The ‘Timeless Dressing’ of HBCU Students Is Featured In New Ralph Lauren Collection

Fashion icon Ralph Lauren set the industry abuzz with a new collection that pays homage to Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Students from Spelman and Morehouse Colleges dressed in cable sweaters and tweeds pose on the lush lawn of a campus in scenes that bear the imprimatur of the designer recognized globally for his all-American style.

The collection drops on March 29 but a preview is available on Lauren’s website. In a videotape accompanying the promotion, Lauren said, “Since I started my company over 50 years, I consider it our greatest responsibility to understand, be inspired by and aspire to the dreams of all those who call this country home. When I was approached with the idea of a collection inspired by the heritage and traditions of the timeless dressing of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, it became clear that part of our design sensibility has been missing.”

On twitter alumni and others celebrated the collaboration.

New HBCU Streaming Platform

On the same day as Lauren’s announcement became public, Entertainment Studios which includes the Weather Channel and is owned by media mogul Byron Allen also shared plans to launch HBCU Go – a streaming platform that will offer sports and entertainment content.

Allen and his team unveiled the network during a webinar for Black-owned media executives, creatives and other stakeholders.

Curtis Symonds, a member of the launch team, said, “We’re going to be the one-stop to reach Black America.”

Difficult start to 2022

It’s been over a month since a spate of bomb threats targeted numerous Historically Black Colleges and Universities. The threats sent students, alumni and administrators into a state of high alert at the outset of Black History Month and served as a reminder of the hundreds of years of racism and violence directed at the African American community and its institutions.

The FBI began an investigation and identified six white youth as persons of interest, creating concern that the ages of the possible suspects may minimize the serious nature of the crime.

During a Southern Poverty Law Center roundtable, Alcorn State University President Felicia Nave said, “I would hope that the public sentiment does not soften but I would also hope that those children are provided with the necessary resources and mental health treatment that’s needed to begin to help change and cultivate a more positive place of being, place of development and understanding. They’re in a very critical point and time in their life and development … we are living in a time that just filled with extremes. What we don’t want is it to start replicate itself and we see other children taking up the same mantle or a counter movement.”

Nave also expressed concern that students at HBCUs where the threats were directed had been “traumatized.”