With fashion evolving throughout concert culture – from the onslaught of feather boas at Harry Styles’s Love on Tour to the bejeweled costumes at Taylor Swift's the Eras Tour – Beyoncé's Renaissance Tour ushers in a new wave of high fashion, with fans standing out in chromatic ensembles.
Featuring outfits with disco ball bedazzled cowboy hats, flared leather pants and yellow jumper jackets, the ASU Beyhive buzzes with excitement to the State Farm Stadium for their very own haute couture concert.
"That is one of the things I'm most excited about for Beyoncé, seeing people. Because the Beyhive is so creative," ASU forensic psychology fourth year student Lindsey Smith said. "They make inspirations of maybe outfits that she's worn or just their own thing. It's a way of self-expression and an art of itself."
Citing heavy influences from Black, queer culture specifically within the ballroom dance and house music scene, Beyoncé transformed the stadium into her very own celebration of music, life, joy, release and self-expression. Akin to a vibrant church worship service, the concert is complete with hundreds of handheld fans clapping across the crowd.
Taking to social media, the Grammy-winning artist had a simple request for her supporters: "to celebrate with you wearing your most fabulous silver fashions!"
All across social media, getting decked out to go out has regained popularity. Dressing to the nines is no longer exclusive to cosplayers and conventions as many have begun to coordinate intricate costumes to wear out to film premieres, coffee dates, theme nights and concerts.
From beachwear at Barbie premieres to bedazzled bustiers at Beyoncé, fans have embraced the "anything-but-boring" dress code to public functions by way of self expression.
"It's another way of kind of bringing us closer, you know?” Smith said. "Wanting to dress up and wanting to do that thing. It kind of helps with anticipating that experience, and that event, and just makes it all the more better."
"Just have some fun with it," ASU alumni and Beyhive member Austin Ashburn says. "It doesn't even have to be a cute fit, just show up and wear something that you wouldn't usually wear, whether it fits the theme or not even."
Being surrounded by people who enjoy the things you do and being able to exchange glowing compliments and gushing questions with one another – about where someone thrifted a top, or how someone cropped their pants a certain way – brings a certain anticipatory joy and excitement to getting to go out and get all dressed up for certain events.
"I think people really listened to her, like whether it was last minute or not, when she asked for everyone (to wear) silver. A lot of people followed that guideline, which I thought was really cute. It was very shimmery, like futuristic energy," Ashburn said. "Lots of chrome, and silver, and gold. I saw some metallic chest plates and all the cowboy hats with the dangly stuff, so yeah, it was a good time."
"I noticed everyone was intentional or purposeful of the pieces or sets that they wore," ASU recreational therapy fifth year student Denise Jan Roa said.
Studded from the stands at the very top of the venue to the rows of seats at the bottom of the floor, fans came packing State Farm Stadium wearing silver, chrome, gray, sparkly, light-up and bejeweled outfits and accessories.
"I was committed to the bee outfit, like I was wearing like a striped – I would say like yellow, black and white striped dress, and my black sexy heels," Jan Roa said when describing her own Renaissance outfit. "It was a pain in the butt, but I still slayed. I felt, honestly, when I looked at everyone else I was the only one that was wearing yellow."
While the captivating couture medley of outfits Queen Bey debuted throughout the sets at her concert came from dozens of worldwide brands – even wearing fits from exclusively Black designers in collaborations with Ferragamo, Feben, Balmain, Tiffany & Co., Off-White and her own brand with Adidas, named Ivy Park, for the Juneteenth show – the cost of looking good didn't shake the fashionable Beyhive.
"(I wore) like a silver tank top with sequins kind of glued on it. I got it from Amazon. And then I bought… the chrome cowboy hat, and so I got that for like $50. And then I just wore black slacks and professional shoes,” Ashburn said. "I don't think it was that crazy. Probably like $110."
"I have a body suit that I'm going to wear and it has silver little rhinestone sequins going down it and it's black mesh," Smith said. "And then under that I'm wearing this black bathing suit top I have, but it has sun and moon and stars and kind of orbital space for 'Alien Superstar.'"
There’s no other way to describe the sensation of being among people in the stands reaffirming one another on the hard work put into each outfit, while simultaneously getting ready to sit and enjoy the concert of a lifetime. The Beyhive gets to share this experience together, screaming every lyric, fanning as applause with one another, and dancing to our hearts’ content.
"You only get so many opportunities to dress up like this nowadays. And I'm really excited. We live in a time where these kinds of events feel more communal than usual," Ashburn said. "So why not build that community by also dressing up, and expressing yourself, and contributing to that atmosphere and environment?"
Edited by Claire van Doren, Sadie Buggle and Caera Learmonth.
Reach the reporter at amvald11@asu.edu and follow @anxieteandbread on X.
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Analisa Valdez is a reporter with the Echo, focusing on covering the arts and entertainment world. Analisa has been apart of the State Press for two and a half years and is in her third year at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication.
