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  • Shelby Stewart

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Can You Expense Essence Fest? Asking For A (Creative) Professional Friend

Every June, my DMs start flooding with the same questions. The first: Do I have any extra tickets for ESSENCE Festival of Culture? The answer,…

Leon Thomas, Babyface And Public Enemy Added To ESSENCE Festival 2026 Lineup

For more than three decades, the ESSENCE Festival of Culture has returned to New Orleans as something bigger than a music festival. It’s a family…

‘Heart & Hustle: Houston’ Season 2 Turns Up the Drama

In a city where ambition moves as fast as the traffic on 610, OWN’s Heart & Hustle: Houston returns with a second season that digs…

Want To Be On Stage At ESSENCE Fest? Here’s The Real Way In

Every July, New Orleans transforms into the epicenter of Black culture, music, and empowerment as hundreds of thousands descend upon the city for ESSENCE Festival…

How My Fear Of The Single Black Mother Stereotype Kept Me In An Abusive Marriage

I was born a Black girl in New York City in the 1980s. It was a time when graffiti graced walls, Lojacks secured steering wheels,…

On ‘Real Housewives’ Performance Comes At A Price

The Real Housewives franchise has always been about the performance of wealth—aspirational, excessive, and just believable enough to keep us watching. When The Real Housewives…

Texas Judge Blocks Changes To HUB Program, Citing Executive Overreach

A Texas judge has temporarily blocked sweeping changes to the state’s Historically Underutilized Business (HUB) program, delivering an early legal victory to a coalition of…

Aerial Powers Partners With Silk Protein For Power Assist Campaign

The stage is set, and March Madness is in full swing.    The final four teams are battling in the Big Ten men’s basketball tournament…

EXCLUSIVE: TheARTI$t Turns Love Into Design With IRIS. Loafer

For TheARTI$t, the outfit has always started from the ground up. “Footwear has always been the ‘it’ factor for me,” she says, describing it less…

‘Beyond the Gates’ Brings ChelseaKat Handbags From Screen To Market

Soap operas have long been architects of desire. Since their golden era in the 1960s, the genre has shaped the way audiences imagine love, power,…