Meet Sierra Luella Mink. The girl from St. Louis, Missouri who's made a home and a name for herself in NYC. I met Luella in person after a poetry show at Le Poisson Rouge but prior to that she always caught my eye on the internet as the girl with the perfectly done face & eyebrows with the afro. (My girlfriend more-so noticed the eyebrows than I did.) I'd always wondered if she did make-up professionally.
When it came down to choosing features for Signature Style, Luella Mink was always somewhere at the top of the list. Well here we are for our first feature shot in the city. I met Luella at her new apartment near Columbus Circle where she introduced me to her cats & kittens and a huge rolled out poster of Kathleen Cleaver that she printed out herself. Once acquaintances were met, we got to talking. It turns out Luella actually started doing make-up professionally at the age 15. Now she's in the business of "making things". In St. Louis, she went to art schools for her entire young life but never went to college. If you ask Luella, people who plan to be artists shouldn't have to go to school. Her mother wanted her to be a nurse but Luella clearly had other plans for herself.
In St. Louis, Luella grew up in the inner city but it wasn't until she was 14 that she really gained a deep appreciation for the culture, reading tons of books and studying all she could. This knowledge she keeps with her to this day and manifests itself in her taste, actions and her brand. Luella makes art, posters, accessories, etc. that are reminiscent of Black/African culture making reference to historical figures such as Kathleen Cleaver or Jean Michel Basquiat. This might be difficult for some folk to wrap their heads around but as Steve Biko once said, "Being Black is not a matter of pigmentation. Being Black is a reflection of a mental attitude."
So about Luella Mink's style; In the one day I've spent with her I've certainly learned a lot about it. Let's start out by saying that Luella has way too many clothes to manage. I was nice enough to "steal" a shirt. (I do what I can to take the load off.) As with all our SigStylers, her style sense all comes from within. She wears wigs because she wants to; She has an abundance of different patterns; Lots of long skirts; She rarely wears pants and never wears shorts; And if you ever read her tweets you might know that she doesn't iron anything but I highly doubt you'd ever notice. This is Luella Mink, our new Signature Style feature.
See the full Signature Style feature with Luella Mink below:
Photos by Dexter R. Jones
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