Fashion to me is...
transformation.
Shaping the way that you’re perceived.
It has seeped into every corner of my life.
It’s about personal expression and community.
I can only compare it to filmmaking or architecture.
My name’s Jameel Mohammed.
I’m Conner Ives.
My name is Lukhanyo Mdingi.
My name is Cynthia Merhej.
My name is Sindiso Khumalo.
I’m Lily Miesmer
…and I’m Jack Miner.
We are The Vanguard class of 2021.
Late?
Psychotic, maybe?
Creative, and driven.
Determined and compassionate.
One sec, just give me one minute,
I don’t know how to describe myself…
very curious.
The Vanguard program is a global mentorship program for people like me.
Young designers, entrepreneurs who are emerging
and who have important things to say in fashion.
It really gives designers certain opportunities
that you might not have.
When people wear our clothes, we really want them to feel special.
I want people to feel like they are
supporting a vision of the world where Black culture
and creativity can be celebrated
at the highest echelons of luxury fashion.
I think it’s really important for me that
they will be able to move in them and feel free in the clothing.
Everyone that I work with is a young person like me,
wanting to do things in a new way.
We’ve been working with the same team since the beginning.
Fashion is not a field where you work alone.
It’s a field that’s collaborative and that’s what I love about it.
I think I would describe my team as…
…independent.
Creatively hungry.
Smart, bright.
Small, scrappy.
I always thought of my work as being something that was uniquely mine.
But when you zoom out from this, you realize how
universal some of these concepts can be.
Truthfully, I’ve always believed
that the power of a collective is far greater than that of a singular.
Our broader creative community has definitely helped as
independent entrepreneurs in their own right.
Makeup artists, stylists, photographers…
super-instrumental.
They’re all part of a much bigger part of our
storytelling and they’ve really been
intrinsic in where we are today.
People that really believed
in what I was building when I had nothing to even show,
and were willing to put their input and their creative eye
into what I was doing in order to help it grow and develop,
so I’m so grateful to all of those people that I’ve collaborated with
over the years and I continue to collaborate with.
Oh, this is fun.
The key to confidence…
Not taking yourself too seriously.
Authenticity.
Knowing who you are.
I think if you understand who you are,
and you know your truth
you are untouchable.
The future of fashion looks
extremely collaborative.
The playbook is thrown out the window.
There will be no more boundaries
and it will be more open and diverse than ever before.
It will definitely become much more democratic, in a good way.
That’s what we hope to see on a go-forward.
Textile innovation, looking at your practices.
Utilizing, recycling, reusing
within our craftsmanship.
I hope to inspire future designers and creatives
to just go for it,
and to not feel like they need permission and a passport to be
working in fashion.
That was a Katie Couric-level answer.
That was great, you killed it.
There was alliteration,
there was a metaphor…
My greatest hope for my work is that
it will be able to create space for other Black entrepreneurs,
creatives, designers.
I would love to inspire
thought process of
really wanting something so bad
that you do everything in your power
to
get it
in the most charming and sophisticated way possible.