Photographer Trevor Stuurman and designer Thebe Magugu at Nirox Sculpture Park.Fashion designer Thebe Magugu’s “Sonic Experience” at the weekend transported guests into the wilderness for a sensory journey that was full-fledged haunting, mystical and spiritual.
To complete the fashion fantasy, the dress code guided patrons to wear all-black. Upon arrival they were each handed a custom Magugu kaftan, made out of the wearable Tswana blanket traditionally donned by brides. The matching aesthetic of the check print, as the cool kids would put it, was giving cult vibez. The spooky atmosphere was heightened by dancers covered to their heads in all-black fabric and delivering a Gothic performance art piece.
“As the name ‘Folklorics’ suggests, the collection looks at the past through a modern lens, much like the artists in my playlist,” Magugu wrote in a booklet given to attendees, highlighting his thought process. “They beautifully combine the past and present – while offering slight suggestions for the future – through intelligent, genre-bending and Afrocentric stories.”
“This season, I wanted to profile some of those stories we were brought up on – from mermaids steering ships to wreck to a cunning poltergeist of whom one should never call by name – and translating it into a key collection for every woman.