in this video and I was like, “What is this? What is she talking about? Is she talking about fashion? Is she talking about being gay?” She was talking about ballroom culture. That changed my entire life. I was 10 years old when that came out. I remember begging my mother—I had no money—to take me to the mall to the music store, and I needed it. It was $50; it was expensive, and it was banned from television. I begged my mom and she bought it for me. I sat in my basement as a kid and I would play it over and over again, I would watch it back to back. It was my only way that I could learn about and see gay people.

I don’t know if I was putting two and two together. I was so young. I didn’t understand why I was so intrigued and what that meant about me. I just knew that I was really interested in this lifestyle; the lifestyle that she was talking about, she was talking about what it is be gay, be an artist, to live in New York City. What it meant to have friends who weren’t white. I didn’t have friends who weren’t white and I didn’t have any friends who were gay. All of that blew my mind. I wanted to be friends with her dancers. I was like, “those are my people.”

In high school, I got really into raving and going to parties. That was a whole subculture at the time where being gay was accepted so I finally found my real people. A lot of the girls at the time were just doing ecstasy and making out with other girls. I just happened to, legitimately, do that even when I wasn’t doing ecstasy.