A new British museum exhibit corrects the misperception that high fashion belongs to Western designers. The fierce garments attest to the motto of a Ghanaian: 'West is not always best.'
hide captionPeter Kelleher/Victoria and Albert Museumtwo-level exhibition looks like a roundhouse inside one of the museum's rotundas and includes fashion pieces that range from eye-catching costumes and gowns to ordinary workday dresses. It makes the case that any list of global fashion powerhouses should include African designers — that fashion is not solely the purview of European design houses like Coco Chanel, Christian Dior or Yves Saint-Laurent.
It is the renaissance and subsequent evolution of the continent's couture that the exhibition"Africa Fashion" seeks to assess and amplify. "Across the board, there is recognition that we need to almost have a broader sense of — a broader vocabulary when we're curating," she told NPR,"to incorporate many of the different cultures that perhaps have been missing in the past and to recognize and revisit our own colonial history."
" — dyed with fermented mud — and not only marketed his designs across the region but further afield in Europe and the United States.Chris Seydou's orange checkered suit and wide brimmed hat is ready to strut at the"Africa Fashion" show.
The curator says that from a purely design point of view she wants to include these two adjacent outfits in her selection for NPR. The one on the right is"exquisite," she says."The proportion of the long jacket against the shift dress underneath, it's just wonderful fashion.
In an interview with NPR, Ayissi emphasized how important local fashion is in Africa, that he wants it to become"a force that functions properly" on the international stage and that the exhibition would help to"educate" people about the continent.The Ghanaian designer studied at the Chelsea Art School in the U.K.
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