sktoriginals

In this portrait, an Asian American woman stands poised in full Renaissance attire — a corseted bodice, voluminous sleeves — each stitch a deliberate echo of the past. The costume is not mere dress-up, but a reclamation: an embodiment of her role as a fashion historian, someone who studies, preserves, and breathes life into the garments of history. Her presence disrupts expectations. As an Asian American within the European sartorial tradition, she challenges the gaze — not to assimilate, but to interrogate. What stories are preserved in the seams of a gown? Who gets to wear this history when she is of mixed race? Her identity complicates the narrative, enriching it with questions of belonging, erasure, and cultural legacy. By placing herself in this frame, she asserts her right to study, wear, and interpret the garments of a history that has not always included her — and in doing so, she rewrites the story, thread by thread.