Future fashion with Britain’s big, bright new talent

What got you into fashion?
I’ve always had a weird obsession with clothes. My parents had to duct-tape my drawers shut because they’d put me to bed, then wake up to find outfits laid out all over the floor.

Who’s your favourite designer to have come out of London?
Mowalola. She’s unflinching and has formed her own cult, which seems to have accelerated at top speed. That’s the London spirit for me.

What would you be doing if fashion never happened?
I’d be a theologist and part-time pin-up girl.

What are your influences?
Having a Pakistani shadow over me. I say ​“over” because I feel like it’s a part of me, yet it’s beside me.

Why should everyone know about you?
There aren’t enough people exploring or challenging the subject lines I’m touching on.

What’s the best advice your tutor gave you?
Tell your story. No one [else] can tell it or live it.

Tell us about your style.
Satirical, witty, thrilling, bizarre, frightening, metaphorical and sardonic.

What is future fashion all about?
Intelligence beyond fashion’s means and designers who aren’t afraid to kick the industry in the balls until it grows a new, diverse and sustainable pair.

How are you hoping to spend 2021?
Hopefully in a few clubs so I can finally stretch my legs.

What got you into fashion?
Watching the Chanel fashion show on television at my grandparents’ place.

How did you make your graduate collection?
The gowns are hand-dyed and hand-embellished, and the printed dresses were all illustrated prints by me, which I worked from my iPad during lockdown.

What’s the best advice your tutor gave you?
​“Be bold! Make it bigger! Bigger!”

Tell us a bit about your style.
Sportswear meets bad bitch.

Describe your collection.
My collection looks at my Angolan heritage and Newham upbringing, tapping into different elements of people from my childhood and adulthood, and celebrating the culture that has raised me.

What has London taught you about life?
There is nothing that cannot be worn.

Describe your collection.
It’s called The Body Decides and it looks at how the body applies meaning to an object or shape, and how that object equally gives meaning to the body.

Does politics feed into your work?
I think it’s hard for fashion not to feed into politics because it’s all about your perspective on the world and your choices in how to represent that.

How do you get by living in London?
I feel like I’m scraping by most of the time. But you just somehow do.

What got you into fashion?
My gran. When I was younger, she’d always be making clothes or altering garments for the family.

What would you be doing if fashion never happened?
Probably be an astronaut. Being able to visit galactic galaxies beyond our reach has always fascinated me.

Describe your collection.
ART!

Tell us about your style.
I like to mix and merge. I’m into Andrei Tarkovsky’s films, but also the reality show Love & Hip-Hop.

Describe your collection.
It explores the process of transforming, merging African folklore references in Gundam robots, connecting the ancient with the future and present.

What has studying in London taught you about life?
To value everyone’s experiences but, at the same time, maintain who I am.

What are your influences?
Fairytales, storytelling, folklore, cultural stories, otherworldly characters and universes.

What should everyone know about you?
I don’t think storytelling should be limited to childhood. Stories can provide both an escape and a reflection of reality and I want people to be a part of the narrative.

What’s the best advice your tutor gave you?
To be the best version of myself, and that my peers were not my competition.

What influences you?
My friends, the clothes they wear and how they wear them.

Why should everyone know about you?
My graduate collection was a commentary on inner-city living from the perspective of young men. I reflect on the daily grind and discuss the need to make ends meet, pay rent, the pressures of communal living and the false illusions of success. And how these can manifest in burnout.

What’s the best advice your tutor gave you?
​“If you don’t know how it’s made, how will you know how to fuck it up?”

Who is your biggest supporter?
My overdraft.

What got you into fashion?
Back in the day, I’d admire my grand-aunt for making her clothes. She had a vintage Chinese butterfly sewing machine and I would watch her turn, twist, unpick, cut and kiss her teeth out of frustration. She made the most amazing garments for church.

Describe your collection.
After an epiphany, he decides to escape criminal life in London by fleeing to Alkebulan [Africa’s ancestral name], seeking spiritual protection.

How are you hoping to spend this year?
Lockdown-free.

Tell us about your work.
My work is threaded by my purpose as a practitioner and person, rather than aesthetic value. There are visual mechanisms that are recurrent in my work, such as the use of colour. But again, these colour decisions are a tool to communicate the intentions of the work.

What do you remind yourself when it all gets a bit much?
It’s OK, I didn’t come from Combatentes, Luanda to sleep. When I’m done, I will.

Who would you like to thank?
God.