You know what’s up: take a minute out of your day to stop and appreciate what you’re thankful for and pick at least three people to be appreciative for today. Today I would like to talk about how African designers are tapping into their roots and culture, finding success out of their normalcy. The first thing I think of when considering this topic is taking one’s every day normal culture and introducing it into another culture. It reminds me of a modern day cultural diffusion.
Designer and founder of the Nigerian label Lagos Space Programme, Adeju Thompson, says “I think it’s definitely important to fuse my culture into my work because I think Africa has largely been overlooked,” as well as, “I have a huge customer base in the US which is why it is essential to me that I educate my audience about my culture in a way that they can understand.” This, to me, means he is expressing himself and his culture, as well as speaking for thousands of people who are part of the African fashion world but whose voices aren’t heard.
African designers and black owned clothing stores have BOOMED ever since the BLM movement took off back in may 2020 and received the attention they deserved. It pushed a reckoning in the fashion industry about a lack of black representation. Many stores and brands have signed a petition which requires stores to save shelf space specifically for black-owned brands.
“I always say that Africa is possibly the last frontier for new ideas, because everyone has mined everything everywhere else,” said Niyi Okuboyejo. This quote, from my perception, means he is saying Africa is very secluded and has had little exploration for new ideas, unlike if I were to go to Europe and ask someone for a new idea, in which case I most likely would have already heard of it.
The conflict between main stream American fashion and out of the box creativity is outdated and I feel like people are finally putting old traditions behind and excepting new ideas and a new mainstream fashion which they should have done forever ago. New designers are bringing a whole new side of fashion out and introducing so much more creativity and true fashion that most of the world just hasn’t seen before and I truly believe its about damn time.
I personally think things like this have to happen with all topics because stuff gets old things get boring. the problem with America is we physically can’t live the same day twice and my understanding of that phrase is no one likes old everyone is always looking for a new pleasurer a new trend to follow. Social media influence is a big part of that problem, everyone’s always trying to impress or be the the next trending topic which pushes people to try and be different which can be good and bad it just depends on what the world decides.
that’s it for this week but as always guys and gals have a wonderful day and carry yourself with confidence. you can subscribe at the bottom of the page and I will shortly be doing a weekly news letter.