In the maelstrom of pseudo-Oriental designs, asymmetrical garments and minimalism gone boring that was New York Fashion Week, a subtle yet steady trend emerged, Africa.
Fashion-wise the trend started in 2009, but more people, designers included, paid more attention to it, also thanks to the World Cup that indirectly inspired events such as the "Into Africa" exhibition at London's concept store The Darkroom featuring objects and accessories created by London-based designers moving from African art and textiles.
For what regards the Spring/Summer 2011 collections inspired by Africa, while in some cases there seemed to be a genuine interest in this theme, in others the influence was limited to moods and colours.
Yet it must be highlighted that there wasn’t any kind of revolutionary approach à la Jean Paul Gaultier in the designs presented.
Designers approached Africa from two different points of view: some of them seemed to display a "colonialist" attitude to the subject, others looked instead at traditional prints and tried to use them in garments characterised by modern cuts and silhouettes.
Badgley Mischka and L’Wren Scott fell for example in the first category.
Mark Badgley and James Mischka moved indeed from the decadence of British settlers living in Kenya in Michael Radford's film White Mischief that inspired elegant evening wear, surface elaborations, embroideries and more practical high-waisted shorts and tops.
In between one safari look (read a sheer jacket matched with white blouse and trousers) and the other, L'Wren Scott tended at times to relapse instead into the Far East theme with gold kimonos, and, while some of the dresses evoked the bright colours of the sky and the sunrise in Africa, their shape, cut and silhouette called to mind The World of Suzie Wong rather than African savannahs and veldts, with occasional abstract prints taken from photos of palms.
African prints and fabrics provided instead more variation to different fashion designers and brands, among them L.A.M.B., Petrou Man and Suno.
Gwen Stefani used African prints in structured jackets with short sleeves, cropped tops matched with plaid drop-crotch trousers, T-shirts with layered ruffled sleeves and tiered mini-dresses.
Africa was also evoked by the colourful necklaces and bangles that accessorised the various looks.
Nicolas Petrou provided instead an option for menswear in his designs inspired by school uniforms and Africa, combining tribal and ethnic prints and hand-sewn light madras with
Western inspirations and fabrics such as denim and twill for a collection that echoed heritage and vintage looks.
The fact that the prints for the designs included in Max Osterweis and Erin Beatty’s fashion label Suno borrowed from the brightly colourful Kenyan fabrics of "kangas", wasn’t the only connection with Africa.
Osterweis is indeed a passionate fan and collector of kangas and Suno’s garments are actually produced in Kenya by a talented and skilled workforce.
As a further homage to Africa, Suno's presentations often seem to display connections with the photographs of Malick Sidibé or the more recent fashion street images portraying Johannesburg youth by Nontsikelelo “Lolo” Veleko.
Suno's designs are usually based on contrasts: different fabrics and prints were mixed in the S/S 11 collection in more casual and sporty pieces such as beach wear, but also in cocktail dresses, accessorised with rows of necklaces, stacks of bangles and belts (all characterised by the Swahili aphorisms usually printed on kangas) and fabric wedges and flats (created in collaboration with Loeffler Randall), but there were also a few minimalist pieces such as white laser-cut shorts and dresses.
African inspirations arrived also at London Fashion Week yesterday with a presentation during Vauxhall Fashion Scout of Bunmi Koko’s “Matriarchy” collection (analysed in a previous post in connection with masks), that includes tie dye prints and tribal inspirations.
I’m honestly in two minds about some of the African inspirations seen so far.
It would indeed be interesting to see some fashion designers coming up with a project that could have some positive effects on Africa and inspire other businesses to launch new ventures that could improve people's lives (well, you could argue that Suno is actually already doing it...).
Menswear fans sound enthusiastic about Petrou’s collection, yet, there have been designers who explored in the past in a better way the potential of African fabrics and weren't reviewed with magniloquent and grand words (by the way, does anybody remember Joe Casely-Hayford designing in 1995 the exhibition "The Art of African Textiles – Technology, Tradition, and Lurex" at London’s Barbican?).
If you think about it, African designers have been carrying out experiments mixing traditional fabrics with modern silhouettes for a while, though they rarely make it into the pages of the main fashion magazines.
Besides African men and women living away from their home country often mix in their everyday attires traditional prints with garments from industrialised countries without turning to an overpaid stylist every time they get out of the house.
I wonder what will happen in future to African inspirations in fashion and if there will be further fashion houses interested in developing products in conjunction with local artisans and designers.
Hopefully looking at Africa won't just be the umpteenth elitist and colonialist trick of the fashion industry that will end up creating further socio-economic tensions between our rich and developed countries and the African continent.
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