Wow I've been checking for some nice ideas for summer outfits and I was so overwhelmed by how much African prints have taken into the global fashion sphere. It's amazing!
A lot of clothing lines are trying to embed them into their style ranges this summer. There's something about it though that I can completely understand. Summer is characterized by people wearing clothes in bold colours and prints. The idea behind exploring tribal prints for summer is becoming very vast. And you know when you talk about bold prints, give it to those African fabrics, they are bold and catchy.
Gwen Stefani wearing a piece from L.A.M.B's collection
Photo-credit - www.fah-schyon.blogspot.com
Now i'm very sure one of my teachers will be so mad at me because he asked me to bring one for him when I was travelling home. It so happened that I had to do a presentation about Nigeria and I talked about them with some pictures and he was really captivated.
It's not totally my fault though. I didn't want to just give him the wrapper cos I thought he would just turn it into a bedspread or carpet Lol
I wanted to make it into a nice cut out outfit for him because the ones I showcased during my presentation were those made into nice styles and worn by people. I didn't want him to think I played a fast one on him when he saw just a long rectangular piece. Lol
I asked him to give me his measurements but I don't even know what he was saying and somehow he didn't until I traveled and came back and then he wasn't teaching me again and now I don't even see him again....
Anyway, I tried. I just hope he doesn't see them these days and think he would have had one of those if not that I refused to give him :(
Burberry's collection
They are really lovely. You do not really appreciate the things that you see around you until you find yourself in a situation where you can't find them so easily again. I know how much I'd spend to buy other dresses and carefully not choose anything with those prints; but right now, I know all the magic I and my tailor could create by merging our ideas together to make some nice pieces for me.
Talking about my tailor hmm! I hope I can still afford her services though. I remember how she told us(I and my friends) not to call her 'tailor' again, instead we should address her as a seamstress because it was more 'hippy', before we could get used to that, she changed it again to 'a fashion designer'. Best believe as the name changed, so did the price. Now I heard she has upgraded it to 'a couturier'. She's really good though. As a matter of fact, all those Nigerian small tailors sorry couturiers (lol) are so underrated. Most of them are really good with incredible styles that cannot even be questioned on any red carpet event or wherever.
Anyway back to talking about ankara materials. Now I do understand why my mum used to say "Ankara has come to stay". She was buying them! I and my siblings thought hers was a tad too much. Like don't you get tired of collecting them? Wait till she sees all these new inventions and the impact it is making in the global world. I'm sure she'll close down one room and store them there or something Lol.
The creativity with these materials is really mind blowing though, I am speechless myself. There's nothing I haven't seen; from bags, to shoes, to hair accessories...and this post will never be complete if I do not acknowledge the wonderful creations by Alex Folzi. They just took everything to a different level with these brilliant master pieces. Who thinks of suitcases in Ankara prints? Give it up to those guys, their creativity is top notch.
I'll just leave a couple of pictures for you to enjoy.
Aren't you just loving those prints even more right now?
Photo-credits:
www.facebook.com/AlexFolzi
