African Fashion and Design Week returns for 6th edition

After five years of consistency, African Fashion and Design Week is returning for its sixth edition.

The theme for AFDW 2017 is ‘Honour the Masters and Celebrate the New’.

The event aims to celebrate and pay homage to both veteran designers, as well as new designers who are showing promising potential.

According to the organisers, African Fashion and Design Week’s primary focus is to provide more retail access for designers to consumers globally, provide platforms for networking and celebrate the African fashion industry.

The fashion week will take place in Nigeria from October 13 to 15 at the Federal Palace Hotel, Lagos.

A series of events leading up to the fashion week will hold between July and early October.

An overview of events are detailed below:

Business of Fashion Seminar: Offers the opportunity to young talents to learn the basic foundation of building a fashion brand and earn a sustainable living; and the careers that are available in the fashion industry. These seminars will take place in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, and Togo.

African Icon of Hope Awards: Acknowledges designers’ outstanding works that has put the African continent on the global fashion map.

Bluepearl Rising Star: As part of BSI’s commitment to fostering creative independence amongst new talent in the African fashion and design industry, Bluepearl Rising Stars is a competition in which the most creative and innovative designers selected will each present a much-anticipated capsule collection, before one of the young designer’s is awarded the title of Bluepearl Raising Star and also given the opportunity to showcase during the New York Fashion Week. The prize also includes a scholarship to study Fashion and Design Technology.

Runway Showcase: Will feature collections from over 30 leading established and emerging African designers from 11 countries.