If there’s one thing Willie Norris is known for, it’s being frank. “Real, honest work is the most radical thing you can do,” the New York-based designer tells me. “There’s so little radical honesty in fashion, and in the world, honestly.”
That honesty is plastered all over their best-known work, which lays cheeky, sharp proclamations about queer liberation across T-shirts and other garments, like “Promote Homosexuality,” “The Words Are Right in Front of You,” and “What Exactly Is Heterosexuality and What Causes It?” Those pieces — part Jenny Holzer, part protest — made waves after Norris released her debut collection under the brand WILLIENORRISWORKSHOP in 2019. Even the show itself — which featured a cast of diverse queer models, including Aaron Philip, West Dakota, and yours truly, and opted for a June presentation rather than a usual NYFW runway — was proof of Norris’ rebel spirit.
Her commitment to doing her own thing has paid off, garnering acclaim from the likes of Vogue and The Cut, and leading to a collaboration with Helmut Lang last year, aptly titled “Helmut Language.” Yet Norris’ latest venture is a more subtle attempt to spark a queer revolution: reimagining traditional menswear, with its masculine silhouettes and reliance on clean, straight lines, from a genderfluid and transgender perspective.
Before WILLIENORRISWORKSHOP, Norris had been working as a design director at the ready-to-wear menswear brand Outlier since 2015. For many fashion creatives working under established lines, branching out on one’s own can jeopardize one’s career — but luckily, Norris had Outlier’s full support. After coming out as trans over the last year, a process she says helped her see design through a more kaleidoscopic lens, Norris signaled a desire to reshape Outlier’s aesthetic from her own point of view.
That led to a line of products Norris presented at NYFW in September called “IDEAS FOR SPRING,” which were simply meant to provoke conversation about how menswear could evolve. The clothes themselves, which include a tailored, multi-colored tank and a belt that is also a bag, had a distinctly androgynous bent. One of Norris’ favorite items, a pant she calls “Injected Linen Highdarts,” are being made available today through Outlier’s website, with more to follow.
Norris emphasizes how rare it is to see the kind of “voracious support” of Outlier’s customers and founders that she has. “I think what I am doing as a trans woman designer at the helm of a menswear brand is quite important,” she says, “and the tension between these two things is creating some incredibly exciting stuff.” Now, after discontinuing the T-shirts that elevated her name, Norris is diving headfirst into her work at Outlier and beyond, still, as ever, aiming to make clothes that empower its wearers.
