Fashion Forward

MI Leggett ’17 lined up outside of the Allen Memorial Art Museum for Art Rental every semester with one piece in mind: a Keith Haring. The art history major wanted Haring’s art in their space as a tool of inspiration: As a fashion designer creating pieces in their dorm room-turned-studio, Leggett was deeply influenced by Haring’s ability to use commercial objects to make explicitly political and queer high art accessible to the broader public.

Over the years, Leggett had remarkable luck with Art Rental, scoring pieces by Picasso, Jasper Johns, and Barbara Kruger. However, the Haring work evaded them each semester—until the spring of 2017, when they finally scored the piece they had waited for, Haring’s Untitled 1, from the series Untitled 1-6. The timing was perfect; by this point, Leggett had started Official Rebrand, an anti-waste, gender-free fashion line.

Official Rebrand’s lines are full of inventive, one-of-a-kind hand-painted garments and custom layered pieces made from upcycling fabric. Imagine a skirt made entirely from discarded skirt hems that were stitched together, or a tank top patterned with a scan of a box of testosterone. Or you might pair a tank top ripped into something resembling a rib cage with a jacket covered in an abstract swan painting.

To date, Official Rebrand’s designs have received attention from publications such as the New York Times, Teen Vogue, Elle, GQ, and Them. “Creating upcycled, gender-free clothing is what I am meant to do and truly the best way for me to positively impact my community,” Leggett says.

At Oberlin, they began as an environmental studies major but as a first-year student quickly fell in love with the art history and studio art departments after taking an abstract painting class with then-Young-Hunter Professor of Art John Pearson. “It rocked my world,” Leggett says. “It was a challenging time for me, socially and emotionally, so having that studio space to retreat into was really important for me.”

As a student, they also found solace in their on-campus job at the ’Sco. “You have to make your own fun at Oberlin, so I was involved in a lot of event coordinating,” Leggett notes. “It taught me about production and logistical planning, which became really helpful later on as an independent artist. Be the party you wish to see in the world.”

This event planning experience led to involvement in Berlin’s queer arts communities during semesters abroad. Official Rebrand—the name began as “an Instagram handle joke about me rebranding from liberal arts college girl to genderqueer artist in Berlin,” Leggett playfully recalls—began during that time of exploration, when they were collaborating with all kinds of artists.

This included an independent avant-garde fashion designer whose approach to reconstructing clothing inspired Leggett’s own wardrobe and outfits as they explored their gender identity. “I hadn’t come out as nonbinary yet, but I didn’t feel comfortable or like I fit into preordained gendered clothing,” Leggett says. “Berlin has a culture of leaving clothes outside, much like Oberlin’s free bins and free store, providing me with endless material to play with.

“I could limitlessly take things apart and put them back together, painting things as I went,” they continued. “I was playing around and figuring out what made me feel good. Making crazy outfits helped me develop a sense of how I wanted to show up in the world.”