From October 26th – October 30th, Heineken Lagos Fashion Week brought together buyers, press, and enthusiasts to experience a week-long schedule celebrating African talent. Here’s a rundown of how the highly anticipated event that welcomed over 3000 people went.
XRetail in partnership with Zinkata
Lagos Fashion Week commenced on Wednesday 26th October 2022 with XRetail in partnership with Zinkata. Focused on facilitating commerce and creating access to market opportunities for fashion entrepreneurs to enable their business(es) to generate sales, the XRetail experience this year welcomed African fashion enthusiasts who got to shop some of their favourite Nigerian brands.
Lagos Fashion Week Opening Party
Creatives, enthusiasts, designers, stylists, and fashion journalists gathered for an exclusive Fashion Week Opening Party/ Meet & Greet with 2022 Bestseller Foundation Green Access Finalists. The evening set the stage for what was to come, guests showed up at their best; Agbayas, hats, well-tailored suits, tassels, and sequins were some of the style trends spotted at the opening party.
Lagos Fashion Week Swap Shop
As part of our ongoing commitment to facilitating conversations and exchange of ideas surrounding sustainability in fashion in Nigeria and Africa, Lagos Fashion Week returned for its inaugural block-chained enabled Swap Shop experience. Putting into practice the foundations of a circular economy that prioritises reuse, reduce & recycling.
The Swap Shop initiative invites consumers to think about the ways they can effect change with their own buying choices by facilitating the exchange of pre-owned items through swapping, sharing, donating and resale. It was a major engagement hub at the experience tents as pieces from Abiola Olusola, Orange Culture, The Style Infidel, Eku Edewor, and Fia Factory, were swapped.
Physical Runway & Offsite Shows
This year, we continued with a more decentralised format for our shows with designers organising independent #LagosFW supported shows within the Lagos Fashion Week Calendar, a triumphant development in so many ways, indicative of how far we’ve come as an industry. The Lagos Fashion week onsite tent, welcomed over 50 designers from across the continent, a key element this year, to showcase a wider selection of fresh talent.
The runway welcomed the 2022 Green Access finalists such as Oshobor (Nigeria), SVL Designs (South Africa), Olisa Kenya (Kenya), Metakay (Ghana), Heru Shezi (South Africa), Aorah (Nigeria), House of Akachi (Nigeria), Lullastudio (Nigeria), Pettre Taylor (Nigeria), and Sahrzad Design (Morocco) as well as first-timers Olooh (Côte d’Ivoire), Algueye Dakar (Senegal), Duaba Serwa (Ghana), Jermaine Bleu (Nigeria) Tia Adeola (Nigeria), Abigail Ajobi (Nigeria), Maxhosa by Laduma (South Africa) and Awa Meite (Mali).
Fashion Business Series with Prosper Africa
On Friday 28th October, Lagos Fashion Week in collaboration with Prosper Africa hosted a roundtable discussion with institutional investors, fashion buyers, Nigerian fashion brands and key industry stakeholders who discussed the topic “Financing the African fashion Ecosystem”. Prosper Africais a U.S. Government initiative that provides tools and resources to increase two-way trade and investment between the U.S. and African countries.
Experience Tent
A key engagement hub for all attendees with interactive booths from Partners TECNO, LUSH Hair, Sunlight, Mac Cosmetics, Showmax etc.
LagosFW presents SHF Prism by Sunlight Nigeria
On Saturday 29th October, Sunlight Nigeria facilitated a workshop for SHF Prism – a hub for creativity, collaboration, investment and knowledge sharing. The one-day workshop featured seasoned professionals such as; Kemi Ogunleye, Creator & Host of Chrystallis Conversations; Claire Idera, Founder of CI workshop; Sola Babatunde, CEO and Founder of the OSC group; and Tosin Olaseinde, Founder of MoneyAfrica who spoke on how to succeed in the fashion industry.
Lagos Fashion Week 2022 is sponsored by Heineken and supported by partners: Bestseller Foundation, TECNO, Lush Hair, Sunlight Nigeria, Austrian Lace, MAC and Lagos State. Lagos Fashion Week is exclusively produced by Style House Files.
Media Partners: BellaNaija Online, Bella Naija Style, Guardian Life, Business Day, The Will DownTown, Pulse, Okay Africa and Culture Custodian.
For more information on Lagos Fashion Week 2022, kindly visit lagosfashionweek.ng or follow our Instagram page @lagosfashionweekofficial.