Lady Gaga's Born This Way Fashion Explained

I'm seeing a lot of confusion around the internet about why Gaga is wearing strange prosthetics. I've also seen a lot of people worried that she has some how gotten implants in her forehead (it's just makeup don't worry!). There's also been lots of disscussion about how the look contradicts the message of her new single Born This Way.

I'm not an expert on McQueen, fashion, or Gaga but I'm a fan of all three so I'll do my best to explain what I've noticed and provide visuals. If I mess something up feel free to correct me (politely please). I'm sure I'll muddle something up in all this because of the amount of brain fog I'm combating right now.

Ok lets start with the single cover for Born This Way.

Gaga has pointy shoulders and protruding "horns" and cheek bones. All of this looks very similar to the makeup that was used during Alexander McQueen's last show and collection while he was alive.

During this particular show (Alexander McQueen's Spring 2010 Ready To Wear Collection) Gaga's Bad Romance was premiered.

Since then there have been lots of call backs in her work to this specific collection. Of course the Bad Romance video itself is full of McQueen's creations. Since he died shortly after that video was made I think Gaga has tried to put tributes to McQueen in lots of her work; the newest being these prosthetics which were worn by the models during the show. She is honoring her friend and an artist who greatly inspired her. Born This Way was released on February 11th, 2011 which marked the one year anniversary of McQueen's death.



As you can see the show had an otherworldly/ futuristic feel to it. Some of the pieces are definitely reminiscent of H.R. Giger's alien designs. Everything down to the model's hair seems to be inspired by them.

Some pictures of the collection followed by some pictures of H.R. Giger's work:

Ok now on to the Grammy's. Gaga arrived in an "egg". On Leno she said the designer (Hussein Chalayan) preferred it to be called a vessel. It resembles a pod which keeps with the alien theme thus far. She was interviewed by Ryan Seacrest recently and said that she said inside the vessel for 72 hours before her performance.

“I was in there for about 72 hours. It was a very creative experience. It was time for me to really prepare and think about the meaning of the song and get prepared for the performance. I really wanted to be born on stage. The creative vessel was helpful for me to stay focused. We had it backstage so that I was able to really stay in this sort of creative, embryonic incubation."

She emerged from the vessel for her performance. The outfits for both her and the dancers were very muted which was quite different from what we normally see from Gaga. It drew most of the focus to the movement of the choreography. It was very much the birth of a new era and album.

She still had the prosethetic accessories from the single cover on.

While being interviewed by Jay Leno she had this to say about Born This Way:

"It's so full of love and spirit, and I think that it's the spirit that people are reacting to the most. I just want everyone to rejoice and celebrate and be unafraid to be happy with music. It doesn't always have to be so dark, it doesn't always have to be so sexy. Sometimes it's wonderful just to celebrate life and kind of go to church with it, you know?"

And she seemed to go to church with her hat and her organ solo.

She continued the theme by wearing what she called a "church hat" while in the audience.

The other outfit she wore that night was a bit more scifi.

She worked the prosthetic shoulders and face pieces into every look. On Jay Leno the next night she was still sporting them.

She had this interesting thing to say about what Born This Way and her Grammy preformance meant:

"to signify an artistic birthing of a new race within the race of humanity that bears no prejudice against anyone"

So for those who think the prosthetics take away from the meaning of Born This Way consider for a moment that maybe Gaga is expressing an evolution and a rebirth through her use of theatrics and special effects. She's trying to create a new breed for anyone who has ever felt alienated or strange for any reason.

I hope this made it a bit clearer for those wondering why she had those funny things on her face. I'm sure there's lots of stuff I missed when talking about this, feel free to point things out in the comments.

I'm going to end this post with her Grammy's performance.