Style
My Canoe, My Truth! Orange Culture explores the Life of the Lagos Fisherman with “Etched Journey” Collection
After his showcase at Pitti Immagine‘s “Constellation Africa“ and representing Nigerian yesterday at the Men’s Fashion Week South Africa, we are excited to see what Nigerian menswear label, Orange Culture will come up with next.
The latest collection for the brand is one with an inspiring and personal touch, etched on the emotional and symbiotic relationship between a fisher man and his canoe. The designer took a childhood memory and pressing desire to learn more, and combined it with his ability to translate stories and journeys of even the most obscure of professions, through clothes.
According to Adebayo Oke-Lawal: “Growing up in the metropolitan city of Lagos that was constantly nestled in chaos, vitality and a spiral of fleeting hopes, it was almost impossible to catch a moment beautified by its silence alone. Everyone always seemed in a hurry to somewhere, for something. But I remember driving past Third Mainland Bridge often with my family, my head pressed against the cold glass alive with dew from the AC, staring out into the sea as fishermen rowed their canoes alone at even the loneliest of hours.
The solemnity of that still beauty rattled me. The elegance of their arm strides saturated in the euphoric concept of gracefulness carried around by people who knew what belonged to them would surely come to them. It stirred something inside of me. I wondered what they were thinking while they stood, legs muscled and firm on the wood, waiting for their capture, or as their lips cracked as they sighted something I couldn’t see. The universe came to them in those moments, and on descending the bridge, I constantly felt robbed of an indefinable beauty.”
The pieces are a blend of the rawness in the journey of fishermen in Lagos through cubic paintings of a Lagos fisherman rowing his canoe under the Third Mainland Bridge as the sun sets. The shoes were inspired by their slip-ons, and the bags designed in collaboration with Nigerian brand O’eclat and the Treefairfax brand.
View the collection below;
Photo Credit
Photography: Tope Horpload (Instagram: @HorploadWorks)
Makeup: DeyDeySoSo Hair (Instagram: @DeDeySoSo)
Hair: Queen Darling
Creative Direction: Adebayo Oke-Lawal (Instagram: @OrangeCultureng)
Models: Kwen & Mannie