What happened to the Orange Culture x Davido collaboration?

At the tail end of 2017, while Davido’s N30 billion tour was picking up steam, the Afropop star joined forces with androgynous fashion company, Orange Culture, founded by Adebayo Oke-Lawal.

Selfridges, in collaboration with Style House Files, released the capsule collection created by the duo for its Music Matters campaign.

The capsule collection debuted on September 12, featuring pieces inspired by ‘IF’, Davido’s hit song. It featured easy to wear stylish t-shirts, tunics and bomber jackets in muted tones.

• What is a capsule collection?

The term originated from capsule wardrobe which is a collection of essential items of clothing that don’t go out of fashion. They can be modified to.fit different times. But nowadays, it has become a fashion lingo for collaboration between luxury brands and affordable clothing chains, and also between entertainers and fashion brands.

The collaboration between Davido and Orange Culture was an interesting moment for the culture as two powerful industries (music and fashion), embodied by two well-regarded contemporary brands, collided.

This brought to the Nigerian front the global trend of musicians being fashion tastemakers and influencers.

After the launch, there was a media blitz followed and weeks later, a showing at the 2017 Heineken Lagos Fashion and Design Week.

Subsequently, nothing else was heard from either the designer, Oke-Lawal, or Davido. Somehow, the collaboration faded away from the conversation at a time many reckoned it will be an enduring initiative.

Davido x Orange Culture’s collaboration was launched at the right time, for it to be sold at the pop singer’s worldwide tour and be promoted using the musician’s star wattage.

In the Western world, the likes of Kanye West, Rihanna and A$ap Rocky have active deals with fashion houses like Louis Vuitton and APC as well as sports brands like Adidas and Puma.

Those brands keep churning out new collections every year. It has been one year since Davido and Orange Culture collaborated and many expected it to be sustained, given the brand influence of both creatives involved.

While little is known about the status of the famed joint effort, Wizkid recently announced that he is putting finishing touches to his Starboy collection which is being designed by Nike.