Mixed Race Studies

Lewis Hamilton bought a Met Gala table for emerging Black fashion designers

Road Show
2021-09-13

Daniel Golson, Social Media Editor

Lewis Hamilton’s influence extends far beyond F1. Theo Wargo/Getty Images

Tables run upwards of $275,000 and can be exclusionary to young, diverse talent, so the seven-time F1 world champion hosted his own.

If you needed any more proof that Lewis Hamilton is an incredible force in the racing world and beyond, not even two days after a near-death Formula 1 crash in Italy he stepped onto the Met Gala red carpet in New York on Monday to promote emerging Black fashion designers.

The theme of this year’s Met Gala was “In America: A Lexicon of Fashion,” centered on American style and independence. Individual tickets to the Met run upwards of $30,000 while full tables are over $275,000 and typically major designers or fashion houses will buy them and invite the celebrities they’re dressing for the night, making it difficult for up-and-coming designers and stars to make an impact at the event, which is referred to as “fashion’s biggest night.” That makes what Hamilton did especially powerful: The seven-time world champion bought his own table and invited four young Black designers as his guests…

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Lewis Hamilton: ‘Everything I’d suppressed came up – I had to speak out’

The Guardian
2021-07-10

Gary Younge, Professor of Sociology
University of Manchester, Manchester, United Kingdom

Lewis Hamilton: ‘I don’t just want to be remembered as a driver.’ Styling: Law Roach. Photograph: Ike Edeani/The Guardian

He’s the most successful driver Formula One has ever seen, and its only Black star. Now Lewis Hamilton has a new mission: to change the sport that made him.

As Lewis Hamilton rose through the ranks of competitive go-karting, his father, Anthony, told him: “Always do your talking on the track.” Lewis had a lot to talk about. Bullying and racial taunts were a consistent feature of his childhood in Stevenage, Hertfordshire, a new town 30 miles north of London; his dad taught him the best response was to excel at his sport.

The trouble was he didn’t have many people to talk to about what he was going through. Lewis is mixed-race, born to a white mother, Carmen Larbalestier, who raised him until he was 12, when he went to live with his Grenadian-British father, from whom she had separated. “My mum was wonderful,” he tells me. “She was so loving. But she didn’t fully understand the impact of the things I was experiencing at school. The bullying and being picked on. And my dad was quite tough, so I didn’t tell him too much about those experiences. As a kid I remember just staying quiet about it because I didn’t feel anyone really understood. I just kept it to myself.” Sport offered him an outlet. “I did boxing because I needed to channel the pain,” he says. “I did karate because I was being beaten up and I wanted to be able to defend myself.”

I understand where he’s coming from; I too grew up in Stevenage. Hamilton’s mother and I went to the same school – though not at the same time. As close to London as it was, it might as well have been in a different universe. In London the Black experience appeared authentic; in Stevenage it felt synthetic. Race in London was something you read about in the papers; race in Stevenage was something you didn’t even acknowledge. I was 22 before I found my first Black male friend…

Read the entire article here.