Hollywood’s heartthrob Pedro Pascal made an appearance at the Thunderbolts premiere in London wearing a T-shirt, loose black pants, a lilac cap, and a taupe coat while his peers donned gowns and tuxedos. While some might say Pascal’s look was too casual for a red carpet event such a premiere, his outfit’s message is much more powerful than any high-fashion gown. The white T-shirt bore three words: Protect the Dolls. And everyone sat up in attention.
Created by the London-based designer Conner Ives, the Protect the Dolls shirt advocates for protecting transgender women and their rights. And in our current lexicon, the word “doll” is a term of endearment for trans women who are feminine-presenting. “Doll” itself as a term originated in ballroom culture, a queer subculture grounded in dance and modeling competitions founded by Black and Latine LGBTQ+ folks in New York City in the 1970s.
The origins of ballroom culture date back to the mid-19th century in the U.S., when cities began to have an economic boom and LGBTQ+ communities formed their own safe spaces. Known as the first person to describe himself as a drag queen, William Dorsey Swann, a formerly enslaved Black man, hosted secret drag balls in Washington, D.C.
Despite facing multiple arrests alongside other attendees, these balls continued and expanded to other cities, including New York, Chicago, New Orleans, Baltimore, and Philadelphia. In the 20th century, drag balls continued to expand as organizations advocated for LGBTQ+ communities. But even then, some spaces were predominantly white and exclusive, with Black and Brown performers facing constant racism.
Ballroom culture as we know it today changed in the 1970s when drag queens Lottie and Crystal LaBeija founded the first ballroom house, the House of LaBeija, in Harlem, New York. Frustrated by the racist practices in the drag scene, LaBeija organized balls for Black and Latine LGBTQ+ individuals, leading to her being dubbed the founding mother of modern ballroom culture.
As a safe space, the ballroom scene allowed individuals to express their cultures and identities without fear of judgment, leading to ballroom culture becoming a powerful symbol of resilience, creativity, and community. And that has always included the transgender community. During the 2010s, the subculture then expanded to Latin American countries such as Mexico, Brazil, Costa Rica, Chile, Argentina, and Colombia; who have themselves always had their own explorations of gender and sexuality within the LGBTQ+ sphere.
Back in the U.S., slang such as ‘‘mother,’’ ‘‘vogue,’’ ‘‘strike a pose,’’ and ‘‘doll’’ became a mainstay of ballroom culture and are now part of our cultural lexicon — think of Madonna’s iconic song Vogue and the eventual TV series Pose. Along with these cultural moments, there was the cultural phenomena of the 1990 documentary Paris is Burning and the current popularity of the reality TV show RuPaul’s Drag Race. All of these mentions have helped popularize ballroom culture and opened doors for LGBTQ+ individuals to be themselves.
Now, designer Ives is doing something similar for younger generations with the Protect the Dolls shirt. It’s a reminder that we must make a concerted effort to protect our spaces and the transgender members of our communities as a whole. The garment, seen on Pascal and other celebrities, including Australian singer Troye Sivan, Colombian-French designer Haider Ackermann, British actress Tilda Swinton, and pop queen Madonna, has become a phenomenon and call to action.
Initially, Ives didn’t plan to make the shirt a political statement. He had spent most of his life keeping fashion and politics separate. But, as he explained to Vogue, there has been a noticeable shift when it comes to the way that transgender individuals are being treated, and the idea of keeping the two parts of his life separate didn’t feel right anymore.
“When I think of the challenges that trans people in the States are facing right now, I just keep thinking about how scared I was when I was a 12-year-old gay white boy in an upper-middle-class suburb of New York City, let alone a trans girl in the middle of America under an administration that’s basically telling her that she doesn’t exist,” the designer told Vogue Magazine.
He also spoke with The New York Times and added, “We’re in very trying times right now—the world is changing in front of our very eyes and there was a helplessness that came with that. The girls who walk my show are trans and I have so many friends that are trans women in the United States. It reached a point where I couldn’t really remove myself anymore.”
On February 24, at his Fall/Winter 2025 show, the designer took his bow wearing the shirt that would soon become popular. By the next morning, the New York–born designer had not only garnered massive public support, but also a flood of messages from people wanting to order the shirt. He then crafted the garment in solidarity with the transgender community, with most of the proceeds going to Trans Lifeline, a U.S. charity led by transgender people that provides life-saving services to those in need. By April, it had already raised $70,000.
Since then, the Protect the Dolls shirt has become the new face of resistance merch, bringing attention to the rights of transgender people across the world. And some may question whether a slogan tee can make a difference. But in a world where laws are being enacted or stripped away when it comes to transgender protections, LGBTQ+ rights, and violence against transgender people is on the rise, Ives’ design proves to be a powerful and clear message: Protect the dolls and the LGBTQ+ community.
