Though a young designer, Jason Wu, 26, seems prepared for all the attention he recieved when the First Lady Michelle Obama decided to pick his dress for the inaugural ball last week. He had been working since he was 16, first as a freelance designer and now a creative designer for a line of dolls called Fashion Royalty, which sell at F.A.O. Schwarz for between $70-$200.
He started his own label in 2006 with personal savings and money from his family. News accounts say his parents were supportive of his talent, driving him to bridal stores to make sketches. He practiced his craft as a child making dresses for dolls.
Okay, forget what I would imagine to be the initial horror of a mother who sees her son making dresses for dolls (whose dolls were they?). But to recover and then support the career aspriations of such a child ... Quite frankly, I think at a certain point, she must have known and just gone with the flow--all the way to the bank, cha-ching!
On another level, the stereotype of gay, Asian men being feminine and viewed (and accepted) by the mainstream as a submissive, flowery presence is again tested. In my opinion, what stands out about Jason Wu is his success as an artist and a business person. While it doesn't broaden the spectrum of professions that young, GAMs can aspire to, Jason Wu's appearance on the public stage here in the U.S. allows for yet another example of how GAMs are an essential part of the fabric that is America. It's up to each of us to do what we can to keep expanding that vision and show its true diversity.
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