TEXWORLD PARIS
ALLFASHION SOURCING 'YOUNG DESIGNER'S COMPETITION 2019'
When I was a kid, I used to dream of being able to go to Paris and had lots of fantasies over the city as well as the country, France. I loved the language and learned it as a tertiary language in my high school years. Never could I have dreamt of actually flying there to showcase work on the global fashion stage.
This all happened when I entered the AllFashion Sourcing 'Young Designer's Competition 2019' in Cape Town, South Africa. I submitted a design proposal around the WGSN trend of 'Designing Emotions', capturing how the future of fashion is heading towards an age where technology is an integral part of life, but in a way that is driven with emotion...with a human touch. As explained by WGSN, 'as humans become more digital, technology will become more human."
The way I had approached this theme was in context to the emotions around unity in similarities and differences, as well as tech infusions in garments. I named the design proposal after the South African national anthem, 'United We Shall Stand', and played around with the use of a QR code, multi-use garment designs, as well as the idea of incorporating solar panel features for that continual connectivity to technology on a daily basis. Amongst 60 participants and two rounds of finalists, I was named the winner of the competition and received the opportunity to showcase my work at the Texworld Paris tradeshow as an exhibitor as well as a runway participant.
In preparation for the trade show, I had been inspired by the 'Humans of New York' project, where the founder and photographer went around the city and collected photos and stories of people's lives. In addition to the range design and construction, I had created the collaborative project 'To Be Human', as well as a temporary website that showed the stories and pictures of people around Cape Town. This project also included an interview-based video posing questions to different women and their answers.
Whilst this season was an incredible season with many victories, it was also during a time of tough decisions and choices, as well as moments of loss and hard learnings. But wow, in earlier years, I would not have imagined to be blessed to see Paris and the international fashion industry physically, as well as a quiet moment under the sparkling Eiffel Tower at night.
Below is a selection of works from my winning submission for the competition as well as what I prepared and took to Texworld Paris 2019.