The Collective Rwanda (RW) Week of Fashion wrapped up its inaugural edition with a successful press launch, several ‘business of fashion’ seminars and a sparkling evening of runway shows that saw the latest collections from local designers showcased to an array of esteemed guests, including Rwanda’s First Lady, Jeannette Kagame, and her daughter Ange Kagame.
In attendance too was an excited, style-savvy crowd.
In what was a highly-anticipated debut, the fashion event took place at the five-star Kigali Serena Hotel, hosted by Collective RW (a creative collaboration founded in 2015 by the city’s local designers Sonia Mugabo, Teta Isibo, Matthew Rugamba, Linda Mukangoga and Candy Basomingera) in partnership with Journal Rw and national airline RwandAir.
With the aim to promote ‘Made In Rwanda’ fashion and encourage collaboration within the African fashion industry, the week of fashion saw no shortage of contemporary, bold, and colorful collections from all the featured designers, against the backdrop of ‘teamwork makes the dream work’. FORBES WOMAN AFRICA was present too; here’s a report of the highlights:
<h2>Haute Baso</h2>
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Having ventured into the world of fashion precisely because it offers the freedom to transform ideas into pieces that can be shared with an audience, the designers at Haute Baso presented a collection inspired by a book about Rwanda’s military history called Resilience of a Nation. Showcasing women’s wear with simple yet contemporary silhouettes, the resultant collection featured classic military print jackets and tees mixed with stylish, easy ready-to-wear pieces.
Haute Baso’s mission is to translate the passion for art and design into a vehicle for positive change, so highlighting local artisans while promoting job creation particularly for youth and women is important.
“We know that to empower a woman is to empower her community,” says designer Linda Mukangoga. Her belief in the potential of showcasing Rwanda in a global market through fashion and at the same time empowering artisans in the community is what drives this quiet, determined and passionate designer.
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<h2>Sonia Mugabo</h2>
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“If ever there is a market where the fashion world still has potential, it is Africa. I believe it is the right time to change the African narrative and I feel as though it is our creative responsibility to do so,’’ says designer Sonia Mugabo. Following her heart despite being advised to do fashion ‘on the side’, she delivered a SS17 collection featuring bold colors mixed with delightful floral prints and layered ruffles in silhouettes inspired by a refined femininity.
Best known for playing with the perfect mix of vintage and modern design, the brand creates pieces that reflect a documentation of ever-evolving experiences and style.
It represents a collection of memories, of places, people and moments brought to life by #madeinrwanda.
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<h2>Inzuki Designs</h2>
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Inzuki Designs is best known for its specialized brand of accessories that are globally appealing, African-inspired and Rwandan-made. Presenting bold, mostly-beaded statement pieces on the runway most suitable to a modern-day contemporary style, every product sees authentic design translated into a vibrant and fashionable accessory.
“I team up with numerous local artisans to transcend traditional Rwandan design and seek to customize it into comtemporay design,” says founder and designer Teta Isibo.
In what was unprecedented for a Kigali show, she believes the fashion week went a long way in showing the potential of ‘Made in Rwanda’.
“We are hoping to grow this movement, get more Rwandan fashion designers on board and forge ahead together to take Rwanda fashion global,” she says.
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<h2>House of Tayo</h2>
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Designer Matthew Rugamba took his turn showcasing his menswear collection combining touches of bold African patterns and textures on shirts and jackets.
Key items included a new mix of African-inspired print shirts, pocket squares and scarves, with slim fitting pants.
Feeling both relieved and happy after the show, the designer said he believes togetherness will create a difference in Rwanda’s fashion industry, and that being a part of this platform means there is a growing opportunity to share experiences and widen networks, whilst growing together.
The Collective RW Week of Fashion looks set to keep contributing to an already growing conversation about African fashion and talent in Africa and around the world.

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Clothes Encounters  In Kigali

These designers showcased memorable collections at two recent fashion weeks in Johannesburg – and could well be on their way to becoming famous among South Africa’s swish set.
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<h3>Rich Mnisi/OATH</h3>
This 23-year-old has already won laurels as a young designer, and his collection is distinct and consistent. This season’s offering from OATH is for the female traveler, who wants to leave nothing behind and wear it all on arrival. A must-have for the stylish working woman this season is the cocoon coat.
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<h3>Celeste Arendse/Selfi</h3>
Having launched her brand only six years ago, this young designer is making waves in the fashion industry. Her apparel is inspired by architecture, and the forms and patterns in nature. Selfi is a Cape Town-based label that wants to capture the essence of the eras.
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<h3>Thabo Makhetha</h3>
Lesotho-born South African designer Thabo Makhetha-Kwinana launched her eponymous label in 2009. The brand has since received a number of accolades, including Nelson Mandela Bay’s Top 40 Under 40; she was also Designer of the Year at the ImpAct Awards (Arts &amp; Culture Trust). Makhetha produces unique functional capes and jackets made out of beauteous Basotho blankets, called Kobo Ea Bohali ‘Blankets of Prestige’. The label made its debut at SA Fashion Week Joburg in March.
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<h3>Nelson Makamo, collaborating with House of Olé</h3>
Though not a designer in the true sense, Nelson Makamo is an artiste you need to know and remember. He recently returned from Venice, where he participated at the annual Biennale. He collaborated with Olé Ledimo of House of Olé, who is known for his Savile Row-style classic-cut suits, but for SA Fashion Week, they added a glorious women’s collection.
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<h3>Natasha Jaume &amp; Carina Louw/Erre</h3>
Theirs is a fashion brand specializing in leather, aiming to provide the working woman quality wardrobe staples and investment pieces that can be worn both on and off duty. But at the Spring/Summer 2015 showing of SA Fashion Week, their fashion philosophy took another turn. Erre presented the Myri dress, which can be worn in different ways – we saw atleast 12 looks on the runway. Jaume says there could be more than 30 ways to wear the dress. This was inspired by the woman with a busy lifestyle who wants a simple dress she can wear in different ways for different occasions.

Selfi-pic-by-Chris-Townend

New  Kids On The Fashion Block

As the lights dimmed and the percussionists performed, Nhlanhla Nciza dramatically appeared on the ramp, in an NN Vintage outfit (her designer line), flanked by two male dancers.
Nciza, a style icon and one half of Afropop band Mafikizolo, belted out Vimba Kanjini from their latest album, Reunited, to the beat of the drums at the recent Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Joburg.
The lights came on and Nciza sashayed the ramp showing off her latest designs,  thus re-launching NN Vintage. She was followed by a bevy of celebrities and models wearing her collection aptly named, The Evolution, an eclectic mix of bold bright fabrics from Uganda, Ghana, Nigeria, Malawi, Kenya and South Africa.
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“I tried to create a look that can compete internationally, also mixing it up with sequences here and there,” says Nciza, who was featured on the cover of the August/September issue of FORBES WOMAN AFRICA.
“It’s an everyday look and I didn’t want to use the vintage look, even though the brand is known for that.”
The designer worked with four seamstresses for the line using materials bought on her travels across the continent as part of Mafikizolo’s music tours. The collection was made up of 34 garments, including a mix of ready-to-wear and high fashion frocks.
Nciza has more news.
“We’re also creating a sub-brand of NN Vintage called Urban Vintage, which will be sold at one of the stores in South Africa. It’s a more affordable range and will appeal to a younger audience.”
NN Vintage had made its debut in 2008 at Audi Fashion Week Johannesburg. The re-launch follows Nciza’s sabbatical creating bespoke outfits for clients whilst focusing on her career as a solo artiste. During this break, she learned more about the African fashion industry, before deciding her next act.

CTP7808

Nhlanhla Nciza 2.0

As Cape Town basked in the glory of being named the World Design Capital 2014, the words ‘design, creativity and innovation’ rang loud at this year’s Design Indaba held in the popular Western Cape city. The annual conference focused on how these elements can positively impact the world.
<div id="attachment_6172" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-6172" class="size-medium wp-image-6172" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/FWA-2014-Apr-May-060-063-FSH-Design-ind-001-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />Shweta Wahi</div>
It was an early March weekend of fun and discovery for the creatives, artists, designers, hipsters – and ordinary folks – who made their way to the Cape Town International Conference Centre (CTICC). There were 500 exhibitors, from Mikhela Hawker, who makes lampshades from recycled plastic bottles to others, such as Galago, which designs and tailor-makes leather sandals on the spot, in less than 15 minutes.
Part of the event was a three-day conference on creativity, which included talks by some of the world’s top entrepreneurs, creative minds and trendsetters, such as computer scientist Juliana Rotich from non-profit tech company Ushahidi, Ivorian architect Issa Diabaté, and South African photographer David Goldblatt. Tickets sold out quickly and for those who could not attend, the conference was simultaneously broadcast across four South African cities.
<div id="attachment_6160" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-6160" class="size-medium wp-image-6160" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/FWA-2014-Apr-May-060-063-FSH-Design-ind-007-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />Kathrin Kidger</div>
The Design Indaba is a platform for exhibitors to showcase their products to consumers and industry buyers. Hearing the story behind the conceptualization, design and creation of a product directly from the people who make them, also helps drive sales.
One designer present at the event was Susan Slee, the owner of Maneki and creator of Mannetjie van Staal – meaning ‘little men of steel’ in Afrikaans. This former goldsmith and jewelry designer displayed an ethnic and animal-themed range of cutlery. Her fascination with the simplicity and quirkiness of children’s drawings led to the creation of the van Staal family. Her stainless steel cutlery range features six characters, each with a name and story. The range has since expanded to wood, carved by Zimbabwean artist Nathan Kenias.
<div id="attachment_6167" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-6167" class="size-medium wp-image-6167" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/FWA-2014-Apr-May-060-063-FSH-Design-ind-014-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />Kathrin Kidger</div>
Yet another participant was Palesa Litha, an emerging designer who studied music before moving on to jewelry design. Her 2014 range, manufactured at an incubator in Rustenburg in the North West province of South Africa, explores the parallels between music and design.
The showcased designers were required to have at least two years’ experience in retail and had to have attended various workshops throughout the year, encompassing everything from costing and retail management to media training. Ten of these designers will now  go on to be a part of the South African collective at international trade fairs in in 2014 and 2015.
The Cape Town Fashion Council (CTFC) booked a R1-million ($93,722) space – the largest at the expo – to showcase 40 emerging and established designers. The CTFC develops entrepreneurship among designers and wants to shift fashion away from being about aesthetics towards embracing a sustainable business model.
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Bryan Ramkilawan, Chief Executive Officer of the CTFC, is working on partnerships across Africa and wants to share intellectual property to get the local and African design industry to where it should be.
South African consumers are starting to pay more attention to local rather than international designs, says Ramkilawan. Three days of sales at the pop-up stores totaled R1.1 million ($103,116), this excluded buyer sales estimated at R2.5 million ($234,327). All the money from the sales went to the designers.
Whether it is fashion, décor, music or art, be sure to head to this year’s World Design Capital. In the words of Ramkilawan, “design is a way of life”.
What design means to them
<h6>Shweta Wahi,</h6>
<h6>Fashion Designer</h6>
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“Design to me, is all about exploring the creative tidbits from my childhood, what&#8217;s in front of me right now, the colors I see, the people I meet, the way a piece of fabric falls on the body, the way it feels &#8211; it’s a matter of perfecting how it feels and looks to express myself and tell my story.”
<h6>David Tlale, Fashion Designer</h6>
<div id="attachment_6164" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-6164" class="size-medium wp-image-6164" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/FWA-2014-Apr-May-060-063-FSH-Design-ind-011-300x214.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="214" />Fashion designer David Tlale at his Sandton store; Johannesburg, 1 November 2011 &#8211; Photo by Brett Eloff.</div>
“Design means innovation, it means evolving, it means moving forward, it means how you reinterpret what has already been done.”
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<h6>Jeanne van den Heever, Product Designer</h6>
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“It means coming up with something creative, especially if you can add function to that in styling.”
<h6>Palesa Litha, Designer</h6>
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“It is a different way of thinking. It’s science, it’s philosophy and it’s a way of living.”
<h6>Weaving Cultures</h6>
<h6>Elbé Coetsee brought rural appeal to urban folk at the Design Indaba</h6>
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In the late eighties, Elbé Coetsee and her husband moved to a game farm in rural Limpopo, South Africa. Based 15 kilometers from Botswana and 18 kilometers from Zimbabwe, Coetsee often encountered women who were looking for work even as their husbands toiled away on the roads and farms. Coetsee took up the role of mentor, teaching the women to weave, embroider, bead, make candles and paint. This provided a great platform to exchange cultures.
“It’s a wonderful experience to be able to learn from them and share some of my culture with them. I really think it’s about bridging gaps and having an understanding for another’s culture.”
Soon the orders came rolling in. In 1994, Coetsee registered the company under Mogalakwena Craft Art Development Foundation, named after one of the main rivers in Limpopo; Mogalakwena, meaning fierce crocodile.
Twenty years on, the company has grown to 20 employees who handcraft dainty table linen, placemats, table cloths, serviettes and scatter cushions, distributed and sold throughout South Africa. Although living rural comes with its challenges, such as being in remote areas away from the trappings of the city, not to mention traveling on dust roads, Coetsee says being surrounded and inspired by nature brings her a joy she cannot describe. Coetsee says the Design Indaba allowed her to showcase her work to an audience that would otherwise not have been able to see it. “It was our most successful Design Indaba,” she says.
<h6>Micro-mini</h6>
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The Design Indaba also got to the heart of objects, and how. The ‘color one’ installation for Mini, by Scholten &amp; Baijings from Amsterdam, dissected the design and composition of a Mini One car. The car manufacturer also displayed the Mini Connected system’s Dynamic Music function, a feature that adjusts the rhythm of music according to the drivers&#8217; driving style. The faster one drives, the louder the music. Attendees at the event could create their own remixes on the Mini dance floor, which was equipped with motion sensors.
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Africa By Design

For many years fashionista Omoyemi Akerele had been pondering the dearth of fashion designers in Nigeria. From her musings, she realized that the issue was not the dearth of designers, but limited platforms through which designers could showcase their works. This was the case for decades despite the efforts of pioneers such as Shade Thomas-Fahm who worked tirelessly throughout the 1960s to bring attention to the industry. Her fervor and creativity laid the foundation for the fashion industry, while she also inspired a plethora of designers to pursue their passion.
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Akerele is one of those stylists that have taken the baton from the pioneer in her commitment to extend the frontiers of the fashion industry. She started a fashion consultancy in Nigeria at a time when little attention was paid to the industry. Her vision is for the industry to flourish and be acknowledged all over the world.
“There is a lot of promise in the Nigerian Fashion industry… So much untapped potential [and] I see my role as a catalyst,” says Akerele.
It was her vision to see Nigeria and Africa take its rightful place in the global fashion industry that drove her to create Style House, a fashion agency that promotes and supports the industry. But this was not enough.
“There was a need for a unified platform that designers could benefit from by showing their work to the industry at large. I thought that if the designers could come together to show under one platform, we would get the press and the whole community involved during this period. There’s more strength in that as opposed to different individual shows at different times of the year”, says Akerele.
Her vision culminated in the launch of the Lagos Fashion and Design Week (LFDW) in October 2011.
Pulling off such an event was no easy feat. After various attempts at securing sponsorship, MTN, the telecommunications company agreed to sponsor the inaugural event.
“What MTN was offering us, was low compared to what we needed to pull off a show of this size, but when you have a vision, you know there’s got to be a way this can work so at least you start,” she says.
In the end, the inaugural Lagos catwalk on the runway set the bar beyond her expectations.
Another challenging issue was scouting for young designers. This was due to certain constraints such as funding, rent textile availability and lack of training and resource centers, which impede the development of the local industry. The average designer has little or no accessibility to funds. Product continuity is stifled by limited supply of certain fabrics. Designers who can afford to produce their own textiles are few and far between and this greatly increases the final cost of the garment.
In other parts of the world, the education sector places emphasis on empowering the fashion entrepreneurs through colleges and resource centers. The industry teams up with upcoming designers who are willing to give their time and energy to teach fashion and its workings. In Nigeria, fashion has no representation in the academic establishment and there are very little collaborative efforts in the fashion industry. The average fashion enthusiast is a graduate of an international fashion school or is self-taught.
“Recently, I got an email from one of our international partners, asking for a list of fashion universities or colleges in Nigeria. I could not reply to the email for two weeks. I was so ashamed. It is amazing to know that about 90% of the industry is self-taught; the other 10% obtained their degrees from international institutions. There are 1% [of Nigerian designers] that probably rely on private people like Ginani or Ituen Basi who run individual fashion courses but in terms of proper institutions that run courses, we have none,” she says.
“I was on the London underground and I saw adverts of British fashion universities. This year, a report was put out for the British fashion industry. As we speak, its contribution to the economy from both retail and the industry brought over £200 million into the economy and they are still focusing on how to make the schools and the industry better to ensure that they produce more. We do not even have fashion universities that function here. That really breaks my heart,” says Akerele.
The visionary founder of LFDW believes that her annual catwalk runway will continue to unearth and support the latent talent in Nigeria. The inaugural event last year brought to the fore names such as Bridget Awosika who received rave reviews from Vogue UK. The fashion magazine described her work as “authentic African design”. This was a proud moment for Akerele. When asked about the event she told Vogue that “the event marks an awakening among some designers here who have been able to gradually evolve from what they come to accept as fashion—let’s call it a more traditional approach—to a place where they now understand that there’s much more we can offer…”
With the amount of effort going into its preparation, LFDW 2012 promises to be even bigger. The event—sponsored by MTN, RIM, Blackberry, Virgin Atlantic Airways, British Council and Porsche­­­—will not just end with the runway. After the event Akerele wants to give designers more exposure in the local and international market.
“The plan is to raise the stakes, not necessarily by doing more things but in strengthening and solidifying the vision. We are just trying to make sure that we do this better and create a better experience for people out there. The pop-up stores come up right after fashion week in London. We believe that it is important for press and buyers to attend. As we speak, Nigeria is not yet a destination for buyers so we decided to take the people to the buyers. We are going for different appointments with buyers to position Nigerian designers to benefit from that. We are also working on the Nigerian market as well so designers can work together. We are working on garment manufacturing companies that can make clothes for Nigerian designers. We are also putting pressure on all the companies that are setting up malls across Nigeria, lobbying for spaces for designers in some of the malls. The more locations the materials can be bought, the bigger the impact on the industry. We want to make a difference in the businesses of these designers.”
Akerele is also the ambassador of the ‘Buy Nigeria’ campaign, an initiative to promote Nigerian made clothes. Her vision for the near future is for the Nigerian indigenous fashion industry to contribute significantly to the GDP and this can only be achieved through indigenous fashion retail.
“Nigerian designers have to think of how to make their designs accessible to the 150 million Nigerians out there. The more people consume, the more people will be aware and the bigger the industry,” she says.
The future of fashion is promising and surely more progress will be made considering the effort industry faithful are putting into its development. Akerele’s tireless task as an ambassador and catalyst for the Nigerian industry has earned her remarkable acclaim with both local and international fashion communities. She has managed to inspire tangible change within the industry in a relatively short period. When asked about her plans for the future, her face lit up and in an alluring response, her reply was ‘Watch this space’.

Why Fashion Breaks My Heart

If you’ve been living under a rock be sure to emerge and catch up because Africa is in vogue.
As far back as 2009, the world’s top designers couldn’t help making inspired references to what was once called the Dark Continent. The likes of Marc Jacobs and John Galliano have paid homage to Africa’s intricate beauty. Well renowned international designer Vivienne Westwood, exhibited her interest in Africa through her Ethical Fashion Africa Collection. Other Labels bitten by the Africa bug have been Burberry, Gwen Stefani’s LAMB and Tommy Hilfiger.
Arise Magazine’s African Icons show at last month’s Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week New York featured designs by Gavin Rajah, Ozwald Boateng, Folake Folarin (Tiffany Amber), Tsemaye Binitie and Amaka Osakwe (Maki Oh).
At the Arise Magazine Fashion Week in Lagos, Boateng was handed the Lifetime Achievement award and labels KLuK CGDT and Maki Oh won best designer.
It’s gone beyond Africans inspiring international designers, to African designers sharing their own history and creativity.
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Nigerian Designer, Lisa Folawiyo, studied law at the University of Nigeria and followed her dream when she started Jewel by Lisa from home in 2005. She redefined the way one could wear Ankara—a colorful wax resist dyed fabric—and makes handcrafted clothes that take an average of 120 hours, using custom made prints.
Nigerian fashion is moving away from the local markets with their rows of fabric stalls and corner tailors.
Folawiyo has exhibited in Johannesburg, London, Paris and New York. To increase her appeal and market, Folawiyo launched a diffusion line, The J Label, in 2011. The pieces emulate the luxury core of her designs but are a more practical and accessible option. The new label offers anything from trousers and handbags to dresses. While the main label ranges from $350-$11,500, the diffusion line ranges from $150-$350.
In South Africa, and further afield, the name Gavin Rajah is synonymous with style, opulence and glamor. He is a true example of an African designer turned international sensation. Rajah’s fashion is inspiring, his shows are mesmerizing and it’s no wonder he’s dressed people like Beyonce, Nelson Mandela, Tom Cruise, Naomi Campbell among others. As if this were not enough, Rajah has even delved into jewelry design.
Taking fashion beyond just designs, Rajah wrote a paper titled “Creating an Identity in Design: South Africa the future of fashion?”, which reached as far as Milan. A founder of the Cape Town Fashion Week, Rajah, is serious about the industry and its sustainability in the country. He’s made a point of employing and mentoring young designers in his Cape Town studio and sits on the Cape Town Fashion Council board.
From UNICEF Ambassador to design extraordinaire, Rajah sees no limit for his brand.
The most stylish first lady of the United States, since Jackie Kennedy Onassis, is a big fan of Nigerian Duro Olowu. Michelle Obama has worn the designer’s garments on many occasions. Quitting law was the best thing Olowu could have done for the fashion world. The courtroom’s loss has evidently been the runway’s gain. Olowu’s love for art goes beyond fashion and makes for interesting collections; all that creativity makes it hard to imagine him wanting to succeed in any profession but this one. His career was catapulted when he won the New Designer of the Year award at the 2005 British Fashion Awards. Now his clothes can be found online and in stores in the United States, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.
“My job is not about dictating to women what they should wear, it’s about presenting them with beautiful options,” Olowu once told The Independent in London.
Deola Sagoe is a talented and beautiful mother of three, whose clothes have been modeled by supermodels Naomi Campbell and Alek Wek. Her daughters have fashion in their blood as they have launched their own fashion label CLAN. Sagoe went to college in the United States and has a Master’s in finance and management. She will showcase her new range at the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Africa being held in Johannesburg at the end of this month.
Describing the Deola Sagoe woman, the designer says: “She is colorful—she uses color to mirror her mood. She is vital—energetic—not the shy, retiring, type, but she also knows the appropriate time to hold her peace.”
The final feather on the African cap is Tiffany Amber’s Folake Folarin-Coker, another Nigerian who did not study fashion and escaped the legal world. Folarin-Coker has a degree in Petroleum law and spent her childhood in Europe. The label launched in 1998 but she made history when she became the first African-based designer to showcase at New York Fashion Week for two consecutive seasons, in 2008 and 2009.
Tiffany Amber has an online shop as well as three stores in Lagos. The brand had grown by adding two more lines and winning Arise Magazine’s Fashion Brand of the Year award for the Autumn/Winter 2011 collection.
With designers such as these, it’s no surprise African designers are taking the industry by storm and inspiring plenty. This is just the beginning as there are many budding designers.
Nina Baksmaty’s Koshie O label is gorgeous. The Ghanaian designer established a workshop in Ghana and her work has attracted the likes of Franca Sozzanni and Roberto Cavalli on their visit to West Africa. She has also brought in American singers Mỳa and Michele Williams for one of her campaigns.
Osakwe’s Maki Oh line is definitely on the right track. Her age has not hindered her will to take on the world fashion. Although she grew up in London, the Nigerian designer returned to her country of birth to start her fashion line. Her inclusion in the New York Fashion Week will only solidify her place as a young designer to watch. She brings her age and fun to her designs and shows that sometime the “now generation” is a little old school. Osakwe uses adire, which is a process of indigo dying cloth using natural indigo leaves as opposed to industrial dye. This is commonly done by Yoruba women in southwestern Nigeria. She says it takes a day to hand paint five meters of fabric and another day to dye and de-wax it.
Osakwe says her latest collection is inspired by secrets and people’s inability to keep them. This imagery is brought forward by the eyes in her prints.
Loza Maléombho is Arise Magazine Fashion Week’s Emerging Designer of the Year. She designs in the United States and manufactures the clothes at her workshop in Côte d’Ivoire. This talented designer’s work can be traced as far back as her early teens, when she made dresses for the women in her family. Her Afro-Modern designs make use of batik prints, wax fabrics and Kente cloth. She’s all about showing the world what she has to offer and helping out the Côte d’Ivorian woman in the process.
The other fresh talent to keep an eye out for is Mimi Plange. Her Boudoir D’Huitres label has been around since 2007. Fashion guru André Leon Talley took an interest in and mentored her for her New York fashion Week presentation. As if this was not enough of a fashion nod, she created a capsule shoe collection with Manolo Blahnik—a dream for any woman in the world.
Africa is bringing more than just oil, gold and war to the table. The future of fashion is here.

Africa In Vogue

With their short hair, casual style and youthful faces, sisters Beatrice and Delphinah look strikingly similar.
“Lauretta is in South Africa, studying computer games,” Beatrice explains her absence as the two sisters sit down to coffee on the beach on a Sunday afternoon.
Despite the fact that Angolan women’s magazines Caras and Caju have designated them as one of Angola’s most influential fashion labels, they make an unassuming, almost shy, first impression.
Beatrice, Delphinah and Lauretta grew up in Botswana and Namibia. Beatrice studied interior design in Cape Town, Delphinah studied economics in Namibia.
Sometime in 2001, Delphinah made a skirt that changed her life and that of her sisters.
“My fellow students really liked that skirt, so I started making denim ones for them. That same year, we launched our own label, GSquare. We even created our own model agency, with 30 male and female models,” she says.
“In the beginning it was just the two of us,” Beatrice says, “but we were soon joined by one of Delphinah’s friends. I designed and made men’s clothes, Delphinah women’s clothes. The men’s label was put on hold, but we’ll relaunch it next year.”
In 2001, GSquare won the Young Entrepreneurs Prize at the Namibian Entrepreneurs Competition. Soon afterwards, Delphinah’s friend quit.
“That’s when Delphinah, Lauretta and I launched our own label: Geraldo Fashions. It is named after our late father, who was an artist, painter and carpenter,” says Beatrice.
“We’ve now got American, German, South African and Namibian clients,” Delphinah says, “as well as Angolan celebrities.”
TV presenter and model Vania Vilèla, for instance, is the current ‘face’ of Geraldo Fashions. So are singer and Big Brother Africa reality TV star Tatiana Durao, Big Brother Africa star and Channel O presenter Weza Silva, and Angolan top model Karina Silva.
International fashion shows form an integral part of the Geraldo sisters’ business. In 2002, the Geraldo sisters participated in the Pan African Fashion Show. That same year, they were elected Best Young Namibian Designers by an international judging panel at the fashion show, Sense of Africa.
Three years after Beatrice and Delphinah moved back to Angola, their label participated in the seventh edition of the Angola Fashion Week in 2008. Geraldo Fashions was also represented at the Angola Fashion Week in 2009, 2010 and 2011. In October 2011, Geraldo Fashions participated in Luanda’s second edition of Fashion Business Angola.
“That’s the biggest fashion event in Africa, with 26 international and nine Angolan designers,” says Beatrice.
There are other high-profile events scheduled for 2012: the Swahili Fashion Week, Cape Town Fashion Week, and Mozambique Fashion Week. The Geraldo sisters also hope to participate in the next Africa Fashion Week.
Geraldo Fashions is still small. Its current annual turnover is a little less than $70,000, compared to $10,000 in the first five years of its existence. So far, neither economic crises nor Chinese or Angolan competition have got in the way.
“We’re too small for recessions to have a significant impact,” Beatrice says, “but we do compete against Angolan boutiques, which often sell very nice Brazilian and European labels.”
Beatrice, Delphinah and Lauretta have funded their entire business themselves. They started their fashion career with one manual sewing machine.
“We only bought our first electrical machines after our first official show, which left us with many new clients. Now that we’re successful, we still make all our clothes ourselves, at home. Our brand is very exclusive, and all our work is based on private orders,” says Beatrice.
The sisters buy most of their fabrics in South Africa, Namibia, Portugal and France. Silk and chiffon are among their favorites, as are feathers, fur and laces. Daring, detailed tailoring, with a wide array of colors, mark their designs.
Those who want to wear Geraldo Fashions’ exclusive designs and materials have to place a personal order. The label is no longer sold at Cape Town designer boutiques Second Time Around and Loulou Store, but the sisters are currently trying to open their own shop in Luanda instead. Their fashion items don’t come cheap.
“But they are affordable by Angolan standards,” Beatrice says. “A dress will cost you between $350 and $700.”
The sisters’ ambitions don’t stop here. Future plans include Geraldo Fashions shops in Namibia, South Africa and outside Africa, and an accessory line with jewelry and shoes.
Geraldo Fashions seems to have been born at the right time. “Our fashion has a modern African feel, for which there is an increasing demand. We see more and more people wearing national designers at events, parties, clubs and restaurants, and also in African magazines. Four or five years ago, Angolan labels were almost non-existent in people’s daily lives,” says Beatrice.

Tag: Garments

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