PARIS — As Chanel prepares to unveil its Métiers d’Artwork present in Dakar on Tuesday, WWD takes a take a look at three up to date designer shops to go to within the Senegalese capital.
Le Sandaga
Khadija Ba Diallo has at all times felt out of sync together with her friends. Whereas her model, L’Artisane, is known for its up to date tackle the normal Senegalese boubou, the garment hasn’t at all times been modern.
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“I’ve at all times made my very own garments, my very own necklaces. Individuals normally make enjoyable of me, so I by no means thought I might make a dwelling from it,” she recalled.
Ba Diallo, who has an MBA in luxurious model administration from Paris enterprise college ISTEC, initially wished to launch a concierge service in Dakar, however determined the native market wasn’t ripe for it.
After stints in advertising and luxurious actual property, she began her label in 2009 with equipment and purses in oversize, flashy types, like her signature Pingu bag, with a deal with formed like an enormous security pin.
However she discovered little success at house. “At the moment, individuals didn’t essentially purchase Made in Africa,” she stated. “It’s as if it have been a type of training to purchase African, to purchase native.”
Likewise, it took a overseas vogue icon to make her camouflage boubou a success. “It additionally didn’t promote for 2 years. Then Naomi Campbell wore it on a Tuesday, and by Wednesday, it was offered out,” Ba Diallo stated. “That’s how the boubou grew to become stylish. Everybody began carrying it whereas seven years in the past, nobody from my technology wore boubous.”
It was throughout her research in France that she got here to comprehend the worth of workmanship, which is widely known as luxurious in Europe, but usually taken without any consideration on the African continent, the place a lot clothes is made by hand, she stated.
Because of this, her store, Le Sandaga, is an ode to all issues Senegalese. “I need to transmit feelings. Once you come into Le Sandaga, I would like the tiles to remind you of your grandmother’s house, and the scent to remind you of the garments she wore,” Ba Diallo stated.
The identify of the boutique, which opened in 2019, is derived from Dakar’s former central market, and it’s full of colourful objects impressed by on a regular basis life, corresponding to T-shirts that includes Senegalese proverbs within the native language, Wolof.
“I’m making an attempt to introduce Senegalese Pop Artwork, as a result of it doesn’t exist, so I take inspiration from matchboxes or cans of tomatoes, and attempt to give them a refined twist,” she defined. “I’m impressed by the whole lot: meals, the road, nature.”
Along with her personal designs, she carries a small collection of classic, along with magnificence manufacturers like Aesop and Diptyque, which she purchases on her travels. “My dream is to at some point have a collaboration, like a Sandaga x Diptyque fragrance, that sort of factor. I need to make a bracelet for Hermès and shoelaces for Nike,” she stated.
Le Sandaga
5 bis Rue Victor Hugo, Dakar, Senegal
Open Monday to Saturday, 9:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., and a pair of:30 to six p.m.
Selly Raby Kane
Selly Raby Kane traces her love of artwork again to watching horror motion pictures together with her father. “That has imprinted in me only a thirst for uncommon photographs, a thirst for dissonant voices,” stated the designer and filmmaker, whose showroom in Dakar is a hub for the native cultural scene.
Recognized for her Afrofuturism-inspired clothes with daring prints, woven embellishment and robust colours, she began in 2008 with a small artisanal assortment produced with a neighborhood tailor. However Raby Kane rapidly realized she wanted a proper training to attain her ambitions, so she headed to Paris to check vogue at Mod’spe.
“I knew that the way in which we did vogue enterprise in Senegal was utterly completely different from the rest,” she defined. “It’s very enclosed, it’s very dominated by conventional vogue as properly, so I actually wished to have that enterprise understanding of vogue, and I knew that I used to be going to be a vogue entrepreneur in Senegal.”
Her model, launched in 2012, quickly gained a following at house and overseas. Her profile soared after Beyoncé was noticed carrying considered one of her kimono jackets, embellished with parrots and swallows, with a rainbow-striped skirt. However Raby Kane wished greater than prospects.
“Being basically digital was very snug for me,” she stated. “However I felt sooner or later that I wanted a territory per se, we wanted to occupy partitions and to challenge that digital data that we had right into a bodily area the place individuals may simply be immersed in it. And as soon as we did it, it utterly modified the whole lot.”
Open since 2017, the boutique sells her label along with a collection of different clothes and accent manufacturers. The rooftop of the area usually hosts exhibitions and installations, usually timed to coincide with main occasions just like the Dakar Biennale.
“It’s a hangout spot as properly for creatives within the metropolis,” stated Raby Kane, a member of the collectives Muus du Tux and Les Petites Pierres. “It’s an area of showcasing various skills, as a result of experimental routes, various routes, can have a problem discovering a real platform.”
To coincide with Dakar Trend Week and Chanel’s Métiers d’Artwork present, she’s presenting a collection of her quick movies on the area. Raby Kane welcomed Chanel’s method, which incorporates spotlighting native artists.
“It’s a terrific vogue rendez-vous, and what I like probably the most is that there’s a collaboration that’s taking place with individuals from the native scene, which is essential,” she stated. “It’s at all times a superb factor for cities to speak by way of their artwork or by way of their crafts. I believe that’s the way in which to create balanced bonds with different international locations.”
Selly Raby Kane
Sacré Cœur 3, SC-103, Villa 10623, Dakar, Senegal
Open Monday to Saturday, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Baax
When Sophie Nzinga Sy launched her first label on the age of 23, she imagined it will comply with the normal route of luxurious manufacturers. A graduate of the Parsons Faculty of Design in New York Metropolis, she absorbed the knowledge of the U.S. vogue trade with out questioning.
“After I first completed vogue college, I used to be actually obsessive about showcasing within the West. I used to be like, I have to showcase at Barneys or Neiman Marcus or these manufacturers, as a result of that’s what I knew,” she recalled.
“And now I’ve a unique view of that. I believe that it’s necessary to showcase in vogue weeks on the [African] continent, but in addition discuss to the native buyer base, as a result of they’re the primary prospects who purchase,” she added.
Her Sophie Zinga label confirmed in Milan, New York Metropolis, Paris, Dubai, Lagos, Nigeria, and Johannesburg, South Africa, along with Dakar, and dressed celebrities together with Lupita Nyong’o. However Nzinga Sy ultimately realized that African vogue wanted its personal rule guide.
Discovering that sourcing materials overseas and manufacturing in Senegal was too pricey, she paused the Sophie Zinga label in 2017 and got here again two years later with Baax, a extra accessible model with a sustainable method.
It manufactures its personal materials in Senegal, specializing in a signature linen-like materials, and has a retailer that additionally carries different native manufacturers like Galadio, Recreyassion and Kalifa. Nzinga Sy is utilizing the boutique as a vogue incubator area for college students on the Dakar Design Hub, the coaching facility she launched final yr in a bid to make Senegalese designers and tailors extra aggressive on the world stage.
“We’re providing alternatives with actually proficient native vogue designers to collaborate with us on our model, for instance, in equipment or in footwear design,” she stated.
Although she plans to participate in a showcase for African designers at London Trend Week in February, Nzinga Sy not produces seasonal collections. Her most up-to-date designs have been unveiled at Dakar Trend Week on Saturday on a preorder foundation and can be delivered in round two months.
“We’re doing issues very in a different way. Clearly, it’s sluggish manufacturing, but in addition, we need to ensure that we now have a brand new calendar,” she defined. “We’re not following what the Western calendar is doing.”
Baax
7 Nord Foire Rte de L’aeroport, Dakar, Senegal
Open Monday to Saturday, 10 a.m. to six p.m., Sunday by appointment solely
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