Tracee Ellis Ross – actor, entrepreneur, style icon and daughter of ‘Queen of Motown’ Diana Ross – is PORTER’s latest coverstar. As her television show SOLO TRAVELING returns for a second season, she talks to PORTER about fashion, freedom and how she chooses herself over and over again.
Tracee Ellis Ross on the first season of Solo Traveling and how other women look up to her: “Honestly, when you saythat, it makes me want to cry. I feel honored, very moved. And my only desire [for the show] is that it just be a reminder that you can do it too. Your version.”
On one of her many mantras: “Your happiness is your own responsibility. That’s really the metaphor. That you can use solo travel the way I’m using it in the show – as a roadmap for an internal relationship with yourself. One that’s lifelong. It’s not just about a trip. It’s about a rich and textured life that is yours. And that’s not to say that it’s just for singlepeople. It’s for anyone who’s really looking for a relationship with their own inner landscape, and what makes their heart sing.”
On fashion: “I come to the office and I wear comfortable clothes, but when I go on a trip, if I’m going to go to Paris, I’m going to bring all my favorite things. And I’m going to live out my editorial dreams as if I were a living fashion spread.”
“Maybe because of social media, people don’t repeat outfits [and it’s] this whole thing. Which I don’t understand, because I build a wardrobe. There are things in my closet from years ago.”
“I love bold things. I love bold people. I love people who know themselves. I love bold expression. And it all comes through in my clothes.”
On being an actor: “One of the things that being an artist and an actor has offered me is the courage toplay; the necessity of play. What other people think of me is none of my business.”
On playing the role of Joan Carol Clayton in the noughties hit TV show Girlfriends: “There’s a lot ofirony in the reality of my life versus Joan’s. Joan was waiting to be chosen. And imagine what it’s like for an actor to speak thewords of someone for 173 episodes, for 8 years, who is constantly saying that; who has this big, beautiful life, friends, a big career, and is still, to a certain extent, unable to discover her own worthiness and her own lovability without the idea of beingchosen.”
On the end of Girlfriends: “It was such a terrifying end for all of us. We were just sent off to pasture with noreal goodbye. I felt like my identity was gone. When I looked in the mirror, I couldn’t see me because I saw Joan”.
On dealing with racism in the workplace: “I had a meeting recently. I walked out of there and it made me cry with how hard it was. I felt like I was in the face of systemic racism. I was the only woman in the room. I was one of two Black people, two people of color. And the garbage that was coming at me with such a sense of ease… it was genuinely staggering. And I felt very proud that I didn’t feel afraid to stand up. I brought it.”
[Photo Credit: Daniella Maiorano, Courtesy of Porter Magazine]
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