|
His material of choice is Aso-oke, a hand-woven
cloth indigenous to the Yoruba people and historically used on
special occasions.
Binitie, who cut his teeth as a design assistant with Stella
McCartney in 2005, began using the fabric in 2017, and he
infuses the yellow dresses that are his signature creations with
cottons and silks to give them a post-modern feel.
"We started to use contemporary African art and culture within
the threads of the collection so you see hints of it or very ...
obvious (signs)," said Binitie, who divides his time between
Lagos and London.
"It's sort of informed fabric, informed colour, informed
styling."
Priced at between $300 and $4,000, his TB12 custom collection
features Aso-oke – which means "top cloth" in Yoruba - in seven
different shades.
"We are sort of preserving the culture, you know, that we've
watched all our lives in front of us ... and teaching the
younger generation that it is something to be proud of,
something to want to wear," he told Reuters.
Fellow Lagos designer Lisa Folawiyo specialises in a different
traditional cloth, the West African wax prints known as Ankara,
and her hybrid collection, called Batkara, incorporates Batik
designs embellished with needle-work beadings and sequin
trimmings. "We have merged what is indigenous to us with what is
familiar in the West and we've made it ours," she said.
That same synthesis informs the aesthetic of Alara, a Lagos
store dedicated to showcasing contemporary African fashion for
the Nigerian and the diaspora markets. Its Head of Partnerships,
Arinola Fagbemi, says more and more people are thinking about
African luxury "in terms of how we live on a day-to-day basis
... not just for celebratory moments."
(reporting by Nneka Chile, Writing by John Stonestreet)
[© 2021 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2021 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content
|
|
