Gearing up for my Documentary launch, Designing Winter 2022 whilst trying to be a good husband and parent.

Do you ever get the feeling you’re failing at being a partner to your spouse, and/or as a parent? Frick me, I feel that so often lately. I’ve been feeling more and more guilty because my work is really getting busy again, now that the world seems to be setting the pandemic aside and playing catch up on the last couple of years. With that, it means I have less time to really focus on things like making proper time for Rob. I make sure I feed my son whenever I'm home and free, and I'm almost always there for bath and bed time for him, but from now until Autumn, things will just get busier and busier and I won’t be able to do all of those family things I’d like to do. I keep telling myself (as does Rob) that it’s for the greater good of our family. That all of this work means that we’re setting our family up, and that Ismail will hopefully look back and see that the times I was away was for him and his future. I really hope that’s the case, and that he doesn’t feel like I neglected him.

I have so many short 2-3 day trips over the next few weeks until I get back to filming. I have a documentary launching on the BBC, called Beauty and the Bleach, at the very end of this month, which I cannot wait for people to see. It’s a doc about colorism, and what it means to be a person of color. I lead the doc, and I share my story of colorism, and how I bleached my skin when I was a young boy, because of societal pressure, and racism, within my home town and my community. It’s the most personal story I’ve ever shared, and I have so many great folks from all over the world share their stories of colorism, too. I’ve never felt more vulnerable on screen before, which is crazy to say, considering I'm on one of the most emotional shows on TV. But, with Queer Eye, I'm quite selective about what I share, and it's very rare I get emotional. During this doc, I can’t help but feel so emotional, and I think that the film is all the better for it. If I were guarded, it would have been a surface level film that probably wouldn’t connect with any one.

I started press for it this morning, with reporters getting early access to watch it. I was so nervous, as it’s the first big thing I’ve done completely on my own, without a co-host. I was so relieved to hear that the reporters loved the film and saw a different side of me. I'm praying the general audience will feel the same when they see it.

It’s only going to be available in the UK, for now, but we’re hoping a US streamer will take it, so that it can be viewed globally. It’s a topic that is truly global, so here’s hoping it gets that audience.

Also this week, I'm finalizing designs for my outerwear brand, Was Him. It’s so hard to edit down ideas and make sure that you’re not just throwing all of your ideas at one collection, otherwise it could get really messy. I have edited down to 10 pieces that I think really make sense together, and that you’ll hopefully love as much as I do. The colors are so bold, and the details represent my heritage, which was so important to me, for this collection. We start sampling next week. I can hardly wait to try them all on and fall in love with them. I'm still obsessed with the last 2 drops, which I still wear daily. I'm hoping I feel the same about these once I get them on my body.

Back to finishing up the final details of these designs. I’ll be back next week.

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