‘Drag Race’ alum Miss Fame returns to Copenhagen to bare all – in biodegradable body glitter

Miss Fame is hard to miss: two-metres-tall (in heels), 20-inch waist, exquisitely painted face, perfectly coifed wig. Having parlayed a solid run on season seven of RuPaul’s Drag Race into a coveted space in fashion’s most rarified stratosphere, you can spot them sitting front row at couture shows, on stage with Madonna, or even on the pages of this magazine (albeit wearing a little less than usual).

The Fame I reach in the kitchen of the quaint Zurich home they share with their husband of 15 years, however, is a little less glamorous. Fresh-faced, wearing a navy baseball cap and sweater, they eagerly show off a bounty of chicken eggs laid out before them on the kitchen table. “I got back into having animals about two years ago,” says Fame, who grew up on a family farm in California. It all started when a new friend, an “amazing, well-educated Swiss farmer named Reto Giacometti, who is also an animal scientist”, invited Fame over to tend to his chickens. Eventually, the farmer gave Fame a few eggs of their own. “I got those eggs and hatched them and I showed those chickens in the Swiss Nationals,” says Fame. “I became very Swiss.”

The locals were “very intrigued” when they discovered Fame’s other life on Facebook. “They would say, ‘Oh, I saw what you’re doing in Paris. Very interesting’. They wanted to talk to me, I wasn’t shut out,” says Fame. “Very quickly my little presence was known here in the agricultural community. It gave me an outlet, honestly, beyond fashion. I had been doing this so long and living in cities. I needed something to refresh my soul.”

Fame was first introduced to drag two decades ago by a legendary Californian queen named Ethylina Canne (Canne remains booked and busy, hosting drag brunches, bingo and club shows). “I met them out of drag and then I met them in drag and I remember being so intimidated by them in drag,” says Fame. “I got this feeling inside like, ‘Somehow I’m quite drawn to this’.” Shortly thereafter, Fame started exploring drag privately. From the very beginning, their “security blanket” was makeup. “Makeup made me feel confident when I was very insecure about my skin breaking out or just not knowing who I was yet,” says Fame. “Makeup gave me armour.”

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The look continued to evolve and at 23, Fame really started investing in their art form. “I bought a wig, I bought a corset, I bought some patent leather boots - stripper gear,” they say. “It wasn’t like today where everything is advertised online. It was before TikTok, before YouTube. It was word of mouth and your drag mother pointing you in the right direction.” When they got their first custom corset, from MistyCouture in London, things really clicked into place. That teeny tiny waist has become a Fame signature. “You get some numbness in your legs, you can’t eat. If I’m wearing the corset I’ll be like, ‘Honey, I’ll eat after’,” says Fame. “It’s really a commitment.”

Landing a coveted spot on the Drag Race main stage changed everything. Their YouTube series, Painted by Fame, in which Fame makes over fellow queens (fans still beg Fame to bring it back) started racking up millions of views and, eventually, Marc Jacobs called Fame up and invited them to sit front row at his show (OK, Fame was invited to sit second row, but they ultimately stole someone else’s front row seat). These days, attending Paris Fashion Week, appearing in magazines and starring in L'Oreal campaigns (they’re also signed to Danish agency Scoop Models), 38-year-old Fame describes what they do as “on the spectrum of drag” – a look that eschews padding (the corset remains, of course) and “relies on natural face structure” rather than creating a visual fantasy. “I feel that Miss Fame is me,” they say. “I’m stronger and more dominant as Miss Fame, of course, but who wouldn’t feel empowered when you look like a Golden Globe?”

There’s another aspect of Fame’s singular identity that’s of particular interest to this magazine. If it wasn’t abundantly clear from their given name, Kurtis Dam-Mikkelsen, Fame is one-quarter Danish. Their Danish grand father, Peer Dam-Mikkelsen and Colombian grandmother on their father’s side adopted Fame sometime within the first year of their life (“My family doesn’t give clean answers”) and raised them on the aforementioned farm amongst the cows and chickens.

In fact, the first time Fame left the United States was to travel to Copenhagen. “My family didn’t travel, because when you have a family farm, you have to stay and take care of the animals,” says Fame. A 10-year-old Fame, their grandfather and his daughter (Fame’s aunt, Margaret) hopped on a flight (“I was afraid to fly”) and stayed in the Danish capital for a whole month. Given that Fame had never left their rural community, it was a big deal. “I got to see all of these tall, blonde people that I was related to,” they say. “I don’t look Colombian, but I’m equally split between both worlds. People thought I was totally Danish.” What stuck with them most was the stunning rose garden and cherry trees dotting the garden of their grandfather’s family home (the garden was tended by their grandfather’s brother, Olé, a professional landscaper). That and the breakfasts of “cheese, jam and the most amazing bread”.

Just a couple weeks before we speak, Fame returned to Copenhagen. Aside from the ever-present baked goods (“I was like, ‘I shouldn’t be eating bread before fashion week, but here we are’”), the conditions were quite different – they were shooting their Vogue Scandinavia editorial. In the images, we find Fame nude and covered top-to-toe in silver body paint. “I might shock people, because my body does not fit into one lane,” says Fame, noting that this body paint experience was certainly a first. “I have a long line, so there’s a femininity to my body and there’s a masculinity to my body.”

Stripping down to just their panties in a room full of people, Fame, who “relies a lot on fashion to help celebrate their silhouette” was raw but never uncomfortable. That was thanks in large part to the paint. It was a surprisingly easy, 20-minute process, in which makeup artist Kate Mur (“She’s a master,” says Fame) started with a petroleum base followed by the pigmentation, which activated as it touched the body. “It felt slightly like going to the beach and sitting in the sand,” says Fame, noting that the glitter was biodegradable. “Immediately I liked my body better in this light, reflective material. I felt like I was in better shape. Like, ‘Oh, since when do I go to the gym?’”

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It’s no small feat for Fame to appear this way. It’s been a long road towards feeling comfortable in their skin, one that began back when they first discovered drag and is still in process today. In 2020, Fame stated on Instagram that they would be using they/them pronouns moving forward, but their journey to discover their true gender identity goes deeper than they’ve ever publicly stated. “Let me put on my big girl panties and let me tell my truth,” prefaces Fame.

For four years, Fame took testosterone blockers. “I was telling no one,” says Fame. “I took testosterone blockers, first off, to improve my skin because I was struggling with acne.” At first, they took a blocker meant for biological women (“My sister was taking it, so I took her medication”). Eventually, Fame began taking the specific medication trans women take to block androgen. “I wasn’t ready to say that I’m trans, but I did feel it was an important journey for me to take,” says Fame. “It was before Covid and into Covid. I probably looked my most feminine and I liked that. I also wasn’t taking oestrogen so I was probably low on natural hormones and I was feeling a bit depressed. So I was caught in a bubble of, ‘Do I go further?’”

“There was a part of me that identified with that world of transness,” Fame continues. “But it’s a grown-up, big-time decision and I didn’t want to take it light-heartedly.” Fame talked to a therapist and their husband at length. Meanwhile, they “took a break” from the blockers because Fame and their husband were trying to have a baby. “I knew I needed to focus on my fertility,” says Fame (the couple has not yet had a child). So where does Fame stand today? “I feel like there is a part of me that identifies as trans,” they say. “Public facing? No, because I live my life as Kurtis and when I go out, people don’t clock me because I know how to give boy. I’ve had no facial feminisation, my hair is cropped and I can wear denim and a coat. But when I was on blockers, in Europe, I would wear oversized, non-gender-specific clothing and my hair was platinum blonde and longer and people were like, ‘Madame?’”

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Though Fame currently identifies as non-binary, they “lean more towards femininity”. “I do not feel super boyish,” says Fame. “I feel the public can perceive me as a man, so I give them that and say, ‘Go for it’, because I don’t even have the energy today to fight that battle. But when I’m ready as Miss Fame and I’m out, I just feel like a woman. I have always felt like that.” It’s a truth Fame has shied away from proclaiming in the past, not wanting to upset or take away from their trans sisters who have medically transitioned and present as a woman every day. But this is Fame’s story and they’re ready to put it out there.

Fame is still on their journey of self-discovery. They hope to spend more time in Copenhagen to gain a richer understanding of their Danish heritage (in fact, they hope a Dane or two reading this story might recognise the names Peer and Olé Dam-Mikkelsen and come forward with an, ‘Oh, I’m related to you’). They hope to delve into their Colombian heritage, too. As for their gender identity, Fame is still “putting themselves into question”. “I might always do that, or maybe at one point I’ll have a realisation that’s so rich I can’t deny it. At this stage I’m kind of existing and in a grey area and maybe that grey area is doing me a service and maybe it’s doing me a disservice,” says Fame. “I guess we’ll find out. To be continued.”