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#1Eight years ago, when a job brought Southern California native Jay Colby to Portland, Portlandia made up most of what she knew of the Rose City. Despite learning her favorite sketch was real and restrooms really are for customers only, Colby quickly discovered a town she didn’t want to leave. But her transplant perspective endures, shaping how she moves in the local drag scene.
A professional makeup artist who came to town to work at Nordstrom’s cosmetics counter, Colby moonlighted dancing at queer Portland night clubs before the pandemic. Drag performers filled the clubs she worked, and during the pandemic, her drag fandom grew into something more.
“I was like, I want to do what they’re doing,” Portland’s No. 1 drag artist of 2026 says, “but better,” then laughs a glamorous laugh.
Colby’s makeup artistry coalesced with her dancing and performance backgrounds. She spent more than two years in the House of Ada, a kiki house (a more casual, beginner-friendly alternative to “major” ballroom houses) featured on HBO’s competitive vogue ballroom series Legendary. Kerri Colby, a Los Angeles drag artist featured on RuPaul’s Drag Race, hired her as an assistant during the pandemic. Kerri taught Jay the art and business of drag and, in 2022, inducted her into the prestigious House of Colby, which is mothered by fellow Drag Race favorite Sasha Colby.
Thus, Jay Colby was born. Her signature aesthetic is feathered and hyperfeminine, with echoes of Marilyn Monroe and Dita Von Teese, though she takes what she wants from Old Hollywood.
“My glamour is glamour with no rules,” she says. “I want to redefine glamour.” More than re-creating the past, Colby says, her style is about expressing herself as a successful trans woman through drag that feels uniquely her own. Colby also credits her husband as a major support. “He pushes me to be the best I can be,” she says, “and is the support system I didn’t know I needed.”
Being part of a family has its effects, too. The Colby name opened doors, but it also brought notoriety.
“I almost felt like I had to work five times harder for [the queens] to respect me,” Jay Colby says. “People thought I was a nepo baby.”
And Portland has had its influence. Colby’s main gig these days is her much-celebrated weekly drag brunch at Alberta neighborhood cocktail lounge Bar Cala. It’s a regular stop on Drag Race and Dragula tours and consistently features a fabulous slate of local queens and kings.
While she appreciates traditional pageantry, Colby is drawn to the city’s experimental performers, and credits their willingness to challenge expectations with keeping the local drag scene dynamic.
“Everyone knows who exactly they are,” she says, “and they’re so unapologetic about it.”
Glamour, after all, doesn’t have rules.
SEE: Jay Colby in House of Dolls at Badlands, 110 NW Broadway, 503-972-7572, badlandsportland.com. 9:30 pm Friday, Aug. 7. $20. 21+. | Jay Colby’s Drag Brunch at Bar Cala, 2703 NE Alberta St., instagram.com/brunchportland. 11 am and 2 pm Sunday, Aug. 9. 11 am Saturday and Sunday, Aug. 15, 16, 23 and 30. $28.52–$33.85. All ages.
