“YOU GOTTA BE YOURSELF…” “...BECAUSE EVERYBODY ELSE IS FUCKIN’ TAKEN!”

Drag entertainers are shaped by their personas, we can circle this topic a million times over, and the sentiment of looking authenticity will always carry the most importance. However, queerness, as it functions, can be a persona in and of itself. What happens when you can’t, and won’t, “turn it off?” To exist should be entirely based on the self, and for Pittsburgh local, and Runway International’s 2024/25 Model of the Year, QP Fascinator (@qp.fascinator_), confidence in that presentation is everything. We sat down with him to unpack his journey through community, competition, travel, night life, and his ability to be a “chameleon.”

For myself to solely define QP’s level of high fashion would be nearly impossible. “I am a person of many different ways of expression…I love formal attire with an edge; boas, flare out slacks, [and] things like that, but I love to put my own personal touch on them,” he describes. From evening wear, to street wear, to “12 bangles and 14 rings,” QP takes inspiration “from everything around [himself,]” and “funnels” it out of his own direction.

Though this path to self expression, QP says, “definitely wasn’t natural.” Before graduating high school, QP focused himself on being an athlete. He grew up primarily around boys, while taking this notion of masculinity for a better purpose, confidence. “I was always very confident in something I felt I was good in. When it came to sports, I knew I was the fastest kid on the baseball team…That’s what clicked with modeling.” While QP’s storyline itself may not be average, and may not have always been easy, the energy that he creates is more than self-assured because it was entirely self-made.

His first steps into modeling actually landed far from our home of Pittsburgh, from studying with Barbizon, doing photoshoots in cities like Las Vegas and Chicago, to, after completing his training, attending the modeling showcase in Orlando, Florida called “Passport to Discovery,” that jump started his career in not only being in front of the camera, but now coaching further generations of outspoken models behind it.

Upon becoming an instructor at Barbizon with his nomination as Model of the Year, QP returned to Passport as a chaperone. While the concept of a model is inherently visual, it sometimes seems to be believed that the act of seeing starts and stops with the camera, but for QP, it is a state of being. “The whole week, I’m walking in heels through this big ass resort as the only male chaperone, and people notice me!” The act of wearing these heels, though, IS a natural state. To win Model of the Year, it is up to the community as a whole to vote. QP found success in promoting himself, as himself, taking home not only the title, but an even further network of individuals who are, of course, fascinated with what his existence offers.

Taking this major achievement though, is not the “end all be all” for QP. He refuses to put a timeline on his success, another aspect of his complete individualism. “In my personal life, I’m having this big shift into adulthood. I’m not going to be naive, and put these shackles on myself to pin me down to this one goal, because…but there might be another that is ten times better [that] I didn’t even know I had…I’ve learned that every opportunity isn’t an opportunity for everyone.” Having done an event with the Pittsburgh Opera, QP shares that while he may have been different from the usual clientele, the attendees were excited to meet him for the same reason. “I had a line of people after the show trying to take pictures with me. They don’t get to see stuff like that in their regular life, so It’s fun for me to be different and [such a] stand out.” While further acknowledging his childhood, he shares that he still had and has kept his “flamboyant ways.”

QP’s audience expands beyond anything as direct as queer nightlife, or even the modeling industry itself. “I can still be around people I wouldn’t be expected to be around…[What] other people see is that confidence. These people don’t know you, you have the chance to be whatever YOU want to be…You gotta be yourself because everybody else is fuckin’ taken!”

The most simple part of QP Fascinator is his mission, to be “widely known,” and I would argue that it has already been a steady success. He leaves us with the sentiment of not bogging yourself down with what should happen, but that “...whatever is coming next is going to be better regardless.” After building his foundation, QP Fascinator is the essence of “progress.”