Master couturier B Michael will be in conversation with renowned editor and publisher Dawn Davis to celebrate the release of Michael's new book, Muse: Cicely Tyson and Me, a Relationship Forged in Fashion. Books will be for sale and an opportunity for signatures will be available. Pre-orders may be made here.

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The reception begins at 5:30pm followed by the conversation at 7:00pm.

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This is a members only event.

If you are not a MoAD Member, join here.

In 2005, B Michael, who has designed for such entertainment royalty as Valerie Simpson, Nancy Wilson, Diahann Carroll, and Whitney Houston received a phone call asking if he would be willing to dress Cicely Tyson for a high-octane weekend hosted by Oprah Winfrey. He said yes, and within a half hour, the queen of Hollywood and Broadway walked through his atelier doors and the energy between them was pure magic. That first interaction led to decades of hand-holding friendship and adoration.

“Muse is magnificent! B Michael shares the 'give and give' of his friendship with Miss Cicely Tyson in a very special, intimate way.” – Phylicia Rashad

‍About B Michael

B Michael was born and raised in Connecticut. He found early design inspirations in his mother’s creativity and grandmother’s keen sense of style and studied at the New York Fashion Institute Technology. After working under icons such as Oscar de la Renta, he decided to launch his namesake millinery line and in 1999 developed and launched his first couture collection, under the priming of fashion industry icon, Eleanor Lambert.

B Michael’s collections have garnered appreciative fans, including socialites and pop-culture personalities and legends such as Beyoncé, Valerie Simpson, Nancy Wilson, Susan Fales-Hill, President Barack Obama’s poet laureate Elizabeth Alexander, Brandy, Dina Merrill and Lena Horne, among many others. He also designed Whitney Houston’s costumes for the motion pictures and sparkle and ballet costumes for the Joffrey Ballet’s World Premier of Alexei Kremnev’s Windy Sand.

In 1998, with the support of Oscar de la Renta, B Michael was granted membership in the prestigious Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA). In 2016 B Michael was given the prestigious Design Visionary Award by the Lighthouse Guild. In 2019, B Michael became the first Black American luxury fashion designer to dress an Oscar recipient, Ms. Tyson. In that same Oscar year, he dressed Costume Designer Ruth Carter who won her Oscar in Costume Design for her work in the film Black Panther. In 2021. B Michael was honored by the National Congress of Black Women during their thirty-seventh anniversary awards gala. In 2022, B Michael was a special guest on Turner Classic Movies (TCM), Follow the Thread, a new fashion in film series, The Stars and Their Designers. B Michael has served as a guest lecturer at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology, and various colleges and universities around the country. He also serves on the board of YAGP (Youth America Grand Prix). In addition to his work and community/cultural activism, B Michael is an avid collector of vintage books, artifacts and photography.

B Michael lives in New York City with his life and business partner Mark-Anthony Edwards, and has two daughters, Saferra and Mychal.
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About Dawn Davis

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The Poets & Writers 2019 Editor of the Year, Dawn Davis is the founding publisher of 37 INK, an imprint of Simon & Schuster. She has edited many prize-winning and New York Times bestselling books, including Never Caught, which was a finalist for the National Book Award, by Erica Armstrong Dunbar; The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, by Issa Rae; Tough Love by Ambassador Susan Rice; and I Can’t Make this Up by Kevin Hart, and various books by weight loss expert JJ Smith.

Davis left in 2020 to become the Editor in Chief of Bon Appétit. While she was away, she acquired and edited many books that went on to see bestselling and critical acclaim success, including three Obama picks: The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan, The Final Revival of Opal & Nev by Dawnie Walton, and How to Say Babylon by Safiya Sinclair, one of the 2023 New York Times’ 10 Best Books of the Year, Master Slave Husband Wife.

Prior to first joining Simon & Schuster, Davis was publisher of Amistad, an imprint of HarperCollins, where she edited The Known World by Edward P. Jones, which won the Pulitzer Prize; Steve Harvey’s Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man, which was one of the best-selling books of the decade; and The Pursuit of Happyness by Chris Gardner.

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She lives in New York City.