VANESSA HONG

It is truly a joy to sit down with Vanessa Hong, my friend and fellow OG blogger turned fashion entrepreneur (and wellness goddess) for this new installment of Our Hair, Don’t Care. Like many of my fashion family, I met Vanessa when I was still a street style photographer, and I immediately fell for her sense of style - on both an aesthetic and human level. We have both grown as digital creators since then, and I am grateful to have observed and learned from her wise examples of how to navigate our fast-evolving media landscape. As early players in the digital fashion world, we didn’t have many mentors who were well versed in content creation and social media strategy. It has always been through honest conversations like these that we were able to stay true to our points of view, remain authentic, and ultimately chart our paths. 

Vanessa has always been a steward for presence, clarity and honesty in our inspiring but problematic industry. Join us as Vanessa reflects on her Vancouver upbringing, building BIPOC community in NYC, sustaining her personal perception of her beauty opposite the digital lens, and gracefully chipping away the Asian monolith myth within the fashion and beauty industries, ultimately leading her to embrace her complete, beautiful and unique Asianness.

Our Hair Don't Care is a beauty focus developed by ATPB in 2018 to bring the rich and diverse stories of our multi-generational relationship to our hair to the center stage of media, rather than as a tokenized, sporadic story. We feature people whose lives and ancestry are intertwined with their hair journey, and  untangle what that relationship means to each individual.

Tamu McPherson:

Let's start with the background of your beauty story, and how it influenced the way your beauty ideals were formed?

Vanessa Hong:

So I grew up in “beautiful British Columbia, Vancouver”. That's actually the tagline, the motto for how we sell our province in Canada the Pacific Northwest. Very low key. 

I don't know if you've been to Vancouver before, but it's very granola. It's very low key, very casual. Everyone's got great skin, everyone's super natural. Growing up, I was super into fashion, but I didn't really develop a super intense interest in hair and makeup until later on. I feel like when I started living in New York was when that really developed, in my late twenties. Before that, I never used to wear makeup unless I was on set and someone was shooting me. I always just felt like I didn't really know how to do my makeup. 

And you know, maybe just to dive really into it, I never saw anybody that looked like me in fashion magazines. So when I was growing up, my mom went to fashion school, so we had fashion magazines everywhere in the home. I used to watch this show called Fashion File hosted by Tim Blanks in Canada.  It was the only fashion show that we had! It was on CBC, the Canadian Broadcasting Channel, and would always come on at the most random times of the night. So my whole upbringing, I was surrounded by fashion inspiration, but rarely saw anybody that looked like me, honestly. The closest person of any color was maybe Naomi Campbell. And I’m not Black, clearly, but I had heard that Naomi has some Chinese heritage as well. Maybe it's like 10%, but I clung onto that, you know? Because there was nobody else that I could identify with. I mean, obviously I found Kate Moss as aspirational, and all the supers of the nineties, but everyone looked literally the complete opposite of me.

I was a skinny, dark Asian kid growing up. In my family, I was made fun of because I'm naturally dark, like East Asian. Some East Asians are naturally tan. We were born this way. So I never quite fit into my family, because I was darker-skinned, and then in this fantasy fashion world of mine, I didn't really see anybody that looked like me, either. So I never played around with makeup much when I was in high school, even when all of my friends would go buy CoverGirl makeup. I'd be like, Oh my God, this blue eyeshadow looks so great on you! I'd put on myself and was like… this looks horrible.

Tamu McPherson:

You know, as a street style photographer, I remember all of your iconic hair looks. Where do you get the inspiration for all of your hairstyles? And you're very, you're very adventurous with your hairstyles. How did you come into the confidence you have in experimenting with your hair like this?

Vanessa Hong:

I've had Blonde hair for almost 10 years now, which is really, really wild. When I first did it, it was because I just wanted to do something different. I remember seeing Soo Joo Park and I was like, Wow, she looks phenomenal, I wanna do this. And in terms of creating looks, my inspiration is always editorial. How I wear clothes, like how I want to do my hair, it always comes from a highly editorialized kind of place. So I'll go on Pinterest and I'll look at archival runway shows or archival magazine editorials.

When I create these quote unquote, viral looks, I start with the outfit. It always starts with the outfit. I'm a fashion girl, I wanna be here to honor the outfit. One of my first ever viral looks was at a Chanel show, and it was all pearls. The iconic days. They loaned me a very old suit from the archives, you could tell how old it was just by touching it. Very simple, and you could tell it had only been worn a few times. 

When I got the look initially I was like, Oh, I wish I'd gotten like a tweed suit or whatever, something iconically Chanel. But when I started looking at it closer, I realized it was a jumping point for me to do something really cool. They were hosting it at the Met that year. Do you remember? It was in the Egyptian room, like where the pyramids are. And actually it was one of the last shows I ever saw with Karl. I went to my hair stylist and I was like, I know the suit looks very simple, but I want you to create a constellation around my head. And I want the hair to be almost like an alien helmet.

So then we collaborated, and I remember she came to my apartment that night and I was sitting on my check-in luggage, because I still didn't have furniture in my house. And she was literally hot-gluing the jewels that she found in a gem store in New York with bobby pins. And as we were putting this all together, she was molding and sculpting my hair. And one by one, she would place these things in. It was a lot of back and forth, very collaborative. She initially was like, Oh, maybe do you want just one side? I'm like, No girl. I want the entire thing. I want this to be a 360 experience. I want you to see me. And I remember the moment… even after I saw it, it was so beautiful. I always feel like I'm never doing enough. That's very much my personality. But at that moment I remember walking in there, everyone was just like, jaw drop. Everyone was like, Can I please take a photo of your head? 

So, long story short, it always starts from a place of respect for what I'm wearing. And it starts from a place of really - I don't know if this is a word, but I've been using it -  surreal, cerebral, the outfit. For me to make it something really interesting I really have to understand the concept. What is the vibe? What's the environment? What's the history of the garment? So there is a very cerebral aspect to it, for me.

Tamu McPherson:

So you mentioned that Naomi Campbell influenced your beauty journey, and she is such a fun, wonderful reference. Who are some other beauty icons that you relate to?

Vanessa Hong:

I think my mom has been my original muse from the very beginning. 

Neither of my parents graduated from high school. There is this idea that all Asian parents are like tiger moms or tiger dads, but I had very bohemian parents and my mom was kind of the black sheep in her family. So when I was growing up, my mom was wearing Yohji, she was wearing nineties Donna Karen, she was wearing Versace.  She wore black nail polish, black lip glosses from Versace. She did all the things. I just thought my mom was so beautiful and she was so adventurous with all of her looks. I would say she was the very first person that inspired me. 

Tamu McPherson:

As a digital creator, you are constantly working with your image. How has this medium and this exposure informed the way you see yourself?

Vanessa Hong:

There's positive and negative aspects.

Tamu McPherson:

You're always candid about this, that's one thing I love about you.

Vanessa Hong:

Sometimes I ask myself, would I love myself more if I wasn't publicly sharing myself all the time? We're constantly looking, taking selfies, right? Yes. And our phones and the cameras capture things very differently than how we perceive ourselves, right? 

When I first started naming how I felt, I realized, oh, I actually have body dysmorphia. I don't have a severe case of it, but I have it the same as most women do nowadays. And having, you know, facial dysmorphia, sometimes I will see myself like in a photo, I'm like, Oh, I don't like this about myself.

I was wondering, am I the only one feeling this? Am I the only one that's so crazy? I listened to this podcast about how our phones capture us: the closest thing to the phone is gonna seem the biggest. So since the explosion of iPhones and this culture of selfies, that's why nose jobs have skyrocketed. The nose is the closest thing to the phone, so when someone takes a selfie, they're like, Oh my god, this is huge, but it's because of the camera. And I think that's why we have to have very healthy-ish boundaries with what we do on our phone, and understand that all of this is not necessarily real.

The positive side of working in the digital universe is that trends happen really quickly. The sharing of information is so prolific. If it wasn't for technology, I definitely don't think my sense of style or my sense of adventure with makeup and hair would be as advanced as it is today. For me, I'm feeling much more adventurous and wanting to do new things because I'm like, well, you know, I'm gonna be sharing images of myself, so maybe I wanna switch things up. I don’t want to stick with one thing for too long.

Tamu McPherson:

I think that's the freedom that social media and our work gives us. It does keep it really interesting. 

Have you felt or noticed that our industry has evolved at all emerging from the surge in awareness of prejudice and violence against Asians across the world?

Vanessa Hong:

Yes and no.

I'm not a pessimistic person at all. Anyone that would say I'm pessimistic based on that answer, they're not seeing what's happening. Obviously, during the height of the pandemic, I think a lot of people were very idealistic about what the industry was gonna look like after. But I think we've only barely scratched the surface. And being an individual that works inside the industry as well as sometimes being in front of the camera, there's still a lot of things that need to be fixed.

There's a lot of things that need to be addressed. And I mean… I don't think it's gonna happen within my lifetime. Because ultimately I think we need to be looking at power dynamics, right? Who's holding the power, who's making the decisions? 

I work with brands, but I am fully autonomous. I can choose who I work with, I can choose in what capacity I wanna work with them. And in a way, simply being in the industry and being vocal about certain things, and caring for myself a certain way is, is just my way of contributing. 

I don't know if you've ever gotten to this yourself, but there have been so many times where I'm like, f*@$ this. I don't need to do this. But one of my mentors is Philip Lim, a fashion designer in New York, and he's told me that I need to stay in this industry, because our simple presence in a room is a message already. And conducting oneself respectfully and with the energy of I deserve to be here. I have a seat at the table and I'm going to stand here and I'm not going to disappear. I want my presence to be felt.

Tamu McPherson:

So you have found a purpose in staying in this industry?

Vanessa Hong:

Yeah, I have. Fashion and the grand scheme of things…  It seems like all fluff and whatnot. I was pre-med in university, I have a degree in biochemistry and genetics. I was on the path to to be a certain type of person in this world. So I completely understand. 

But on the flip side of it, fashion truly is one of those universal languages. Like you can go to Japan and not speak a stick of Japanese, but someone can see your outfit and be like, you're cool. Art is the same way. Music is the same way. These are all things that on some crazy cellular level, we react to. And in that sense, I think fashion is such an incredible vehicle to connect with people, to work and to communicate things. Because fashion is at the intersection of all of these things; culture, politics, art activism, all of these things cross through fashion more now than I think ever before.

Tamu McPherson:

People have access and they can relate. And they can connect through style immediately. 

What did you experience during this period with our white friends?  Because as a black woman, when George Floyd happened, I had lots and lots and lots of conversations with all sorts of white friends. And the support was there. I mean, close friends, the support is still there. And then I feel like, PR officers, the support was there at that moment because the brands were paying attention. But now that we're out of the pandemic and things have kind of moved on, I don't know how much attention they're giving it, because it's not the focus point anymore. What was your experience with their white friends during the surge of Asian hate?

Vanessa Hong:

Okay, this is interesting, because nobody hit me up during that time. And then this was actually a very common conversation among all my Asian friends. It was like people just didn't hit you up at all. They weren't like, Hey, how are you doing? And so my experience growing up Chinese in a very white world, in Canada, which is very different from the American experience… Not to say that everything is kumbaya in Canada. Racism exists everywhere. But in America it's like a whole different flavor. 

Tamu McPherson:

Because the history of our country is so toxic.

Vanessa Hong:

Yes. It's really sad. I, you know, being a Canadian, I didn't study American history.  I listened to The 1619 Project when it was released and I was horrified. Obviously I knew that America was built on slavery, but listening to that entire series completely unnerved me. And then attending the protests directly after George Floyd’s death and seeing generations of Black folks, like grandma, daughter, granddaughter having to do this all over again. How are we still here? 

Attending those protests and educating myself on the history of America downloaded a lot of PTSD for me that I never dealt with. Being in a lot of rooms, from elementary school, high school in Vancouver or later on working in fashion, it's this sense of tokenism, putting words and concepts to things I've only ever felt really. It really unhinged me. For instance, my ex-boyfriend was actually extremely racist to me, but I never I never understood it. Because this has been my entire life. In Vancouver, I was often the only Asian. And my whole life, friends, teachers, boyfriends, they would always tell me, Oh, but you're not like one of them. 

Tamu McPherson:

Which is the worst thing that you can say.

Vanessa Hong:

It's so insidious. So, going back to the industry, I’ve never really felt support specifically for the Asian community, because I think there's this idea that, oh, they have it really good already. 

Tamu McPherson:

They don't know the statistics in New York City. The highest poverty rate demographic in New York (in 2020) was Asians.

Vanessa Hong:

And in fashion, when you think of Asians, we are just thought of as a huge demographic of luxury shoppers. Bryan (Yambao) has spoken about this very openly. It's interesting that you want our money, but you don't want our likeness. And you don't want our input. You don't want us sitting at your table. This has been like an ongoing frustration of mine. Still, to this day, sometimes I walk into a showroom in France and a very French PR person could just be like, Wow, your English is really good!

Tamu McPherson:

And you're like, have you traveled the world? Why are you so ignorant? 

Vanessa Hong:

Not only that, it's like… there's such a thing as YouTube, right?? There's such a thing as the internet! Is there an excuse, especially when you work in an industry like fashion, to have such archaic ideas of who should be speaking English well and who should be  able to access these areas.

Tamu McPherson:

Like, dude… leave your neighborhood and meet some other people.

Vanessa Hong:

Going back to your original question, a lot of people stay in their bubbles, right? I have a very small circle of friends, but almost my entire friend circle, we’re all people of color. I had this boomerang type of effect happen in my life, where I grew up with mainly white people, and I was always the token person of any color. So when I moved to New York, I suddenly had way more black friends, way more Latinx friends. I have a lot of ABC (American Born Chinese) friends, and people who are very proud of who they are, in their heritage.

The feeling in Canada is like, Oh, we're all the same. We all have the same struggles. Whereas in America,  for all of the problematic things, people are very outspoken. I’m spending more time in France these days, and spending more time in Scandinavia as well, and their way of thinking is very much like how I was brought up, and that we're all the same. Like, it's all about equality. Let's just brush the fact that you know you're a person of color under the rug. We have transcended race.

Tamu McPherson:

Without addressing any of the underlying issues.

Vanessa Hong:

Right. And I think fashion is like that too. Fashion is like, we just want to make an incredible runway collection. We've transcended race, we only see beauty and da da da. That's extremely problematic. Because we haven't transcended it at all.

Tamu McPherson:

They don't want to take the bandaid off the wound because they're so fragile. All of the theory and the writing on it is on point. We are propping up white fragility by not speaking out. It's so important that both our communities speak out, and speak out often. When I was in uni, it had gotten to the point where in New York City, like even children of mixed ethnicities thought they were in a post-racial world. I had one incident right before I moved to Milan where I went out to a club. We're all young professionals, we can splurge and spend a lot of money. It was a big birthday party. We had dinner at a restaurant and then after dinner we went to a lounge, and we were organized because, you know, we'd been going out to clubs for a very long time.

We got more than one table. And we had a lot of space, but they wanted us to check our coats at this club. And it was when you could still smoke outside and you know, you're at a party. I didn't smoke cigarettes, but all my friends smoked. So they wanted to be able to go outside with their coats. The young manager, a young white man, was riding us. It was crazy. He would come over to us. Meanwhile there are like white people standing with their coats at the bar, which is more of a fire hazard than us piling our coats neatly. Like we, you know, we're, I think we're in our mid twenties, so we were not messy. Like we were getting messed up, but we weren't messing coats piled up together. 

It wasn't our first time at a club. We were going to drink a lot and spend a lot of money. But I'm about business. If you're gonna harass me and we're spending all of this money, I'm not gonna give you my money. I'm leaving. So I walked upstairs and I walked out, and this young woman asked, Why are you leaving? And I was like, because your manager is racist and I'm not gonna give him my money. I work way too hard. And so she was like, No, racism doesn't exist anymore. 

But that's the reality of where we are, and how they don't wanna talk about it. They don't want to deal with it and they want to gaslight us into feeling that. 

Vanessa Hong:

And this is why finding community is everything. I think as I get older in this industry and I see so many young Asians wanting to break into it as I settle down more and I have more time, I feel drawn to expand my mentorship. Everyone is always asking how I find such amazing assistants - Betty (my assistant) has been with me for six years now. I always really want to work with young Asian women, because when I was growing up all I wanted was to find someone that was interested in fashion like me. And in freaking Vancouver, I couldn't find anybody. I've always taken the role of being like a bigger sister. Because I think there's also this sense of oh, there's not enough for all of us here. 

Tamu McPherson:

Absolutely.

Vanessa Hong:

We're built into this capitalist society with a scarcity mindset, right? And then you add in the minority aspect to it, then you're like, Oh, there's only one Asian allowed at this table. You know? Only one of us can be cast for this campaign. And I think that's how they keep us out of the industry. 

Tamu McPherson:

It's structural. It's systemic racism.

Vanessa Hong:

So when I work with people, I really try to bring people into my circle who I would consider like a friend, like people in my own community. And I think like it is in numbers and it is in open conversations, like this one that we're having right now, that we're really able to gain momentum. Because we're only having these conversations behind closed doors.

Tamu McPherson:

No one is hearing it.

Vanessa Hong:

No one is going to hear it. I felt so alone for so many years, like, oh my God, am I the only person? 

Tamu McPherson:

And it's systemic. So they gaslight us into not talking about it. So, why did you feel alone for so long? Actually, I wanted to talk to you about this because, because you and Tina Leung both chose to have blonde hair, they're confusing you and mistaking you guys for each other. I saw Nicole Warne and Chriselle Lim at Valentino and they were saying the same thing. That they've had people full on have conversations with them thinking they were the other person. Because in white supremacy, we, as people of color, are all considered a monolith. We look alike. We're the same person. There is no homework. No one is saying, well no, that's not Tina, that's Vanessa. Nobody's doing it. You can't be the only two Asian girls with blonde hair. How does that make you feel? You are edgy. Tina is very glamorous. You look nothing alike. Your aesthetics are completely different. How does it feel that industry professionals confuse you guys?

Vanessa Hong:

It's really interesting. So even before Tina, people used to confuse me with Margaret Zhang.

Tamu McPherson:

And she looks really young, she's always looked like a 15-year old. And good for her! Amazing genes. But you guys look nothing alike. 

Vanessa Hong:

So when I first started going to fashion week,  Margaret and I used to travel with each other. People would routinely confuse us, even afterwards. Margaret was not even blonde - she was blonde for like a hot second, then she went to blue. But even before she went blonde, people would always confuse us. 

Not to drag other people in the industry, but it's like, okay, you literally have five influencers who are all white, blonde, same body type, same style, but you know all of them. You somehow find the nuance with these five girls. But with these two girls, you're not even doing the homework. 

Sometimes it drives me wild. Me and Tina kind of joke about it. Actually, when we left the Gucci show, someone taking a video asked us to introduce ourselves, and I was like, Hi, I'm Tina! And Tina was like, Hi, I'm Vanessa. Because it's like… what's the point? 

If anything I find it really, really embarrassing.

Tamu McPherson:

On their part.

Vanessa Hong:

Yes. I know Betty has done it for me before, leaving a comment to say, you just tagged the wrong person. Or like, I will write a comment if it's an Instagram post, this is not even remotely close to me. And I mean, I have been mistaken for Soo Joo before… I'm like, great that somehow in some universe you think I look like, you know, Soo Joo the supermodel.

Tamu McPherson:

Thanks.

Vanessa Hong:

But like… different Asian diaspora! Completely different height and body type and skin tone as well. What confuses me is not only the haircut and the style, but also I'm a darker skin tone. I'm a darker skin tone than a lot of girls that they would mistake me for. And because it happens so often and I'm like, I don't really know what more I can do.

Tamu McPherson:

But your point that they'll have five influencers who are rewarded for looking the same, cuz it's annoying as hell that they are rewarded for looking exactly the same and being a carbon copy of each other's style. Those women are privileged for being white and they are living in their privilege and you know, white PR officers, they will give them the honor of studying who they are, but the rest of us don't get that same privilege. And, and that's the point. It's the privilege.

Vanessa Hong:

I feel very embarrassed for the PR people who mess up these things. And actually when I was in Copenhagen recently for a fashion show - did you see Vashti's post about this?

Tamu McPherson:

No.

Vanessa Hong:

So we attended a fashion show together and this brand had dressed her for the show. They're like, can't wait to see you there. She gets there, and they put her in standing. I'm like, y'all don't know who Vashti is?? Like she is the culture. 

Tamu Pherson:

For the last decade and a half.

Vanessa Hong:

And then I talked to Chrissy Ford about this after. And Chrissy's like, this happens to me all the time.  Like all the time.  So going back into that question of yours: do you think things have changed? At the core of it? No, not really. Maybe if you are one of the people holding guard at these old PR agencies and maybe you can pat yourself on the back to be like, Oh well I put like three Asians in the front row. But you're still getting us confused. I can't even count the number of times I've shown up at doors where I'm sitting front row for a show and they'll be like, Hey, good morning Tina. Or like, I'll go to a fitting and they'll be like, Hey Tina, we like selecting these things for you.

Tamu McPherson:

Not putting the work in. 

Vanessa Hong:

I get it. You are tired. But even on an average day, if someone called you by a different name and they were convinced that that was your name, it's very disrespectful. And it doesn't make you feel good.

Tamu McPherson:

No. It will chip away at your self worth.

Vanessa Hong:

How are we still having to confront these issues on the daily, on the hourly?

Tamu McPherson:

I'm interested to know, how do you think beauty for the Asian diaspora has changed if at all of late?

Vanessa Hong:

I feel so much more proud to be Asian than I think I've ever felt. And this is not only like a beauty level, but just like a whole 360 spiritual level. My whole life, I had always wanted to look like my friends, and all my friends were fair-skinned brunettes and blondes, because I never saw anybody that looked like me. Philip once told me, if you can't see it, you can't believe it. So how do you, a young human, consider yourself worthy or beautiful when you don't see that reflected or validated anywhere? 

The youth culture now, they give no fucks. And they’re leaning into their Asianness, and leaning into all the things that make our diaspora so beautiful. That's really inspiring. There is definitely some sort of spiritual shift that did happen after 2020. The entire planet paused and systemic racism was put out there in the open, and it was really embarrassing for all these people. 

So, yeah, I really want to own my Asianness now more than ever. It's so funny. Even things like that whole fox eye plastic surgery trend, I think Bryan talked about this too. It’s basically Asian eye surgery, the shape they are creating.  And it's always been a racist trope, a thing that someone does when they want to make squinty eyes, but now it’s a plastic surgery trend, and you want to call that something else.  You don't wanna call it Asian. 

Having my online community, having friends who see me and who are killing it and embracing all their Asianness, it’s really inspiring. Even working like with younger with younger generations - they just give no fucks. And I think even older generations are really feeling it too.

Because my mom went to British boarding school in Hong Kong and had been living in Vancouver since she was 13, she has very much been a part of the white world her whole life. And although I think she's never been ashamed of her Asianness, I think now more so than ever, she's very proud of her heritage and where she comes from. And so I think there's a shift happening across generations, and my hope is that more and more of us can just live in our Asianness, and our fullness. Because we are beautiful. All of us are on this planet, and we should lean into the things that make us so unique.