AFI Joburg Fashion Week 2018  runs from October 4 to 7 with Nigerian born designer Deola Sagoe and her three daughters presenting their labels Deola and CLAN on Day 2.
Deola Sagoe, founder of the haute couture fashion house bearing her name, is an entrepreneurial success story.
“African designers need to celebrate their cultural roots and fashion history in order to become globally competitive,” said Deola ahead of her visit to South Africa.
The woman entrepreneurship dynasty in the fashion business continues through Deola’s three daughters who in 2011 together with her founded their own CLAN label.
With the theme “Tropical Galactica” for AFI Joburg Fashion Week 2018, Deola and Clan will present a sweeping tropical rainforest from the heart of Africa with a curiously striking infusion of Outer Space.
“I often fuse African cultural style with a modern approach to design. I love the dynamism of creating modernity out of something that is steeped in history. I think it’s what gives my collection such a cultural mix,” the designer matriarch says.
Her clients include models, celebrities and society personalities with more than one of Africa’s first ladies as well as Naomi Campbell, Thandie Newton and Lydia Hearst.
From being named MNet Face of Africa/Africa Designer in 1998 and 2000, Deola has since won the MNet Anglo Gold African Design Award. She also was nominated by the former US Vogue editor Andre Leon Tally as one of four designers from Africa to show their work at New York Fashion Week 2000.