At African Fashion Foundation (AFF), we strive to empower fashion designers and creative professionals from Africa and the diaspora to succeed in the global fashion industry. In order to achieve our aim, AFF creates diverse avenues that place these designers at the centre stage of African Fashion and the global fashion industry. It is for this reason we came up with the new project #AFFpresents.
Collaboration and cultivation remain at the the core of AFF’s values, and to do this, we at AFF provide tools to individuals and companies in the creative industries in Africa to reach their full potential and inspire diversity in the global luxury and creative market. It is in this same vein, AFF conceived The Ambassadors Collective and #AFFpresents and it is through this that we supported Orange Culture’s S/S 22 showcase at Lagos Fashion Week in October 2021.
Founded in 2011, by self-taught Lagos-based designer, Adebayo Oke-Lawal has pushed his brand Orange Culture forward to become one of Nigerian fashion’s biggest names. The brand has garnered international acclaim for its androgynous style and willingness to push boundaries with pieces sustainably manufactured in Lagos, from ethically-sourced local fabrics.
AFF was proud to have sponsored Orange Culture at Lagos Fashion Week 2021. Our Project Director, Onyinye Fafi – Obi had this to say:
“We are excited to support Orange Culture, one of the brands we are working with for the Ambassadors Collective, at their showcase at Lagos Fashion Week. For us, it’s important that we remain a vehicle that empowers creatives, it is for this reason #AFFPresents was established, an initiative that allows us to support creatives with grants, sponsorship, resources, and mentorship.”
The S/S 22 Collection by Orange Culture was dubbed “The Peacock Riot”. Speaking to Adebayo Oke – Lawal, founder and Creative Director of Orange Culture, he explained the meaning behind the collection to be a symbiotic balance between the crazy and the calm. The collection aimed to highlight political campaigns through fashion activism. By incorporating colour, texture and patterns to their pieces, Orange Culture brought to the foreground the different groups of people that rallied together to fight for arguably the most important cause in the 21st Country; ENDSARS. For the Adebayo, Orange Culture’s aim was to tell a story about the beauty in the stereotypes placed on the youth by playing on the stereotypical narrative that identifies us as a people.
The collection saw a lot of bright colours with youthful and matured silhouettes to strike a balance between the different groups of people that came together to fight the ENDSARS cause. The collection also included the use of stretchy mesh fabric, hand dyed cotton, upcycled fabrics and custom prints to carry on the theme of Peacock Activism.
Adebayo Oke – Lawal had this to say in relation to the collaboration between AFF and Orange Culture:
