An Endowment of Black Glamour
Our Philosophy
Glamour as Intellect
Atelier Lincoln is an experiential Black glamour house embedded in storytelling, archival memory, and the art of preservation. Our work gathers the elegance of the past and translates it into stationery, collectibles, and curated experiences that honor the lineage of Black sophistication.
Each collection and encounter draws from the heirlooms of our history, handwritten letters, vintage photographs, and gestures of grace, revealing how Black glamour has always been both style and strategy.
Through our stationery, exhibitions, and gatherings, we celebrate the quiet power of inheritance and the artistry of those who made beauty a form of resistance. Atelier Lincoln exists to keep those stories alive, tactile, intimate, and timeless.
The Lincoln Framework
THREE PILLARS OF PRESERVATION
The Firm.
Our curatorial practice, offering research, storytelling, and exhibition design for institutions and brands that wish to deepen their cultural resonance, connecting heritage with the audiences, members, and communities they serve.
The Repository.
Existing within a larger curatorial framework, this world is devoted to preserving and honoring Black glamour through ephemera, vintage archives and collectibles. We move between research and collection, uncovering how our heritage becomes art, and how glamour becomes economy.
The Study.
Our curriculum of Black glamour through the literary lens. With books, archival materials, critical essays, and intimate gatherings, we move through the pedagogy of Black glamour not only to admire the past, but to inherit its strategy.
“In a time when we have more access than ever before to the traumas of this world, how will you resist the tide of despair? Let beauty be your anchor.”
— Cole Arthur Riley
Under the creative direction of Atelier Lincoln, The Lincoln Conservatory is a curriculum offering deep study into the intellects of Black Glamour.
Through carefully selected readings, archival materials, and intimate gatherings, we study the lives of Black Women who used glamour not just as appearance but as strategy, power and economy.
This is the first edition, a collector’s run. Exposition I is open to all readers at no cost. Select gatherings within the series will be ticketed experiences, available for those who want to step deeper into the world of Vintage Black Glamour.
Café Society
Collector’s Preview
Inspired by the glamour, rebellion, and brilliance of the Black creatives who gathered in Harlem’s legendary nightspots. Café Society is for the curious, collectors & the committed.
✓ The Expositions (released slowly, title by title)
Midnight Flight
Collector’s Preview
The first class glamour experience, named in honor of the quiet courageous journeys of the Black artists, thinkers and seekers who crossed international borders for freedom, study and discovery.
✓ The Expositions (released slowly, title by title)
✓ The Glamour Repertoire (visual essays and archives)
The Loendi Club
Pay Per Event
Named for a society and literary circle from the forgotten Black Renaissance of Smoketown, these live salons and intensives are intimate, in-person forums that deepen and expand the Conservatory experience.
✓ The Expositions (released slowly, title by title)
✓ The Glamour Repertoire (visual essays and archives)
✓ Forum experiences held in Durham + Surrounding Areas, NC
The Curricula of Black Glamour…
To honor the discipline of Black Glamour, we must also study the ways it has always survived. These traditions guide our approach to study, shaping the readings, gatherings, and reflections that unfold within the Conservatory.
GLAMOUR NOTES FOR THE ARCHIVE
Create Your Own Curricula of Glamour.
Build your own archive. We create stationary collections with vintage motifs and designs. Each item becomes is a tactile part of the your own repertoire. A meaningful way to carry Glamour into your everyday.
Enjoy the restorative practice of writing. This time do it with Glamour in mind. Make sure to pair it with your favorite color to compliment your repertoire.
Glamour Deserves Gratitude
We decided to create our own language. The semantics are Black Glamour.
Get to Know Me
You may also know me as @theglamourarchivist. I’m the founder of The Lincoln Affairs, a curatorial firm located in Durham, NC. Through it, I honor our experience through the lens of Vintage Black Glamour not as costume, but as strategy for survival and healing.
For a long time, glamour felt distant. Something reserved, unobtainable and an elite offering only for special people. But even as a child, I knew Black Glamour was at least real. I saw it in my Grandmother, Betsy. In the way she groomed herself each morning, even when her life gave her every reason not to. The lipstick. The hot comb. The nail designs. I wore plastic high heels and princess tiaras, sensing that I, too, would become something beautiful. But I didn’t yet know what or why.
YOU'VE GOT GLAMOUR MAIL
YOU'VE GOT GLAMOUR MAIL
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Ephemera.
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Glamour.
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Vintage.
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Archives.
The practice of beholding this fidelity to beauty in all things, I’ve come to believe is no small form of salvation
- Cole Arthur Riley