The hair, the glasses, that style and that face. Who was this beautiful boy popping up on screens and parties of my life? This is Emanuel Ilagan. He’s currently schooling Vancouver and the folks at Emily Carr but back in the day he was giving me all sorts of fashion tips as we navigated the tundra together.
Check out his portfolio; that style carries forward onto the page for real.
How would you describe your style?
If I were to use one word, I’d have to go with clean. An eccentric kind of clean.
How has living in certain cities, including but not limited to your current one, impacted the way you dress?
Maybe it’s counterintuitive, but I think growing up in Edmonton made me a lot more adventurous with the way I dress. The rumours are true, the city isn’t necessarily the most stylish place. But when you come across someone who values expressing themselves through what they wear, Edmontonians are a lot more brave than Vancouverites.
Dressing well in Edmonton had a countercultural aspect to it, for me at least, and that can make people fearless with their style.
Vancouver, however, is a very trendy place. People here don’t seem to want to look different from each other even if they are well-dressed, and there’s a certain ease to people’s outfits that probably has to do with the whole laid-back West-coast lifestyle. I just don’t vibe with it. I wear green more and plaid less since I moved here though—I don’t know if that means anything. As for my time in Toronto, I was basically living out of two suitcases for three months, so what I wore was essentially the summer clothes I brought with me. I was definitely impressed with the greater amount of stylish, confident people there though. My mom’s mantra growing up was “it’s all in how you carry it”. Toronto was inspiring, I felt like it embodied that.
Our mutual friend, Vivek Shraya, discusses in his book, God Loves Hair, how growing up Hindu in Canada offered him space to express queerness in a way that white culture, or at least public school, didn’t offer–do you find any parallels with Filipino culture?
Oh, most definitely.
My parents were always quick to point out that we weren’t white, and that idea of difference can be enough to open up a space to express queerness.
But on top of this, I believe that so many aspects of Filipino culture are emasculating—and I don’t use that word in a negative sense. White culture is built on male power, a certain kind of male-ness that I’ve never identified with. Maybe it’s the colonial legacy left on its people, but the ideal male in Filipino culture is essentially a domestic, soft, family man with big kind eyes, not a rugged bearded woodsman. (I mean, I can barely grow facial hair for chrissakes!) Culturally, Filipinos are set up with different expectations for gender. For example, I remember getting in a fight with a classmate in Grade 1 over my dad being a nurse. She told me that men couldn’t be nurses. But then there’s this opposing paradigm, because nursing, regardless of gender, is considered to be a sought after profession in Filipino culture. These kinds of contrarian standards have made it easier for me to question what is normal and therefore be more receptive to a queer politic and way of thinking.
Speaking of culture, I have heard you mention that going into graphic design is something that your parents are a bit unsure about.
I feel that for a lot of immigrant families and their children, access to opportunity has largely been mediated by “acceptable” careers for people of colour.
I don’t actually think that as a Filipino, I was ever expected to be involved in an industry that is involved in cultural production (design, liberal arts, fine arts), which is a career path that can often be non-linear and unpredictable compared to say, nursing. That lack of stability is something I know my parents worry about. Graphic design wouldn’t have gotten them into Canada, but as nurses they were welcomed in with wide arms.
You seem very close with your mom in particular–can you share a bit about what makes that relationship so special for you?
I’ve always had strong matriarchal figures in my life, and my mother was (and still is) a huge role model for me. To her, dressing up was a way of embodying her self-confidence and the way I carry myself now has so much to do with how she raised me. I’m proud of my mom for having such a visible personality. She doesn’t even have to say much, no one ever forgets meeting her—she has such a vibrant energy. She isn’t afraid to laugh and she lives life to be happy, what more do I have to say?
I have heard rumours of Emanuel always looking fresh, even back in Jr. High. Is there a memorable style phase you had as a kid/teen?
None of them were memorable enough to escape being willingly forgotten. Oh, the trauma of adolescence! (Really though, I can barely look at pictures of myself back then.) I wore a lot of brand name, label-y stuff, but my mom always insisted we wore clothes that fit us well and to never be afraid of colour.
You have shared some personal writing on your Tumblr which I really enjoyed–do you have plans to do something a bit more structured with these pieces; compile and make available somehow?
When I wrote the first piece on my blog, it was honestly a way to deal with unresolved emotions surrounding one of my exes. The process of boiling down a relationship to a singular intimate moment ended up being incredibly cathartic for me, which ended up structuring all of the other stories I wrote: one for each person I’ve had an intimate encounter with. After writing the last one two years later, it seemed wrong to leave it at that, so I ended up compiling all of the pieces into an artist’s book in collaboration with my former roommate (and beautiful friend/photographer Ruth Skinner). I only made two copies—one for me and one for her, but you can check out the digital version on my website: PDF
Tell me about Wilson-Filipino
When I first moved to Vancouver, I think being away from my family in Edmonton made me realize how little access I had to the culture I was raised on. I felt like at that point in time, I had eschewed many aspects of growing up Filipino in response to my family’s initial reactions of unacceptance with how I chose to live my life. But being away from my hometown also made me realize how much I missed my family and how important my upbringing was to how I self-identify now. Which is where Wilson-Filipino comes in. I met Marvin and Mickelli through work, and it was love at first sight, really. Being 20-something gay asians with similar outlooks in life, the three of us were naturally drawn together. We’re each other’s family—they understand how growing up as a queer Filipino shapes how one views the world—I think it was important to us to be able to see that in one another. So we formed a band that doesn’t play music.
