‘Harlem’ Star Jerrie Johnson Preps for Wedding at New York Bridal Fashion Week

For Jerrie Johnson, the plot of the ultimate season of “Harlem,” the tv sequence during which she stars, feels oddly much like her personal life.

In a plot twist within the sequence finale, which aired in February, the character Ms. Johnson performs, Tye, a infamous participant, proposes to her love curiosity. Ms. Johnson’s companion, Dria Brown, was on the set when the scene was filmed in March 2024. The 2 checked out one another between takes, even crying at one level. All of it felt too actual.

“Once I learn concerning the proposal, I had already been fascinated with proposing,” Ms. Johnson mentioned.

After filming, Ms. Johnson went on a solo journey to Tulum, Mexico, the place she had an epiphany: She, too, ought to suggest. (The couple plan to marry subsequent 12 months, although they haven’t set a date.)

The couple theorize that the present’s creator, Tracy Oliver, drew inspiration from their love whereas writing the ultimate season of the sequence, which follows the lives of 4 ladies in New York. “I used to be like, ‘Oh my gosh, this season is de facto our life,’” Ms. Brown, 33, mentioned. “However I’m not a participant — simply to be clear,” Ms. Johnson, 31, added.

On Tuesday afternoon at Union Sq. Cafe in Manhattan, virtually a 12 months after Ms. Johnson proposed throughout a visit to Jamaica, the couple have been mentally getting ready for his or her first wedding-dress fittings. They’d spend the day at runway exhibits, shows and personal appointments throughout New York Bridal Style Week, the place designers showcased their newest collections to media, patrons, and on this case, two brides.

Ms. Brown, in earth-tone Collina Strada pants and a few funky green-and-black boots from Miista, rested one leg over Ms. Johnson’s lap. “I feel one thing that’s actually necessary about our love story and marriage ceremony is we each have Virgo moms who should not current for this journey,” mentioned Ms. Brown, whose mom has had A.L.S. for seven years. Ms. Johnson’s mom died in 2019. “My mother would have liked Dria,” she mentioned.

On their approach to their first presentation of the day, held by Justin Alexander, they held palms and sang Sabrina Carpenter’s “Please Please Please,” Ms. Brown’s lengthy brown braids swinging behind her again.

Throughout the presentation, they sipped champagne whereas participating with the fashions. “I’ve to clap for this one,” Ms. Brown mentioned as she regarded a corset gown with a sq. neckline and a basque waist.

After the present, Ms. Brown selected the gown, together with just a few others, recent off the runway, to attempt on with Ms. Johnson. The couple squealed and giggled within the becoming room. Ms. Brown even made Ms. Johnson flip and face away from her through the first becoming as a result of she wished their clothes to be a shock.

“Oh my God, let’s simply get married tomorrow,” Ms. Johnson mentioned, sporting a corset robe with a peaked bodice and a excessive slit. “That is the perfect factor I’ve ever tried on,” mentioned Ms. Brown, sporting a strapless robe with a drop waist. They twirled round and adjusted one another’s clothes.

Ms. Johnson, who grew up in Philadelphia, and Ms. Brown, who’s from Winnsboro, S.C., are energetic and bubbly. The pair, who reside collectively within the Mott Haven part of the Bronx, met in March 2022 when Ms. Johnson was the host of a panel concerning the play “Confederates,” and Ms. Brown was a panelist. “I believed Dria was just a little cute,” Ms. Johnson mentioned, however she additionally discovered Ms. Brown and her good friend “just a little cliquey.”

Ms. Johnson tried to get the eye of Ms. Brown, an inventive producing director at an arts-based nonprofit known as Broadway Advocacy Coalition, for months over Instagram DM. They went on their first date in November 2022.

After making an attempt on two extra traditional kinds, Ms. Brown mentioned her fears of making an attempt on marriage ceremony clothes had dissipated through the becoming.

The clothes she tried on have been extra revealing and tightfitting than she was used to. “I’m the daughter of a pastor,” Ms. Brown mentioned. “There’s been a lot I’ve been informed about masking up, that’s so deeply ingrained in me, that it’s been laborious to let go,” she mentioned.

“I simply am sort of a tomboy, you already know?,” she added. “I need to transition into my divine female. I really feel so attractive and assured in our relationship that I need to additionally really feel that within the marriage ceremony.”

Throughout the fittings, she mentioned, she had not felt squeezed into clothes in a approach that made her self-conscious about her physique. She mentioned she had additionally felt comfy as a result of one of many 4 fashions within the presentation was a Black girl with a physique sort much like hers.

“If she is rocking it, I can rock that, too,” Ms. Brown mentioned.

Ms. Johnson mentioned she had by no means imagined herself in a standard marriage ceremony gown, although now she was contemplating it.

On a taxi trip passing by the cherry blossom timber across the metropolis, the couple mentioned that neither had been to a marriage till their mid-20s, so that they didn’t have any fantasies about weddings.

They mentioned they’ve been reinterpreting wedding-day traditions, like sporting white. The thought of sexual purity and advantage related to sporting white doesn’t resonate with them, however they mentioned that they’d discovered that Yoruba deities wore white for peace, safety and renewal.

“White protects me from no matter spirit that I don’t need to let in, so as an alternative of sexual purity, it looks like non secular purity to me,” Ms. Johnson mentioned. “White can signify clearing your self to have the ability to settle for divine partnership, to have the ability to settle for this subsequent step.”

Over at a runway present on the Guggenheim Museum for Kyha Studios, Ms. Brown mentioned she appreciated that the present “was like an editorial escape.” She mentioned she would think about taking her engagement pictures sporting a silver balloon gown from the gathering on the Empire State Constructing.

After the present, a visitor stopped Ms. Johnson for a photograph and a hug: “I’m obsessive about you,” the fan mentioned. Ms. Johnson posed with extra followers on the road earlier than popping into Esé Azénabor’s retailer on the Higher East Facet. “That’s what you name craftsmanship — craftswomanship,” Ms. Brown mentioned, pointing on the corset beading and three-dimensional, hand-embroidered flowers on one gown.

The final cease of the day was an appointment with Scorcesa, a model from the Haitian designer Charles C. Dieujuste.

“Sak pase?,” Ms. Brown greeted him in Haitian Creole, that means “what’s up?”

“N’ap boule” — we’re good — he responded.

For this appointment, they tried on their outfits individually. “I’m already unhappy,” Ms. Brown mentioned, peeking into the becoming room the place Ms. Johnson turned into a white jumpsuit with an uncovered midriff.

“That is what I imagined,” Ms. Johnson mentioned concerning the look when she stepped out of the becoming room within the homey Midtown studio. “I find it irresistible. I really like you,” Ms. Brown mentioned, embracing her beloved.

Ms. Johnson additionally tried on white pants and an identical cropped jacket with two removable trains, flipping them round and doing a spin for Ms. Brown. She practiced twerking in it. “OK, so long as I may do this,” she mentioned.

Mr. Dieujuste engaged in a heart-to-heart chat with the couple, about taking pleasure of their identities, inviting them again for extra fittings and a few conventional meals.

“I can’t wait to come back again for some Haitian meals,” Ms. Johnson mentioned.