18 minute read
BEHIND THE RUNWAY
Meet Designer, Tameekah "Murph" Murphy of Alani Taylor Designs and cocreator of Deviant Lie and The Zenneth Collection. Her designs have been seen on Beyonce, Cardi B, Serena Williams and more! Learn more about how she became a designer and how one of her designs ended up in Black is King. Intagram: @alanitaylorco @alanitaylorst | www.alanitaylor.com
Why Timeekah Murphy designs I just design. I just love what I do and I'm not out here for, of course I want people to respect the craft and everything like that, but I'm not doing it for recognition. I'm doing it to make people feel good, to make people when they walk out the house, you just turn into a whole different person.
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The Zenith Experience I don't know if y'all know who Ray is Sam- I got to put her on. This is like the next generation fashion designer right here. So she just showcased on last Friday at the Zenith experience and everybody was going crazy over her clothes. when I created the Zenith for people like her, like creative designers that think outside the box. So when we showcase to you guys, [you] can say they brought a show, there were true artists who have that creative mind and she's one of them, a rare breed for real. Zenith Collection with Brittany Duet So I met Brittany [Duet], well, at the time before we met, I had met Brittany five years ago. I was still designing, I started in 2010 while I was in the military and one of my friends introduced us again in 2017. I had just got to LA and Brittany, when I met her, she had these ideas that she wanted to get out and she hadn't met anybody that kind of, I guess you could say interview that really understood what she was trying to do or knew how to bring it out. So originally what people don't know about the story is Deviant wasn't created. When Brittany started, it was Deviant I don't think we had Deviant yet or maybe she did, but it was latex. So she wanted to start a latex line and then one day fast forward a little bit she started playing with these ropes. So she started playing with ropes and created like this little skimpy, like barely anything there and people on her live was like, yo, that looks cool. But it was nothing, nothing compared to what you see today. So she called me over and I saw it and I was like, yo, that's what we need to do. We need to figure out how to make this into art because this is different. No one's doing it and even if they did, it's not popping like how this is. So that's when we transitioned from latex to her agreeing I'm going to focus on doing ropes. So for about three months, everyday nonstop, we started creating, creating, creating, trying to figure out how we can get the garment off? How could it be wearable? So I would make corsets from scratch for the back of it and then it became something. And I think at the end of 2017 I told Brittany, you need to be in a fashion show.
Ashanti in Zenith Collection Photo: Instagram/@Ashanti
So I bring her on with Society Fashion Week. Everybody loved it. So we were like the duo that will open and close for each other at fashion shows. So we would open with Alani Taylor and close with Deviant especially because it was more a sex appeal than anything and that's like to keep the crowd going. So we did that. We partnered for two years on that. Deviant became a thing.
The first collaboration with Beyonce One day Brittany got an email from Zerina Akers and she was like, "Hey I have my client Beyoncé that I need you to do something for." So she called me and she was like, "Are you ready to die?" And I'm like, "No, I'm not." but she was like we have to design for Beyoncé and I went crazy. Like, no, no! This was Lion King. Spirit and Bigger video. So it was exciting until the work time came and the deadlines. So at first [Zerina] said, I need 20 pieces but then she was like, okay, I need 10 pieces for dancers and one piece for Beyonce in four days and everything we were doing was handmade. There's no sewing on a machine. I had to hand sew every single piece. I had to hand sew the rings on the back of it to do the whole corset part. Brittany was gluing, creating. So we did that.
The experience with Cardi B Kollin [Carter] called for Cardi B and was like Hey! So we're driving to her hotel and I'm like "we're going to go see Cardi B!" And I'm not even star-struck at all, but it had nothing to do with being starstruck. It had to do with fashion getting me here. You know what I'm saying? Fashion got me in this door. It got me this opportunity and I wasn't into fashion growing up. I knew nothing about it. So that alone I'm like, yo, I'm really about to go see Cardi B for fashion. So I went to Cardi's hotel and I had to sew the rest of the pieces onto her to make sure it fits perfectly. That was an experience within itself cause Cardi is Cardi and I love her for it.
Beyoncé in Zenith Collection Photo by Parkwood Entertainment/Disney+
Cardi B in Zenith Collection Photos by Alani Taylor/BET (left/right) WWW.ILOVEFLAME.COM
Alani Taylor x Deviant La Vie So we did the Zenith experience. So what we wanted to do, because I was getting lost in Deviant. I had my own brand already coming up. Upcoming designers, everybody looked at me as and I had styled different people, but I kind of walked away from Alani Taylor. I started losing myself because once I see greatness, I want to be a part of your story. So even if that takes me sacrificing my greatness to help you with yours, because I know that I'm great and anything that I touch is going to be gold. I knew that I could afford to step away from mine and still come back and be great. So I gave all my time to Deviant, but also I started getting frustrated that I wasn't getting the respect that I deserve. People started thinking that I was her help, I was her assistant, that all the work was done by her and it started making me look at her a certain way and we eventually, we was just like, you know what, we can't do this. But going backwards last year before I walked away, what we tried to do was the Zenith collection, which is both brands together. We tried to bring the ropes and the dresses cause I sew, she doesn't. We tried to bring it together and introduce ourselves to the fashion industry. This is Brittany Duet of Deviant, my name is Murph of Alani Taylor and we wanted to show you how two creatives can come together and create magic. That didn't work. It didn't work. After the Zenith collection was released, all you saw was Deviant, Deviant, Deviant and I started realizing that people didn't want the Black face a part of the greatness and people only wanted to see Brittany Duet and I couldn't take that because I'm like, I stopped working for my daughter to work for this and I was just like if I can build what I built for Deviant, I can do that for myself. And I was just like, I got to go and then this happened.
Not getting credit Fashion Bomb Daily, they [had] it all wrong. [They] had Deviant La Vie as a Black owned business right now and hasn't changed it yet. I'm tired of fighting for it. I'm just like, you know what there's no more collaboration between Alani Taylor and Deviant. So everything now is whatever lane I create for myself. If I fail, I only have myself to blame. I can't look at Deviant anymore and be like, "you know what? This is your fault." And then part of that responsibility needs to be taken and I guess that's why we went on [IG] live cause I really wanted Brittany to own up too you know, "I could have done better."
So we were like the duo that will open and close for each other at fashion shows. So we would open with Alani Taylor and close with Deviant especially because it was more a sex appeal than anything and that's like to keep the crowd going. So we did that. We partnered for two years on that. Deviant became a thing.
Beyoncé - Black is King So then last year Zerina called again and was like, Hey! I knew a year ago that Beyoncé was going to wear the dress. I didn't know it was going to look the way it looked on a TV screen. So that's how I got here.
Initial reaction upon seeing design in Black is King Oh my God, I lost my voice within two minutes. I went crazy. It was me, my stylist, one of my models and one of my assistants here and we were up, we were not about to miss it. When it came on, again I didn't know, I just know because Beyonce bought the dress from me. Like when they came and picked it up, they were like, she wants to keep the white dress. She wants to buy it or whatever and they sent everything else from the collection back. So you're talking about waiting 365 days to see what Beyoncé was going to do. So all year after she picked it up, they were like, yeah. So they told one of the assistants that came, he was like, yes, she's doing 12 videos or whatever and we never knew if it was coming the same year that she brought it or now, a year later. And so in my career at the time, I was just like, man, this would be the perfect time for Beyoncé to drop that dress. All year I was saying it. I believe in God. I'm only here because of God. So I know how God works. I know how the universe works. Then when I was wanting it, I wasn't ready. I wasn't ready mentally. I wasn't ready spiritually. I didn't have the team that I'm supposed to have now then. So man, I went crazy. And I had just [seen], you know how it shows the little piece of them carrying her and then it goes away. I was like it's no that's all I'm going to get. I said, please that's not it. That's not it. But when I saw it, we rewinded it. I screamed again, everybody screamed. Like we have the video of the model and a stylist recording it and yeah man.
Beyoncé in Zenith Collection Photos by Parkwood Ent/Disney+ But no, man, I can't even explain how I felt. I really can't. I just knew my voice was gone in two minutes. And when I wake up now, it did something to me like as a person to know, like, yes, I created history with Deviant, but now the conversation of Alani Taylor and Beyonce are in the same category, in the same sentence and that's what I've been fighting for.
Inspiration behind the white dress Nothing and that's the crazy part about it. Like, nothing was inspirational. We had colors that we wanted to stick with and we wanted to make sure we did an all white piece. I think it came from me making a hat. I put the hat on that mannequin and I was like, yo, like, this is crazy. So then we started coming up with [something]. So it would be sometimes Brittany would create a rope piece and then the idea of everything else would come behind that rope because you can't make the garment before the rope is made, because I now have to sew that rope into that garment. So we had the white piece, we had a blue piece that was crazy insane. Although she needed to make what was in her head first and then once she was done, she could go to sleep and then I had to come and say, how can I make this fire? So that rope piece would just be sitting on a mannequin and now I got to work all of that. So I knew I wanted [the dress] to be a twopart thing with the Beyoncé piece. So I created the skirt of course, put that on and then we knew if it was going to be for anybody, I needed to put something to cover their bra area and all that and that's when the whole Marilyn Monroe started coming through with the gloves and everything. So it never came from anything. It was just literally two creatives coming together and doing everything from scratch. Again, I don't draw, I don't create patterns, everything that I do when I make it's in my head. So I'm just going to make it.
Telling her daughter All I could think about was like, and I woke my daughter up because I just wanted her to see, like Alani you don't understand right now but that belongs to you. You know what I'm saying? This is an icon that you will learn about and understand that's going to be written in history and she has your name on her back right now. But she was like, "Yeah, mom." Like, she didn't understand. So I'm like, I just wish you do right now. So when Beyoncé comes on TV now and I'm playing Beyoncé all day now, especially 27 minutes and 36 seconds when that just came out. So when she sees Beyoncé on TV, now she's like, that's my cousin. I don't know who told you that, but whatever you want.
The price going up I'm having a hard time with that. I'm so having a hard time with the prices going up thing, because I know where I came from. To the people like yourself, to the people who have been there when I was doing street wear only, I catered to them. This is why I do it. I love the fact that celebrities wear my clothes, but they're not my target at all.
Failing not being an option Not all at all, not at all. The Military taught me that. I can't fail, I can't fail. When the mission is given, I'm going to complete it. Like it's no other way. I'm not just fighting for my name, I'm fighting for my daughter's name. You will not take that away from her. So I'll probably fight way harder for her than I would for myself. So they got trouble when it comes to her name.
Making garments without patterns No, I don't make patterns for my pants at all. I don't make patterns for anything because ever since I got my brain injury I register things differently. So if I made that pattern, I'm going to lose it anyway cause I'm not going to remember. So I had to teach myself how to start, trying to keep certain things in my head, repetition, repetition. So, because I was making these all day every day, I literally just, if I have your measurements, the pattern is made from my eye and yeah and that's it. So she knew that in order for me to do something, you either got to draw it and let me see the whole thing and I will say how that pattern is supposed to be and just cut it or I had to make it and we fixed whatever errors need to be fixed while the garment's made. But yeah, we never touched patterns or anything like that. A talent I didn't know I have. Like I said, me getting hurt was a gift and a curse because it taught me different ways to like kind of maneuver through life. "I'm not just fighting for my name, I'm fighting for my daughter's name."
How brain injury changed her life I got to keep bringing it up cause my brain injury changed my life. So a lot of things that I do and where I am, it has to do with that because who I am now with a brain injury, wasn't who I was before. Again, he literally, like I got to write everything you have ever been through as a kid out of your life because if I don't, I can't get you where you need to go. When I had gotten hurt, when I woke up I was in a coma. When I woke up, I couldn't remember nothing. So I had to create all new memories and I knew that growing up, I was molested from the time I was 2 to 16 years old. So I got the brain injury in 2013 and I woke up, of course, I still had to heal and I had these crazy visions and can only remember bad things that were happening. But I'm so serious when I say I am who I am today because I had to create myself all over again cause I guess He's like, yeah, you were messed up. Like you went through a lot. And if I had to carry that with me, I probably would've been dead because as a kid, I was told, I tried to commit suicide tons of times starting at seven years old.
So when I say, I don't know how I got here, one it's because what I remember, I didn't know how to dress for nothing. I didn't know nothing about clothes. I didn't grow up with money. I didn't have a mother. I didn't have a father. It was just my brothers, my cousins, my grandmother, my uncles. Everybody with standard mindsets and they said from birth, you was always that kid that like, we would go steal candy from the candy store because one, we didn't have money to buy it and my brothers and them would be eating their candy and I'm on a corner selling it back to people to make the money back. So I always knew I was different then my family and they will even say it too. But still, when I wake up, I don't know how I got here, with the patterns, the creations. But I just go with the universe, man.
Adding womenswear to the brand I'm tired of y'all attacking me. Okay. I'm in love with menswear. My design started from how I dress and I knew that that was unisex. So you can take anything that I created and a woman if she had that fashion sense she can make it bomb. But I knew that it was easier for a man to dress in Alani Taylor than a woman. So a lot of my garments that I create women that don't have that fashion sense can't really see themselves in it if it doesn't have a woman's physique to it. So I really did get tired of y'all coming at me and saying when are you going to do stuff strictly for women. And anything that I do, if I can't give my all to it, I don't want to do it. Like they say, plus size, I would love to do it but I don't think that I'm at that point where I can give plus size women what they deserve as a designer. So when I get there, they'll have it. Right now I've mastered women's clothing cause I was scared of it coming up, that's why I didn't do it and now I know how to create women's garments and still keep Alani Taylor to be a part of the aesthetic. So that's where I'm at. I'm excited about it. I can't wait for people to see what we create. It's going to be dope.
