For the tour, Elliott also collaborated with creative director and stylist June Ambrose, who famously outfitted the artist with the unforgettable inflatable suit she wore in “The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly)” music video in 1997.
“When I first met June, she said, ‘darling, no one’s ironing their pants anymore.’ Because I came from Virginia and I wanted everything creased and T-shirts starched. She said, ‘darling, no one’s doing that anymore. You want to be matchy-matchy?’ June taught me about fashion very early on,” Elliott said.
The duo has worked together for the majority of Elliott’s music videos, creating looks inspired by the musician’s thought-provoking lyrics. “The lyrical content is so provocative, but the images that we created were such a dichotomy for what women in hip-hop, at the time, was delivering. So Missy didn’t feel the need to match that with overtly provocative clothing. Because all of the sex was really, if not in the lyrics, it was also in her body movements and her dance and the fact that we didn’t lean into that and we were disruptive in the conversation where I was, like, we’re redefining sexuality and how we’re perceived as women.
Courtesy of Derek Blanks with crowdMGMT; Courtesy of June Ambrose (sketch).
Culturally, I think that is really liberating. There were tons of artists that came before us that stood on their center, like Queen Latifah and MC Lyte and those girls who didn’t feel the need to necessarily play into that narrative, but Missy specifically, because her lyrical content was so sexual and…about the things that you would always speak about privately or behind closed doors. And then you look at her and she’s, like, this super sporty, fun, superhero, tomboy. To me, that’s really where I think we carved out our own space, and I’m always going to say ‘we’ because everything is mute without a muse like Missy. And no matter what, whether it was the director or choreographer or the costume design, Missy really brought it all to life—she’s what made it so believable. She’s so authentically magnetic and connects with the looks,” Ambrose said.