We are so excited to share that the Institute of Black Imagination will be making its NYFW debut this week with “Source Code: Fashion as Technology” featuring selections from the archives of André Leon Talley and Geoffrey Holder!
For the IBI, the archive IS the source code; the dataset that produces such iconic figures. We so often are struck by the outputs, but rarely get a glimpse into the process; what feeds the algorithm of becoming.
We’ll continue to explore this notion throughout the week, via The Academy, with conversations between our founder, Dario Calmese (@dario.studio ), and industry greats like creative director extraordinaire Ruba Abu-Nimah (@ruba ) and Dr. Monica L. Miller, writer, historian, and guest curator of “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style” at the Met’s Costume Institute. Sunday brings a special conversation on text->texile w. Calvary Roger’s, founder of @senecalabs .
We also get into some vibrational technology with friday night DJ set with fashion muse, @badcolours_ and a special Valentine’s guest DJ for the brokenhearted :).
More to come. RSVP link in bio.
Major thanks to @popcollab and @nyfwcollections whose support helps make this possible.
#nyfw #andreleontalley #geoffreyholder #sourcecode
LABRUM LONDON HAS LANDED AT SPACE 001.
Today, on a day obsessed with discounts and velocity, we offer something rarer: a lineage you can wear.
LABRUM(@labrumlondon )—designed by Foday Dumbuya, born in Sierra Leone, shaped in London—has dropped into Space 001. Known for its distinct fusion of West African heritage and British tailoring, LABRUM crafts custom textiles that integrate archival imagery—from passport documentation to family photographs—to tell stories of migration, memory, and belonging.
This is fashion as archive, design as testimony, style as a vessel for African pasts and African futures.
Available now.
Space 001 — World Trade Center Oculus
Limited quantities.
#Labrum #blackimagination #space001 #blackfutures
IMAGINATION IS LIBERATION.
The Institute of Black Imagination (@blackimagination ) isn’t just a place—it’s a portal. A living archive. The nexus where past, present, and future remix in real time. It’s for the dreamers, the disruptors, the architects of what’s next.
Because imagination isn’t just escape—it’s strategy. It’s survival. And right now, we need it more than ever.
Pull up. Listen in. Build with us. The work is vast, and the doors are open. Support link in bio.
Major gratitude to the dozens of individuals who’ve dreamed with me over the years.
✍🏽: @sephsees
📸: @guarionex_jr
#BlackImagination #IBI #nytimes
On this Resurrection Sunday, we're beginning to think it might be time to resurrect the podcast.
We came down to earth to open Space 001, and even popped up at New York Fashion Week with Source Code, but to be honest, it's a lil dense down here (no shade).
Who would you like to hear from? Comment PODCAST to find out when the next season drops.
In the meantime, check out E89 "Perfection is an Illusion" with the gospel GOAT, @kirkfranklin !
#IBIpodcast #resurrectionsunday #blackimagination #kirkfranklin
Aesthetics is the shaping of perception.
Not what you wear, but how meaning is composed through it.
On this cover, Shawn Carter becomes a study in arrangement—gesture, fabric, color, and atmosphere tuned into coherence.
As June Ambrose reminds us, style is not object—it is orientation.
Aesthetics is how the invisible becomes legible.
To go deeper, listen to June Ambrose on Episode 50 of the IBI Podcast.
#WhatIsAesthetics #BlackImagination #JayZ #JuneAmbrose #InstituteOfBlackImagination
Hypothesis: CORRECT.
Black imagination is technology. What becomes possible when you create conditions for exploration and self discovery? What does dynamic investment look like?
Years ago, Adam Saleh (@almost_adam ) described the IBI Fellowship as his “first seed fund.” And now, Complex (@complex ) announced the acquisition of Presq (@presq.studio ), the company he founded. Adam now joins Complex as Creative Technologist!
We share this with pride, yes, but also with clarity.
This is what happens when Black imagination is met with mentorship, trust, and catalytic support at the right moment. Adam once said the most important thing he received from the fellowship was mentorship, and that IBI was “actually an accelerator for your career.”  
We do not only honor what culture becomes once the world can see it.
We work to recognize it while it is still forming.
Congratulations, Adam. Onward.
And an incredible thank you to our community of support, including @mellonfoundation , @fordfoundation , and @siliconvalleycf for believing in our mission.
#adamsaleh #blackimagination #ibifellowship
Eid Mubarak.
May this day bring joy after fasting, tenderness after restraint, and the gift of sanctuary, where beauty restores, belonging deepens, and the soul returns to itself. In the IBI Lexicon of Values, sanctuary is not escape from the world, but the ground from which a new world can be designed. 🌙✨
#EidMubarak # Ramadan #Sanctuary #BlackImagination
How is Black Imagination a quantum technology?
The “Surreal Musical Montage” in Sinners offers a clear entry point.
In the sequence where Sammie Moore conjures past and future through blues, we witness a fundamental principle:
Blackness as superposition: infinite, uncollapsed possibility.
Vibration as technology: blues, jazz, soul, funk, rock, hip-hop, pop.
Embodiment as collapse: the movement, gesture, and dance through which possibility becomes form.
What appears as music is, in fact, a spacetime operation: multiple eras resonating within a single field.
This is Black Imagination at the quantum scale. not metaphor, but method.
Study it. Sit with it. Return to it.
For those extending their research, we’ve included texts from the archive.
For future Study Hours and in-person sessions, comment ACADEMY for the link to join our newsletter for readings, study hours, and future programming.
#BlackImagination #Sinners #TheAcademy
Which bodies are worthy of salvation? How can we think more expansively about God?
As we continue to highlight the women within the IBI universe, Dr. Eboni Marshall Turman (@ebonithoughts ) reminds us of how language shapes reality and creates invisible hierarchies of value and self-worth; especially within The Black Church.
While the majority of church congregations are made up of women, their leadership remains diminished, and their bodies policed. This evolutionary point in history provides space for us to investigate: In what ways have we internalized and replicated the language and behavioral patterns of those who deem womanhood and blackness unworthy of flourishing? Of agency?
Here’s to the Fannie Lou’s and the Willie Mae’s who continue to render us visible in a system of erasure.
Podcast link in bio.
cover image: @dario.studio
#womenshistory #blackimagination #instituteofblackimagination #ebonimarshallturman
Here’s to the sisters, the aunties, the grandmothers and the nanas, that have not only nurtured us, but shared their wisdom in times of uncertainty and distress.
We scoured some of our favorite clips from the IBI podcast (not easy!) that when taken together… feels like necessary medicine. From Luvvie Ajayi Jones (@luvvie ) teaching us how to be a professional troublemaker to Torkwase Dyson (@torkwasedyson )defining the terms of Black Genius, these woman prove that womanhood, and more specifically the imagination of Black Womanhood, is prismatic, shining, and revolutionary.
Happy International Woman’s Day! Which is your fave?
Full episodes of the Institute of Black Imagination Podcast can be found on your preferred podcast player.
Featured Episodes:
E23. The Hidden Costs of Racism with Heather McGhee
E13. The Art of Living w. Lana Turner
E8. Torkwase Dyson, Artist.
E2. Dr. Mabel O. Wilson, Architect and Scholar.
E45. Luvvie Ajayi Jones: The Professional Troublemaker.
E20. The Psychology of Skin with Rose Ingleton M.D.
E26. A Revolutinary Life with Black Panther Chairman, Elaine Brown.
E35. The Hero’s Journey with Model and Activist Bethann Hardison.
E24. Dancing Through Life with Performance Legend Carmen De Lavallade.
cover image: @dario.studio
What if the archive isn’t a vault—
but a generator? What if fashion isn’t merely clothing, but technology?
During NYFW, “Source Code: Fashion as Technology” invited books from the personal libraries of Geoffrey Holder and André Leon Talley into dialogue with the present. We call the practice Archival Intelligence: turning inherited material into new vocabularies.
Thank you to everyone who entered the room and expanded it.
With foundational support from @mellonfoundation & @fordfoundation , and program support from @popcollab .
Event partners: @nyfwcollections & @n4xtexperiences . Design support: @leica_camera & @studio_molo .
To the Holder and Talley (@andreltalley ) estates—thank you for trusting our stewardship.
To The Academy contributors—@ruba@profmonicalmiller@badcolours_@calvary___@vuyosotashe —and the IBI design + tech team: @gentttry@amariwyking@adamradice (plus @justinmcelderry@bharrisonbryant & Natalie Renee)—thank you.
Black imagination is a technology of becoming.
Hypothesis: verified.
—The Institute
Tag who needs to catch the one (and anyone we missed in the carousel)!
#blackimagination #nyfw #geoffreyholder #andreleontalley #sourcecode
We made it to the back of NYC Taxi cabs, and we couldn’t be more proud ✊🏾.
Thank you, @nbcnewyork .
*cues “Empire State of Mind ft. Alicia Keys”
#blackimagination #sourcecode #nyfw #geoffreyholder #andreleontalley
