The September 2019 Issue
Gloria Wavamunno Discusses The Past, Present and Future of Kampala Fashion Week
After years abroad, working and learning, Gloria Wavamunno, founder of Kampala Fashion Week, moved back to Uganda in 2009 to start her own brand. Five years after working in Uganda’s burgeoning fashion industry, and seeing all the challenges therein, she set out to create a platform that could support and elevate fellow designers to grow. Kampala Fashion Week was born.
Five editions after, the platform is still growing, and Wavamunno and her team are showing no signs of stopping. This week, 12 designers from across the region will be presenting their spring collections at the 6th edition of Kampala Fashion Week. Themed ‘TEMPLE’, this year’s edition seeks to create a place that harmoniously brings people together using the power of symbolism, art and the positive elements of the spirit of our country.
Lyn Atwiine had a chat with Wavamunno about what to expect, the future of Ugandan fashion and her lessons thus far.
What is the significance of this year’s theme?
I think since I established and founded Kampala Fashion Week, it was always about the bigger picture other than just fashion, like the art community and how when tied together we can build the arts industry within particularly Uganda (for now), but of course expanding around to many African countries. I feel art in general, as much as it is being glorified and utilised in the Western world, it is a natural form with us humans. It speaks so much of our messages and helps us understand and define what we are.
With this being the 6th edition, as a team we are proud to put ourselves there. We are all artists. I don’t think a lot of people are aware that, these are artists who are expanding their artistry and skill because they know that it’s needed. I’m just proud that even with the complications that occur, being a developing nation, and still also the lack of development that we have to deal with, we shall continue trying to develop our country. We have so much beauty, pride and history. With the theme “Temple”, we’re trying to tie in that journey for us; our journey as humans, our journey as people and the journey of this earth. We are all just trying to find a heightened level of ourselves, we’re trying to find the best level of ourselves, we’re trying to find peace within ourselves. This KFW edition is definitely trying to work with as much of the audience so that we spread the message and share our creative energy.
Also, we as the internal team, it’s showing us as Ugandans (as well as other Africans that work within our team) how much we are capable of. We have taken it within our own hands to grow ourselves and develop. Like, we’re not looking to give credit to colonialism or neo-colonialism, no, we are a generation that is trying to say we are taking our country and our African-ness into our own hands, and we are proud, and we are seeing the value of what we are. So this year KFW is trying to represent that. And also bring the audience on that journey that we’ve had with the team – the ups and downs, good and bad, the new the old and how we’ve come to the centre, being prideful. We are so humbled that we get to be in a position to share this experience with our audience and our fellow Ugandans.
Other than fashion, what tools are you utilizing to advance the arts industry in Uganda?
We are adding in installation pieces that work with local materials and local crafters so that we see another element of art which is building. We work with local musicians; we are going to have a personal curated set by one of our upcoming DJ’s. We also wanted to show the pride of where we are taking ourselves as musicians, and how we are mutilating and mutating the African sound. We bring in models, and the models that we’re working with, the fact that we’re a culturally diverse country as Uganda, and we have a number of countries living within our community – the models show how we are embracing each other being all from different countries and cultures – at the end of the day, it’s overall that we are Africans and that spirit of togetherness as people. We also have different locations every year and that is really purposeful because, growing up in Uganda and not maybe having a lot to do made me really inquisitive about what really exists; so with my parents we went to the village, to rural areas, like I knew so much of Kampala, yet to get older and you realize people don’t know other areas of Kampala – so like bringing that geography to show people, look at the city we live in, it’s not just a hub of where the districts are in, like, move around. You learn how people are so different in the different areas of Uganda.
So those are all the little aspects we bring in and workshop them into the art. There’s also the aspect of the educational system, nobody comes in and leaves without being properly trained. We are not just like “here do this” or “carry that” we want everyone to understand why they’re doing it, why it’s needed, what it helps you with. You’ll think it’s just being organised but no, take that into your home, into your next work life – organisation is key, structure is key, being accountable is key. So we also bring that business aspect to the arts, because everyone just thinks, “Oh, arts is so light” I wouldn’t be here with KFW if I wasn’t structured with business.
So, what are we taking from the shows this week?
I definitely know, from my own perspective it is the pinpoint of my journey, through all of this I’ve been blessed and lucky to have been a leader and to help project and bring people to find themselves, and I hope that’s what everyone else walks away with. If you’ve followed KFW, if you’ve been part of the various events, I hope you just feel that art spirit, this is the moment we really want to share as a team, how passionate we were and the hard work we put in – we truly love what we’re doing; so I hope people feel that spirit of love, and self-love. It takes you to love yourself, so all of us individually as a team getting into loving ourselves and going through our own personal work and journey and darkness so that we could eventually come together and spread our love with each other and also feel it. I want someone who comes to go away going like “you know what I feel love for myself, I feel value for myself and I also want to spread love.” So once you feel that you don’t want to spread love, or you won’t give love out, that’s not how we’re going to heal the world.
What’s your take on the future of Ugandan fashion?
I think there’s such a bright future because there are so many raw materials, but we need more people to get to work. I can’t do this by myself, my team can’t do it all. We are a small team but we acknowledge, it’s a lot. For us to move forward, it can’t be handouts. If we still have that continuous attitude of aid, we won’t have room to be passionate, like you have to choose for yourself, “I’m choosing to go into this field, and I’m going to give it my all.” Because we may support each other but it can’t just be me helping everyone else, one person helping – it doesn’t work that way. It goes back to the theme, I must love myself, I must replenish myself before I can replenish others. I also need my tribe; I also need my clan to help me. I want people to realize that you have it in your hands, you have so much technology, you know, I had to find books in my day if I wanted to know something, now you can literally just Google it and get every information. Use the power of this knowledge in your hands, advance yourself, no one is going to go out of their way to advance you. The world we are living in now is very capitalist, so it does not support the personal values of individuals, and yet we all want to live in a healthier world.
I tell the new generation, work, study, learn – every aspect, it doesn’t have to be the techniques of fashion, learn your history, I know my tribal history, maybe I am fortunate to come from very proud parents who knew their clans, their ancestral line, but those things are so important because, we have to keep evolving it. How do we update our traditions, how do we update our cultures so that we are the best Africans we can be? That comes into how you’re going to feed in your work.
What lessons have you had thus far?
I think we have got both responses (negative and positive). In the beginning it was more of resistance than understanding. This goes back to what I was saying, you have to be more conscious to ask and question things. Whenever anyone would hear Kampala Fashion Week or they heard my name they’d think ahh, and be judgmental about where I’m from and from the family I come from, they weren’t willing to understand my mission so at the end of the day I just decided to persist. I decided to make what I needed to happen and through that time the response changed, and more attention was placed on it but because I knew my intention and my mission was pure, I think that showed through eventually.
Another thing is we have an amazing team, they’re passionate people who took a chance on me when everyone was not really supportive, and because of the great work they’ve produced I think it has started to affect how people see the structure of certain events to how people see themselves in their fashion, I’d like to think they don’t see themselves as so materialistic. Fashion becomes an expression of yourself and not just an ornament to look at, or a tool to show which category of elitism you’re in. There’s also that consciousness of where you’re getting your clothes, like where are you buying it, are you getting your clothes from H&M which owns sweatshops or are you supporting a local designer who is embracing their ancestral history, using local materials and supporting the economy?
I feel like now people are finally understanding where our heart is coming from, and with that we are also taking away what we want which is to feel inspired. It’s evolving. It’s creating conversation, and I’m very happy that that’s where it is right now, despite the challenges. We are an organisation, in case people didn’t really know, I am a smart businesswoman, I wanted support, even though I know people don’t really support the arts, but I wanted sponsors and brands to support this mission with the vision that it (art) is part of the community, an essential one.
Being the businesswoman that you are, what’s the future of KFW?S
Well I’m also part of a council, Uganda Fashion Council. I’ll take a more educational stance; documentation, archives, I want to help people to connect. Like if someone is looking for a tailor, someone is looking for fabric, they can connect digitally, because that’s the platform now. KFW is under UFC so it’s about that, I hope we can create more programmes that work for our community. Like with Kampala Fashion Week I just took the name, like Europeans use for London Fashion Week, Paris etc, but everything else, the structure is African. And a lot of fashion names have contacted me and said, “Yo you look like you’re doing something different” and I’m like yeah, it’s modeled to my country, and I know what we need – really we don’t need some party with free booze, we need education, we need teachers. Even now I work with universities abroad and they send their best student here, and that person interns in various local tailoring schools.
That’s how I want to expand, to have more universities like the university from London, St. Martin’s, and I would like more universities from around the globe with such great trainers to come to Africa and give; not give because we are a charity, but give because we are earning it. We built all of those civilizations, it’s time to pay back. So my goal is mainly education and expansion, if I can start a school in every department from fashion to photography, business, marketing and so on… yeah that’s the dream.
How then is the fashion council instilling the spirit of togetherness?
The key is to collaborate! If we are all trying to do the same thing, why not support each other? If everyone is trying to do “my thing,” “my brand” and carve out their name for themselves then what does that gain us as a whole? It’s not helping the country to go forward, and then at the end of the day you’re in debt when you could have avoided it by going the older model instead of this individualism.
Kampala Fashion Week holds this week from Thursday 26th to Saturday 28th of September at Yamasen, on Tank hill road. To attend, buy tickets here
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