South African Designer Thebe Magugu & Valentino’s Pierpaolo Piccioli Transform Each Other’s Work Courtesy Of The Vogue Designer Challenge

'Thebe Magugu X Valentino'

South African break-out fashion designer Thebe Magugu and world-renowned Pierpaolo Piccioli of Valentino were tasked to repurpose each other’s designs as part of this year’s Vogue designer challenge. The designers fused history with heritage and created a conversation through fashion with their two repurposed pieces .

The two impeccable designers exchanged two haute couture pieces to repurpose, “when South Africa’s fashion wunderkind Thebe Magugu first opened the mystery crate from Rome containing Pierpaolo Piccioli’s Valentino haute couture garment, he recognized it at once as the dress that Tracee Ellis Ross wore to grace the 2018 Emmy Awards. This was the garment chosen by Piccioli that Magugu would be tasked with reimagining as the second chapter of Vogue’s dress-swap initiative.” Says Vogue Magazine.

Thinking of Queen Nandi Bhebhe, mother of Shaka Zulu, who founded the Zulu Kingdom in 1816, Magugu took on the daunting task and essentially deconstructed the dress and restitching it, almost Frankenstein-like, into a very elevated trench coat from his universe. He added industrial topstitching but balked at unpicking the pleats. Magugu also decided to use every element of the original garment, from the zipper to the underskirts, which he transformed into wide-leg pants and a blouse. Researching the 17th- and 18th-century paintings that were Piccioli’s original inspirations for the collection. Magugu also used more of the petticoat’s crin to create a hieratic hat that likens the headpiece to a Nefertiti headdress

On the other side of the world, in Rome, Pierpaolo unboxed Magugu’s almond-green pantsuit and the thing that impacted him the most was this letter that Thebe sent him one that talked about the importance of having Magugu’s African heritage represented in the final design and Pierpaolo honored his wish.

“Piccioli wanted to layer Magugu’s ensemble with his Roman world, to give value to this fabric by incorporating it into a cape—a symbol of the Italian Madonna, of Renaissance culture while still keeping the African essence of the original design.” Says Vogue Magazine. Twelve craftspeople from Valentino’s fabled couture atelier were tasked with transforming the blanket motif into a form of intarsia embroidery set into cashmere, a subtle but highly labor-intensive process.

“Ultimately, Piccioli says while talking with Vogue magazine, “this is a demonstration that fashion can connect the world. Thebe’s talking about his culture, I’m talking of my own—but actually, we share the same values, the same idea of fashion as self-expression.”

Photos Courtesy of Vogue Magazine