Ellen Elias aka Ellen X is an Eritrean/Swedish visual artist, costume designer and stylist currently based between Paris and London but working on projects globally.
Ellen X became known for her distinctive personal style that she defines as ‘matrix goes cultural’. In her experiments with culture, fabrics, periods and shapes, she creates looks that are celebrated by fashion and lifestyle media across the World.
She was named one of the top 100 influential in styling in 2018. Her mantra is to inspire people to express themselves through their art, style and emotions and she has used that to throughout her work from redefining the style of major artists from labels like ROC Nation, in her work styling music videos as well as when collaborating with clients like H&M, LEGO, Monki and Swedish Television (SVT), National Touring Theatre (Riksteatern) and Film producer Baker Karim.
One of her biggest sources of inspiration is her motherland, Eritrea, whose culture and distinctive tribe-led styles can be seen throughout much of her work including ‘Svaret’ – a multiaward winning theatre play in Sweden celebrating black women for which she was Creative Director and Costume Designer.
Having collaborated with photographer Èmilie Régnier, Nuits Balneaires and Anton Renborg just to name a few.
Most recently she’s completed the first part of a series dubbed ‘Traveling Visual Identities’ which explores countries and tribes in Africa and mix their traditional attire with her point of view on that particular culture/style while using the city’s resources. A project highly celebrated by outlets like Vogue.
