Fashion Accounts, which reexamines the practices of collecting, archiving, and memorialising through dress is arguably one of the greatest triumphs of local museum work in recent years. Curated by Wanda Lephoto, Erica de Greef, and Alison Moloney, it explores memory, resistance, and preservation, featuring works by The Sartists, Mimi Duma, Thebe Magugu, and Sindiso Khumalo…
I recently caught up with the founder and head designer of Siyababa Atelier, Siyabonga Mtshali. In the fancy foyer of his Braamfontein atelier, even the doorman remarked at the maverick’s magnetism. Glamorously clad in an audacious fur, Zulu leopard vest, leather pants and kinky accessories, Mtshali led me up to his top floor space as…
In a spotlight feature promoting 44 Stanley’s lineup of trendy stores, IFUKU was lauded as its ‘shrine dedicated to vintage denim’. Aside from its vintage charm, the establishment is steeped in history, a virtual mecca for denim aficionados and lovers of timeless craftsmanship. IFUKU, with its quaint yet resolute presence, is curated by the visionary…
One of the best things about social media is that it exposes us to creatives that may otherwise have been rather obscure. The little-known Afro-centric, sustainable, Black Femme-led brand, SEOKEΞTSA caught my eye with their succinct and well-curated Instagram feed. I reached out to Lesego Seoketsa, the visual artist who is also the brand’s founder…
Originally from Limpopo, Sipho Vuyo Lushaba grew up in Soweto. His background and experiences in both places would serve as inspiration for SVL Designs. The fashion brand was established in 2016 when he was a third-year student at Lindiwe Kuzwayo Academy of Fashion Design in Durban. Since its inception, the accomplishments of the brand include…
High level fashion stakeholders have said that September is the January of the fashion world, with September beginning the start of the Fall/Winter season in the fashion calendar. The Fall/Winter season in particular is exciting and bears weight for fashion forecasting because it’s when predictions for the next fashion year start to pop up. Of…
There are artists taking the opportunity to change the ways that their projects are visualised, realised and shared. By broadening the scope of their creative consideration, they attach the undertaking to a sense of reality that is aware, and that cares. Two such artists, gathering together a community of like-minded individuals as they go, are…
This year’s South African Fashion Week (SAFW), yet again hosted by Mall of Africa, took place last month from 28 April – 30 April. In many ways, the Spring Summer 22 program is an exciting one, seeking out new talent in the form of the New Talent Search competition. Some of those contestants — with…
I think of collaboration, community, and what moves in those spaces as another type of technique — a creative technique but also one of making and living life. Lindiwe Mngxitama, Everybody Talks Technique | a journey of states with BLK JKS’ Tshepang Ramoba and Team Sunday, 2021 If fashion had a heart, what would we call…
It is no secret that the global retail industry, especially fashion retail, has struggled for sustainable growth over the last decade. In what has been coined as the ‘Retail Apocalypse’, writer Bobby Stephens mentions that industry pundits acknowledge that close to 8 642 retail stores will have to close in North America alone. Propagated by…
*This essay forms part of Bubblegum’s Collaboration with Bag Factory and their visiting curator from Uganda, EM Mirembe. Aiduke is a pop-up clothing shop that opened on 4th December 2021 in Muyenga, one of the more well-off neighbourhoods in Kampala. For now it lives in an innocuous room at the entrance of Tank Hill Park, an airy wood-roofed…
The vision of the brand is purely rooted in the creation of distinctive views as well as opening the eyes of the generations that come after us, hence “ShwelaBana” which translates to “Die for the kids”. This is not a direct and literal statement, but simply put, means our struggles should build stable foundations for…
