Douglas Says
Douglas Says is an American fashion designer, stylist, author, and make-up artist. He is known for using stretch fabrics in eveningwear and has worked with figures in the ballroom scene, including his longtime muse Tracey Africa Norman. In 2024, his fashion and impact on Newark's fashion aesthetics was exhibited as one of eight artists in the Newark Museum of Art’s exhibition The Story of Newark Fashion: Atelier to Runway. Says is also the star of the short documentary film , directed by Brandon R. Nicholas premiered at NewFest, which highlights the legacy of drag performer Moi Renee, and features a signature catsuit designed by Says.
Career
Douglas Says began designing clothing in the 1970s while attending high school in Newark, New Jersey. After taking a course in men’s tailoring, he began producing garments for classmates and friends. He initially explored modeling but shifted his focus to design and eventually found greater interest in creating clothing for women. By 1983, he had completed formal training in fashion design. In the 1980s and 1990s, Says participated in Newark's fashion and nightlife scenes, including involvement in drag pageants, ballroom events, and local discos. Some of his clients have included has worked as model Iman, singer Celia Cruz, and runway coach Miss J Alexander. He has also worked with photographers including Gerard Gaskin, Mike Ruiz, Alex Chatelain, Ghillian Lewin, Fadil Berisha, Marc Baptiste, Dah Len, Keith Majors, Anthony Barboza, and Jerry Jack.In the early 2000s, Says began presenting annual fashion shows in Newark. His work was also featured in the Thurgood Marshall College Fund’s annual fashion shows in both 2007 and 2008. Visual records of his collaborations with prominent icons in the ballroom scene like Sinia, Danielle Revlon, Karen Covergirl, and Octavia St. Laurent, also appear on platforms like Google Arts & Culture's Ballroom in Focus.Visual records of his collaborations also appear on platforms like Google Arts & Culture's Ballroom in Focus, where he is featured alongside ballroom icons he styled like Octavia St. Laurent and Tracey Africa Norman captured by the photographer Luna Luis Ortiz. Says first introduced Gerard Gaskin, a prominent photographer of ballroom culture, to the scene in 1993. Gaskin's first series titled "Douglas' Girls" was the beginning of Gaskin's 2013 book Legendary: Inside the House Ballroom Scene which won the Center for Documentary Studies /Honickman First Book Prize.
Alongside his design work, Says self-published two books, Amuse and The Red Dress,which features models wearing his garments His work has appeared in several books and anthologies, including Mainhattanmanhattan, NYC Go-Go by Slava Mogutin, The Way We Wore by Michael McCollom, and Queer Newark: Stories of Resistance, Love, and Community edited by Whitney Strub.
Legacy
Publications like Black Fashion History, Swerv Magazine, and the Vera Center for Arts and Politics, among others focused on Black fashion history and ballroom culture have recorded Douglas Says' visual and material contributions. In 2007, his designs were included in the Black Style Now exhibition at the Museum of the City of New York. For the exhibition "The Story of Newark Fashion: Atelier to Runway" curated by Kristen J. Owens, the museum commissioned the painter Mickalene Thomas to create a full-length portrait of Tracey Africa Norman wearing a Douglas Says gown.Swerv magazine featured Douglas Says and Tracey "Africa" Norman on the cover of the September–October 2017 issue. The feature article celebrated their decades long friendship and collaborations as designer and muse respectively.
Douglas Says still resides in Newark, New Jersey, where he remains involved in local fashion and arts communities.His work across design, authorship, and styling has continued to inspire designers. Scholars Mary Rizzo and Christina Strasburger reflecting about how Douglas Says influenced the creation of the Queer Newark walking tour write their essay within the anthology, Queer Newark: Stories of Resistance, Love, and Community, "Fashion Designer Douglas Says saw the closing of Murphy's as a huge loss to Newark's gay community. He said, "we have no place to go. There's no gay spots. None, absolutely none. Once Murphy's left, that was the last of it.... It's like we've been shunned, kicked--it's like we've been pushed back in the closet." Say's words complicated media narratives about LGBTQ communities,which often describe gay people as experiencing more freedom over time." Rizzo and Strasburger use Says’s account to argue that establishments such as Murphy’s functioned as vital cultural and social infrastructure, and that their disappearance marked not progress but contraction—revealing how gay bars and clubs were central to sustaining Black LGBTQ community life in Newark and why figures like Says remain important witnesses to these histories.