On the life and legacy of L.A. designer Invoice Whitten

Portrait of Invoice Whitten.

(Courtesy of Margo Cross)

Dec. 9, 1984. Thunder and lightning crackled over the strobing sky. All of a sudden, a yellow glow emerged over the horizon. Blinding mild gave solution to 5 male silhouettes. Increase. Increase. They descended stairs as if from the heavens. Increase. Their heels reached the final step; a chord struck. The dazzle of their outfits eclipsed the afterglow of the sunshine. They slowly reached up their palms to take off their glasses. The central determine revealed his face a breath earlier than the others, his proper hand sheathed in a stunning white glove.

Hysteria. The screams of crying followers overflowed from Dodger Stadium into the hills of Elysian Park. It was Michael Jackson with the Jackson brothers on their Victory tour!

The screams wouldn’t have reached the Hollywood Hills, the place Invoice Whitten wound down after a typical Sunday cooking Southern-style collard greens and cornbread in his eclectic house stuffed with African and Black American minstrel artwork.

It had been a busy yr — nay, decade — for the Jacksons’ costume designer, the picture architect behind Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” and “Dangerous” eras. Whitten most famously designed MJ’s singular white glove, however had been recognized — for individuals who have been within the know — because the “Black Bob Mackie” after Neil Diamond found Whitten’s West Hollywood store, Workroom 27, within the early ‘70s.

Diamond. Earth, Wind and Fireplace. Elton John. The Commodores. Lionel Richie. George Benson. The Jacksons. Edgar Winter. Smokey Robinson. Stevie Surprise. Siegfried and Roy. Whitten did all of them.

However regardless of his spectacular shopper checklist, Whitten himself continues to be comparatively unknown — a disappointment for individuals who knew and celebrated him. As appreciation for menswear surges, it’s late time to look at the life and legacy of the person who transcended the established order of stage costuming, creating probably the most enduring photos of the twentieth century.

Earth, Wind and Fireplace performing in costumes designed by Invoice Whitten.

(Courtesy of Vaughn Terry Jelks)

“God is within the particulars” – Invoice Whitten

Born in 1944, Whitten got here to glitzy Los Angeles from dusty Bessemer, Ala. Going to high school in garments handmade by their seamstress mom, Annie Bell, the seven Cross-Whitten youngsters (from two marriages) all the time appeared sharp, in accordance with Jack Whitten, the embellished American painter who occurred to be Invoice’s older brother. The best way Jack put it in dialog with critic Robert Storr, the entire siblings have been gifted, however he and “Billy” had the self-discipline to hold out their artistry.

After graduating from Dunbar Excessive Faculty, Invoice Whitten break up city and moved in with one other older brother, James, who had already made the transfer to Los Angeles. Whitten studied design at Los Angeles Commerce Tech and began his profession within the Garment District working for junior traces and making elaborate menswear shirts that have been quickly picked up by well-regarded menswear retailer Eric Ross & Co. in Beverly Hills.

Invoice Whitten, his brother Jack who was a well-known painter, and Jack’s daughter Mirsini.

(Courtesy of Margo Cross)

Invoice Whitten with Nicole Richie.

(Courtesy of Margo Cross)

Vaughn Terry Jelks and Louis Wells with Invoice Whitten on the “Purple Rain” premiere.

(Courtesy of Vaughn Terry Jelks)

Invoice Whitten at Bon Choix Couture.

(Courtesy of Bon Choix Couture)

In keeping with archival newspaper clippings, Whitten struck out on his personal with Workroom 27 someplace between 1968 and 1970. Quickly, he’d develop into a favourite among the many Hollywood crowd. His swanky West Hollywood atelier had colourful wallpaper and African masks on the partitions, an enormous potbelly range and a full bar, the place clients may indulge all through a becoming.

“You couldn’t simply go in there and purchase a bespoke swimsuit,” says photographer Bruce Talamon, who captured Whitten doing a becoming with Eddie Kendricks for Soul journal in 1975. “You needed to cross the take a look at to get into the door.”

On the time, Whitten’s important opponents have been Bob Mackie and James Galanos — each womenswear designers. However in a decade finest outlined by large lapels, flared pants, afros and platform footwear, Whitten introduced the bugle-beading extravagance of a Cher or Diana Ross to menswear, and particularly to Black acts — the majority of his clientele.

“The Black acts need to come to Invoice as a result of we was bringing the participant swag,” says designer and tailor Vaughn Terry Jelks, who received his begin at Workroom 27. “I imply, what does Bob Mackie find out about ‘Psychedelic Shack’ and ‘Shaft’ and ‘Tremendous Fly’?”

Identified for pushing the boundaries of fabrication, Whitten’s telltale as a designer was his distinctive patchwork building. The fish pores and skin pants he designed for Michael Jackson usually are not composed of 5 to 6 sample items (like many ready-to-wear pants are), however dozens of small items of pores and skin sewed collectively, then backed on cotton. A menswear jacket initially made for Doc Severinsen has dozens of Levi’s jean patterns overlapping and crisscrossing, full with zippers for embellishment, again pockets for the jacket’s important pockets and an vintage U.S. quarter greenback because the fastening button.

“To give you any such sample, it’s like a maniacal, mad scientist,” says the proprietor of Classic on Hollywood, Brian Cohen, who now holds the jean jacket in his private assortment.

“He put stuff collectively that you just wouldn’t suppose goes collectively,” says Keith Holman, a designer who received his begin aiding Whitten. “Wild,” he says, is one of the simplest ways to explain a few of Whitten’s fits.

As a dressing up designer, Whitten wasn’t simply pondering deeply in regards to the aesthetics of his clothes, but in addition how they might mould to a performing physique. How do the jacket arms increase when an artist is dancing? Can the garment face up to a grueling and sweaty tour? Are the costumes, meant to reinforce the artist’s actions, seen from a budget seats? Regardless of, say, the burden of clothes coated completely in crystals, Whitten ensured performers would look sharp on stage. In flip, artists got here to Whitten as a result of they knew he would make them look the a part of stars.

Sooner or later in 1980, after Workroom 27 moved from West Hollywood to Glendale, Whitten got here into the again room and located Jelks engaged on guitar straps for Earth, Wind and Fireplace’s Johnny Graham.

“What? No person ran that previous me,” Jelks remembers Whitten saying (in a reasonably reserved reproach from a person recognized to fly off when perturbed). “Give me the hours that you just’ve labored on, every little thing you’ve labored on, you perceive?”

What Jelks didn’t but perceive was that his work may have been billable hours, and with Whitten — who labored on designs and then despatched an bill to the tearful accountant, reasonably than designing from a predetermined funds — each little element added up.

“Let the work communicate for itself” – Invoice Whitten

For all of Whitten’s work, a lot of it’s misplaced to time. Within the heyday of the ’70s, costumes have been simply that — costumes.

“Individuals didn’t see costumes as one thing that you just preserved,” says costumer Tony Villanueva, who first labored with Whitten within the mid ’80s. After a tour, if the artist didn’t have a group excited about a future archive, costumes can be shipped from abroad again to warehouses in the US. “You weren’t alleged to acknowledge there was a backstage or something in regards to the background, or something that wasn’t actually the artist performing.”

In different circumstances, Black artists didn’t have the posh of sustaining an archive, says Jelks, as was the case of Earth, Wind and Fireplace’s Maurice White, who offered a lot of the group’s costumes when cash received tight.

Whitten’s work may go missed as a result of, on prime of working primarily in costume design reasonably than within the extra revered world of trend, Whitten was based mostly in Los Angeles.

“I feel that there’s this tendency to miss West Coast designers, and it’s one thing that I can acknowledge in my observances simply casually, however I additionally see so many examples of designers in our museum assortment that illustrate this theme repeatedly,” says Christina Frank, a curator on the L.A.-based ASU FIDM Museum, who has spent the final yr researching Whitten and his legacy, and is how Picture first encountered Whitten’s story.

In 2011, a personal donor gifted FIDM a 30-piece wardrobe, all designed by Invoice Whitten’s Workroom 27. Richard Wolfe, the donor for whom the customized appears to be like have been made, doubtless crossed paths with Whitten within the late ’70s, when Wolfe labored as vice chairman of video expertise for twentieth Century Fox. The gathering was then tucked away into FIDM’s archives till Frank’s colleague posted one of many blazers on Instagram, highlighting the garment’s mesh of “Victorian-style piecework and embroidery with precision mitered tailoring.”

The next engagement was “putting,” says Frank, who explains that the big accession of each day menswear trend helped broaden the standard notion of Whitten’s brilliance being restricted to costume design. Spurred on, Frank quickly posted an Instagram reel elaborating additional on Whitten’s profession.

“Typically, individuals who work in museums are actually within the archive and caring for the objects retains them going, and whereas I undoubtedly have that aspect to me, what I’m actually enthusiastic about is, how do I get folks proper now to be excited by these objects?” she says. And true to her intentions, the reel caught the eye of Maiya Sykes, an L.A.-based performer and Whitten’s great-niece, who supplied Frank a extra private understanding of the designer.

However disappointingly for Frank, the Instagram reel didn’t be a magnet for the esteemed trend institute that was at the moment engaged on a present about Black male sartorial self-representation.

“I actually was like, ‘Are they gonna contact us?’” Frank says of the Metropolitan Museum of Artwork’s Costume Institute, whose spring 2025 exhibit “Superfine: Tailoring Black Fashion” is the primary devoted to menswear in over 20 years.

Frank’s disappointment was mirrored by Talamon, who took the superhero shot of Earth, Wind and Fireplace, inducted into the Nationwide Portrait Gallery, that was included within the “Superfine” official monograph.

“They name me, they are saying, ‘Hey, you recognize, we’d love to make use of your {photograph} of Earth, Wind and Fireplace,’” says Talamon of the Met’s preliminary method to license his picture. “Nicely, nice, ‘You already know it was a Black man who designed the costumes,’” he instructed them.

“Their reply was, ‘Nicely, we need to present your {photograph} — it was form of an illustration to point out what was taking place — however we’re celebrating this different younger Black designer,’” Talamon says. “Nicely, that younger Black designer won’t have had a profession if it wasn’t for any person like Invoice Whitten.”

The proof of Whitten’s affect is within the exhibit itself: Past the picture showcasing Whitten’s customized designs for all 9 members of Earth, Wind and Fireplace, there’s additionally a Prince shirt designed by Jelks and Louis Wells, who have been Whitten’s proteges, within the part on Black male magnificence. (The Met didn’t reply to a request for remark.)

Whereas folks like Frank grapple with how you can recenter Whitten’s contributions now, Whitten knew his influence whereas he was alive. He referred to himself as an “picture maker,” as his brother Jack revealed in an essay in photographer Bruce Weber’s 2016 e-book “Wild Blue Yonder.”

When Whitten began working with a brand new shopper, he first listened to their music. He believed that music got here from the heavens, and that an artist was uniquely blessed with musical skills, says Villanueva. From the music, Whitten would catch inspiration and design one thing that captured the distinctive essence of the artist.

“The one factor that Invoice was nice at was constructing a picture that was endemic to the individual,” says Sykes. “Individuals affiliate costumes that my uncle made with that individual’s picture, as a result of he was excellent at that. He was in search of individuality.”

And the 2011 FIDM accession proves that Whitten’s skill to create “the very best model of your self” wasn’t restricted to stage costume, says Frank.

However the overwhelming feeling among the many technology that labored with Whitten is that by the flip of the millennium the style world not valued the excessive requirements of customized design. Spurred on by the road kinds of hip-hop, the ‘90s kicked off the “age of the stylist,” says wardrobe supervisor Thomas D. Wells, brother to Louis. Artists have been tapping stylists to purchase garments for them, reasonably than working with a designer to create a complete look from scratch, and therefore light costume designers out.

Pasquale Fabrizio, a customized shoemaker, whose uncle and namesake first labored with Whitten, has seen this firsthand. Again within the day, he would take molds of an artist’s foot, finishing the shoemaking course of in-house to make sure sturdiness and luxury for the performer.

Right now, with youthful artists and celebrities “it has nothing to do with high quality, it’s all brand-driven,” Fabrizio says. “That’s how they determine trend with luxurious. So in case you’re doing one thing customized, it doesn’t matter what you construct. If there’s no title, no identify on it, no person touches them.”

This sort of pondering, in fact, ignores that many individuals, representing many specialties, should come collectively to make a standout garment. In Whitten’s case, he carried out an orchestra of the very best artisans in Los Angeles to drag off his intricate designs, together with however not restricted to Stella Ruata and Bessie Nelson at Creative Hand Beading; Warren R. Caton of A1 Pleating and Belting; Fabrizio of Pasquale Shoe Restoration; Andre No. 1 Customized Sneakers; Mariam Barbar and sons of Bon Choix Couture; welders Maggie Schpak and Tom Browne from the outdated Western Costume Co.; and the greater than 30 in-house pattern-makers, cutters, seamstresses and tailors employed throughout Workroom 27’s heyday within the ’70s.

“This will’t be performed,” Caton was recognized to say to Whitten when he’d carry on this or one other merchandise for embellishment.

“That’s why I’m bringing it to you,” Whitten would reply.

Jacket (element), circa 1973. Invoice Whitten. Workroom 27. Present of Richard Wolfe. ASU FIDM Museum Assortment.

“Nobody may disguise their true self from Invoice F. Whitten” – Jack Whitten

As with a lot of his skilled relationships, Whitten’s long-running partnership with Earth, Wind and Fireplace disintegrated, in 1980 (this time, over cash). Jelks and Wells progressively took over store, and when Earth, Wind and Fireplace took a hiatus in 1984, they started designing for a Minnesotan upstart named Prince. Over that very same time interval, Whitten disappeared.

A February 1980 article from the Every day Document, initially sourced by Frank, recounts Whitten’s current admittance to the Mormon priesthood. “It means my firm will change instructions. I’ll by no means work on one other Sunday and I should surrender sure evenings for household night time conferences,” Whitten was quoted saying on the time.

By “my firm will change instructions,” Whitten is referring to his sexuality, a private wrestle he particulars explicitly in a poetry assortment known as “Save Me,” self-published in 1983 whereas nonetheless on a break from costuming. Frank calls it probably the most stunning discover of her analysis — by the way by way of Worldcat after months of looking the general public library archives. The e-book dwells on “the ‘uglier’ aspect of the Homosexual expertise — drug abuse and self-destruction, promiscuity and alienation, and the shortage of route of many gays,” as acknowledged within the introduction by Jerry De Gracia.

“My uncle struggled with, I feel, feeling what he thought was normality as a homosexual individual,” says Sykes. “I feel at one level he thought, perhaps if I develop into Mormon, then it is going to convert me. He was contemplating getting married to a lady, after which I feel he was simply form of like, ‘I dig the faith, however that half’s not for me.’”

Deliberations of self have been all the time a part of Whitten’s journey. Rising up because the youngest of seven siblings in Bessemer, his older brothers would teasingly bully him, the smallest bodily with the worst mood. They known as Whitten a “wasp” for the best way he’d sting again by tossing his footwear at them.

Whitten was additionally the fairest of his siblings. After his seamstress mother relaxed his hair, and whereas sporting a hat, he may cross for white; he’d be despatched into city to buy. These negotiations of race and sophistication have been later mirrored within the signage for Whitten’s Workroom 27: a sharply dressed man within the type of a blackface caricature beneath the phrases “Spoony Invoice’s.”

As a younger man within the ’70s, Whitten wasn’t outlined by his sexuality — by a number of accounts he was removed from flamboyant. He all the time dressed sharp and exuded energy the place his white romantic accomplice Steve Loomis exuded Haight-Ashbury hippiness. In a cheeky transfer, Whitten disseminated pins that stated “Black is a queer coloration” to his homosexual buddies, together with Little Richard, and they’d flash the pins from their internal lapels once they noticed one another.

But Whitten clearly struggled along with his sense of self — even if his sexuality, an open truth, didn’t detrimentally influence his profession crafting photos for others.

“Most homosexuals wouldn’t like / For me to confess that it’s a social downside,” Whitten writes within the poem “Coming Out In Protest.” “However on this lifetime / On this nation / So long as the social attitudes / And authorized negativities exist / Homosexuals have a major problem of oppression / That to a gaggle of delicate folks / It impacts their internal soul / Producing mass strangeness.”

Jacket (element), circa 1973. Invoice Whitten. Workroom 27. Present of Richard Wolfe. ASU FIDM Museum Assortment.

Whitten was nonetheless wrestling with this “mass strangeness” when he returned to society one yr later, in 1984. He was there at Kenny Rogers’ extravagant fortieth celebration for his spouse, Marianne. He was there the night time Michael Jackson, whom he dressed, received eight Grammys. He costumed all of the Jackson brothers for the record-breaking Victory tour. However struggles with substance abuse would coloration the following decade of the 40-year-old’s life.

Having closed Workroom 27, Whitten started primarily working with the Berberian household of Bon Choix Couture, then situated in a 1,000-square-foot store on S. Robertson Boulevard. Most days he may very well be discovered there at lunchtime, consuming the home made Armenian meals of matriarch Mariam Barbar, who based the store in Los Angeles after the household fled the Lebanese civil struggle.

Whitten’s relationship with the Berberian household cemented when he and Bon Choix turned companions in his new Invoice Whitten retailer on Melrose (earlier than all the key manufacturers moved there). Positioned doorways down from Fred Segal, the shop offered trend, reasonably than costumes, although in fact nonetheless at ingenious ranges and for individuals who may afford it.

Everybody who was anybody was on the retailer’s opening on March 4, 1990. Cicely Tyson, certainly one of Whitten’s finest buddies, shaved her head and emceed the opening trend present, held beneath a tent within the again car parking zone. Lola Falana was there with Emmanuel Lewis on her lap. Lionel Richie’s daughter modeled, and her mom, Brenda, closed the present in a marriage costume look. Whitten stood on stage in a prime hat and his hair in a zany afro — which was truly a weave put in by 4 Senegalese ladies for the worth of $2,600, says Sykes.

Invoice Whitten, the shop, didn’t promote single- or double-breasted jackets — too primary. As an alternative, it stocked as much as 65 jacket designs, with asymmetrical necklines, embroidered lapels, zippers working vertically from hip to nip, accented with strips of leather-based, you identify it.

Shirt (element), circa 1973. Invoice Whitten. Workroom 27. Present of Richard Wolfe. ASU FIDM Museum Assortment.

The store operated as what at this time’s designers might name “demi-couture.” As a result of the clothes have been so troublesome to make, just one measurement can be on the cabinets. When a buyer would order one, the sample can be ready within the again workroom to be made match to tailor. A extra well-liked merchandise, like a buckled jacket styled from Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation costume, Agop “Jack” Berberian can bear in mind making 150 instances.

However because the months glided by, Whitten’s presence on the retailer turned increasingly more sparse. The indicators of drug abuse had began to point out within the late ’80s. His relationship with Michael Jackson fractured after Whitten, unauthorized, haphazardly operated stage equipment, injuring Japanese employees within the course of, in the course of the preliminary Japan leg of the 1987-1988 Dangerous tour. Again in L.A., he started carrying a cane to maintain himself up, says Berberian. His accounting, as soon as meticulous, turned sloppy; he was typically not current when it was time to signal checks. One time, Rep. Maxine Waters visited the store, Berberian remembers, and Whitten fell out.

However it might be dishonest to attribute Whitten’s decline solely to drug abuse. A decade later, in 1998, Whitten and Sykes — who on the time was interning for him — have been in his house workroom when the cellphone rang. Sykes picked up. It was the pharmacist, who began rattling off Whitten’s medicines. Sykes froze earlier than whispering, “Maintain on, I’m gonna get Invoice for you.” Whitten took over the dialog, as regular, but confronted his niece when he hung up the cellphone. “What did you hear?” he requested. He knew, her stone-faced look instructed him as such, that she knew. He was HIV constructive.

“You’ll be able to’t inform anyone,” stated the non-public man, with massive feelings, who designed drag costumes for disco legends like Sylvester, who made shirts referencing DARE to withstand medication at the same time as he battled habit, but carried a lot disgrace. By Sykes’ estimates, Whitten contracted HIV within the late Nineteen Eighties. He had been secretly dwelling with the illness when he died of mind most cancers and issues from AIDS in 2006. He was 62.

Jacket, circa 1973. Invoice Whitten. Workroom 27. Present of Richard Wolfe. ASU FIDM Museum Assortment.

“Specific what you are feeling” – Invoice Whitten

Whitten did finally wean off medication, along with his older brother James straightening him out, says Sykes. In his final years of life, Whitten frolicked along with his older sister Martha in Chicago, earlier than shifting again to Los Angeles in 2004. After promoting his Hollywood Hills house and liquidating his property, he moved in with James, the one he first adopted to L.A., and have become a bona fide household man. Days have been spent watching boxing matches with James, whom he known as “Brother,” and attending cousins’ infants’ birthday events. He even had “his chair” in James’ home, as Black elders do.

However at the same time as Whitten’s well being declined, he remained frenetically inventive and was by no means restricted to 1 mode of expression, says Whitten’s nephew Jimmy Cross. Whitten was working with Cirque du Soleil. He designed light-up costumes for Dolly Parton’s Dixie Stampede. He was making a plus-size model for juniors. He had ambitions to show a brief story of his known as “Cotton” into an animated brief.

“He had open contracts when he died,” says Cross’ spouse, Margo, who, together with Sykes, has taken the household lead on amplifying Whitten’s story.

The ladies are matched in urgency by Frank, who for now’s persevering with to assemble details about the designer, together with conducting oral histories, and would like to stage an exhibit on Whitten when the sources and time come.

What would Whitten consider these efforts?

It’s a query designers who’ve labored with Whitten, sitting in entrance of their very own sketches, have requested themselves.

As a designer, Whitten was incapable of being boring and unduly compelled towards originality. Spending time along with his garments — pinstriped fits accented with sinewy leather-based, belts embellished with cash and cowrie shells, or delicate but stiff snakeskin pants — one is struck by the immeasurable depths of his inspiration.

“Don’t fear about what different individuals are pondering whenever you’re making an attempt to specific your artwork,” Whitten as soon as stated to Wells, when collaborating on the wardrobe for Neil Diamond, the designer’s longest-held shopper.

“Specific your artwork. Know your historical past. Simply use your God-given expertise to specific your self,” he’d say.

Whitten had a exceptional and fraught life, and he made the long-lasting picture of so many artists. However it’s this soul-catching skill, as his brother Jack as soon as mirrored, that makes Invoice Whitten certainly one of one.

Go well with and Shirt, circa 1973. Invoice Whitten. Workroom 27. Present of Richard Wolfe. ASU FIDM Museum Assortment.