In the Middle of Fashion Week, Gucci Traveled to Detroit for a Gucci Changemakers Celebration

Fashion is a global endeavor. Brands cross continents and oceans in order to entice and engage their audiences. Yet, our everyday lives, identities, communities, and histories are very much a local affair. Navigating between the two has its perils and pit stops but also a lot of promise and potential. Case in point: Gucci.

As one of Italy’s biggest brands, Gucci has consistently and fearlessly thrown its support and raised its stakes in the global communities it means to cultivate. In 2017, they helped revive Dapper Dan’s studio in Harlem after a 25-year hiatus (he won the CFDA Lifetime Achievement Award this past year). In 2018, after the tragic shootings at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, it promptly made a $500,000 donation to March for Our Lives in support of gun control. And in 2019, it launched Gucci Changemakers North America, a scholarship and impact fund for grass-roots organizations and young creatives of diverse ethnic and racial backgrounds. The initiative identified Detroit as one of its key cities of focus and thus began Gucci’s love affair with Motor City’s rich history and culture. Three years in and busting out of the pandemic, Gucci celebrated the initiative, its scholars, and a new store on Liberty Street with a bash kicking off Detroit Month of Design.

Festivities were held on Thursday, September 8, at the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit. On view was “Building a Lasting Impact,” an exhibition spotlighting the work of Gucci Changemaker’s growing list of recipients. Gucci EVP, chief brand and client officer Susan Chokachi gave opening remarks reaffirming the brand’s commitment to culture, community, and creating positive change; Jessica Care Moore recited an original poem, “We Wear the Working Day,” commissioned by Gucci Changemakers. DJ BMAJR filled the space with the booming beats of classic Detroit house. The mood was exuberant as locals enthusiastically welcomed their newest neighbor. Amid the revelry came a moment for reflection and appreciation for what Gucci Changemakers has accomplished.

Essence SVP of creative and interim deputy director Corey Stokes is a native of Flint, Michigan, and was in town for the night’s events, “It’s really exciting to know that a brand like Gucci is really invested not just in young talent but also in a city like Detroit that is more than deserving of tonight’s celebration.”

“This is coming to fruition from a lot of work and planning and a lot of outreach and love,” said New York fashion veteran and Detroit native Tracy Reese as she surveyed the crowd, “It’s so nice to be here to see young people experience all of this.”

Gucci Changemakers has been the collective effort of a board that includes Bethann Hardison and Michaela Angela Davis, both of whom were in attendance. “It’s a complicated ecosystem to build equity in, it’s hard work to create room when there is no room,” Davis spoke, referring to the lack of representation and diversity that has troubled the fashion industry. “With a heritage brand like Gucci that is 100 years in and at the top of its game, it can be a model of how to evolve and really set an example for the rest of the industry.”

With an iconic career spanning decades, Bethann Hardison has witnessed fashion’s evolution firsthand “The industry, corporations, and the world are changing. This is all happening right on time. I loved that it’s happened and I love the joy that Gucci gets out of it.”

Though the party lasted only a night, the relationships Gucci Changemakers has forged will live on indefinitely. “It’s a real community we’re creating. We’re staying with them, mentoring them,” Davis said of the Gucci Change makers awardees, “That’s the ecosystem we’re trying to build.”

Gucci, like its wildly creative and dauntless luxury fare, is shifting paradigms and rewriting the rules. Global is local. The personal is political and when it comes to fashion, change is truly the name of the game.