@EthanISupreme is the living embodiment of his instagram handle. Not only supreme in his charisma, poise or humbleness, but also in his ability to spot the vintage Dior bag from the corner of his eye the very second we entered Wasteland on Melrose Ave. in Los Angeles. Spending the afternoon shopping with Ethan felt analogous to hanging out with a close friend, his presence brought sunshine into the dimly lit store while his overall chill demeanor cooled down the sweltering sun right outside. When I learned Ethan was 16 years old, my jaw visibly dropped. When I was 16, I was hitting parked cars. Ethan on the other hand is reinventing the beauty world and acts as a makeup guru to over half a million instagram followers. He is exactly who I would have looked up to to help guide me through my teenage awkwardness.
Photography by [Devin Kasparian](https://www.instagram.com/devin.pdf/?hl=en)
As we browsed vintage clothes, Ethan explained his personal aesthetic to me.“I usually try to take a little bit of emo and a little bit of gay and a little splash of something designer - just think gay but kind of dark.” His emo side stems from his parents love of metal and punk. His dad took him to a Metallica concert for his eighth birthday, so it’s becoming very clear that being cool runs in the family.
Through being exposed to a homogeneous mixture of music genres at a young age, Ethan explained that music holds a special place in his heart. “I just love music a lot and I think very visually with things - I love music videos.” He further elaborated that he gets “a lot of inspiration through music videos because of the visuals.” He is able to transcend mediums through using what he learns from creatives such as Travis Scott, who happens to be his favorite artist at the moment, and create avant-garde makeup looks with his inspirations in mind.
Ethan could most likely write a New York Times bestselling guide on pop culture references, yet, deep down he an old soul wise beyond his years. Listening to both Miley Cyrus and Maralyn Manson in his free time, Ethan is the perfect juxtaposition between old and new.
His innate wisdom partially stems from having to go through experiences that forced him to grow at a rapid rate. His eyes, that are crystalized with knowledge, opened widely as I asked him about his experience getting kicked out of private school the summer following 7th grade. His exuberance never falters as he tells me his story.
Photography by [Devin Kasparian](https://www.instagram.com/devin.pdf/?hl=en)
“In 7th or 8th grade I started doing social media. I was wearing makeup online but I wasn’t really flamboyant in school. I wasn’t annoying about it, I didn’t talk about it, I didn’t wear makeup to school. I didn’t really ever get bullied from it, it was just very neutral and nobody really talked about it. Then as I started gaining more followers around the summer before 8th grade the school board wanted to discuss my social media activity. It was over the summer - it was before we paid tuition for the next year and my parents and I were like “oh okay we see how this is going to go”. We just went in there and basically, long story short, they said that my social media and me as a person didn’t reflect their moral standards for the school and that I couldn’t go there anymore. The school couldn’t straight up just say because I was gay. I also got really good grades, wasn’t annoying, all the teachers liked me- I was the only boy that wasn’t hyper and distracting. My parents were super supportive. My mom in the middle of the meeting actually said “fuck all of you, youre not allowed to have him” to the school board and we got up and left. We left there and that’s when I started doing online school.”
What happens when you get kicked out of school for being gay in the 21st century? You kickstart your Instagram, Youtube, Internet career. At an impressionable young age, this could have been a life defining negative experience. However, fuelled by passion, Ethan transformed the worst into a means of self expression. Through using his new free time productively, he has become a makeup and beauty entrepreneur before getting his licence. When I asked Ethan if he had anything to say to his school now, first asking if he could be vulgar, he then responded with the simple phrase, “Suck my ass.”
Ethan is an enigma. His vivacious presence and contagious laughter had me visibly smiling for days. He is the kind of person you go your whole life looking for, the best friend you want by your side for those _ride or die_ situations. His last words of advice? “Be unapologetically yourself.”
