Nigerian-born Fashion Designer, Joy Ijeoma Meribe, alongside four others of African descent opened Milan Fashion Week on Wednesday under the banner, “We Are Made In Italy.”
Meribe, who is originally from Nigeria has lived in Italy since 2003. She started out as a cultural mediator.
She worked with silk from the Como-based textile company Taroni, revisiting some of her earlier designs for her Modaf Designs brand that she has traditionally made from cotton renderings of traditional African wax textiles.
According to her, Buchanan helped with fitting and encouraged her to change ideas at the last minute without being too rigid.
“This collection is the most luxurious I have ever created. For this capsule collection, I went beyond every possibility,” Meribe said.
The fashion designer was listed with four others from Burundi, Morocco, Senegal and Cameroon.
Dubbed “the Fab Five,” they are the first crop of creators nurtured through a collaboration between the National Chamber of Italian Fashion and the Black Lives Matter in Italian Fashion movement.
Italian-Haitian designer Stella Jean, Milan-based African American designer Edward Buchanan and Afro Fashion Week Milano founder Michelle Ngonmo launched the movement last summer.
The collaboration has expanded from September, when the Fab Five’s collections hung in a showroom, to a bona fide runway show of five looks each for Milan Fashion Week, which is taking place 99% online.
*Excerpted from USA TODAY’s report on the Milan Fashion Week 2021
