South African architect Sindiso Khumalo turns to fashion.
Khumalo is a womenswear textile designer currently living and working in London. After studying architecture at the University of Cape Town, she moved to London where she worked for award-winning architect David Adjaye. However, it wasn’t long before she followed her true passion and turned to fashion design.
The digitally printed Billie Top and Zama Skirt form part of Khumalo’s debut Spring/Summer 2013 collection. The bespoke prints on the garments are inspired by the graphics seen in traditional Zulu beadwork.
Fashion can become an empowering agent by creating positive economic activities in other marginalised parts of the world, says Khumalo.
Khumalo believes the future of textiles lie in retracing old ways of making and renovating into a new and contemporary context: looking back and forward at the same time and finding ways of integrating new technologies with old techniques.
The Billie Top and Zama Skirt were showcased as part of Design Indaba Expo’s Africa is Now exhibition under the theme “Africa is Tradition Reinvented”, which looked at how African designers interpret ancient vocabularies of form, material and craft into a new visual language, creating African icons anew.
