An ever-changing design landscape brings with it interesting new talents.
Tackling a virtual fashion week, designers of recent trans-seasonal collections at South African Fashion Week showed gender-inclusivity, sustainability and flair in their ready-to-wear collections.
This was especially true in the collections by young designers.
If you haven’t seen or heard of them yet, here are five fresh talents to keep an eye on.
Maklele
Martin Rose and Emily Adams Bode are rising talents in men’s wear internationally. They’re part of a rising trend of female designers dominating that space. Our own Mikhayla Farouk is another designer making waves on the scene. Her recent collection for her brand, Maklele, was inspired by landscapes that capture her “desert aesthetic”, an ode to dunes that are mapped out on her pieces. No materials were bought for the collection. Instead, Farouk used fabrics donated by design houses such as Lunar, offcuts from her studio and scraps from a multitude of other sources.
Art Club
No stranger to the SAFW ramp, Art Club and Friends is a unisex label defined by artistic collaborations and fierce expression. Inspired by the morbid year 2020 has been, its recent collection tackled the coldness of the colour blue as a means of reclaiming the sadness it harbours. The brand’s functional wear from its gender-fluid collection is a breeze of light fabrics and sophisticated touches of femininity that spark jolts of hope and optimism on the South African fashion landscape.
Boyd
“Contemporary sustainability” greatly defines the streetwear-influenced brand Boyd. The 2021 trans-seasonal collection zoned in on versatility. This included a lightweight unstructured suit created for functionality and flexibility. Many of the looks take inspiration from modern interior design to geometrical creations which focus on Boyd’s bespoke tailoring.
Xavier Sadan
Johannesburg meets Cape Town through the design genius of Xavier Sadan’s founder, Michael Peter Reid, who’s inspired by the two worlds. The designer was part of the top 10 2018 SA Fashion Week Student Competition finalists and also made it into the 21 Steps to Retail Edcon Design Innovation Challenge. With boxy cuts and daring fabric combinations, Sadan’s collections challenge stereotypical ideas of male and female to create a soft masculinity and strong femininity. His take on sustainability is evident in his collection which uses discarded materials that have been upcycled. Plastics were smelted and reused in his 3D printed buttons, a first for South African fashion design.
Thabo Kopele
Making a prominent debut, Thabo Kopele makes a grand entrance into SA Fashion Week. Kopele had to leave Johannesburg fashion design school LISOF because he couldn’t afford the fees. That was in 2018. After starting his eponymous brand, he received a bursary from LISOF and was able to build the Thabo Kopele brand, which focuses on minimalism. His style is inspired by the idea of architecture for the human body. Shying away from the utilitarian aesthetic, Kopele focuses on creating premium ready-to-wear, with a touch of luxury.
