Amanda Laird Cherry
South Africa is one of the most dominant countries in Africa. Their pop culture has great influence on the world. And just like Nigeria and Ghana, they are great players in African fashion industry. In a survey of their fashion design landscape one name that comes to mind is Amanda Laird Cherry. Although this is a name of a lady, it is also the name she calls her big fashion brand. According to Amanda while granting an interview to fashion of southern Africa, she states that she is influenced by her country and things around her.
From observation of Amanda Laird Cherry Apparel, one could say they derive their designs from mixing elements of African fashion to western fashion vogue. Unlike most African Fashion designers who make their designs with at least seventy percent fabrics made with African designs and motifs; the reverse is the case of Amanda and her crew. And she does this because of the following.
The cultural Differences in South Africa
One can easily attribute this switch in direction to the fact that there are white and Black South Africans. That means two fashion styles conflicting in the streets of South Africa. What Amanda and her crew does with their design is to fuse this two cultural and fashion styles to give a nice blend. They creatively use the rich colours of African fabrics to mix with the plain materials of western designs.
Also the styles of the designs is also mixed. With a keen eye, one could notice that most of the designs made by Amanda and her crew are mostly with collars. They try to make English cooperate designs look casual. They achieve this by mixing African colored fabrics/designs and cooperate fabrics.
The local climate of South Africa
The climate of South Africa is relatively different to that experienced by most African countries. But one thing most African countries have including South Africa is a hot weather. This reflected in most African designs because most designs are made to have enough space to allow for the general ventilation of the person wearing it. Amanda and her team of seasoned designers always put this into consideration hence their clothe line are always looking bogus.
The Tourist influence
Finally, South Africa is one of the favorite destination for tourist. With the wild life and other natural features of South Africa, people from around the world always try to visit. This also influences their design. Therefore, the purity in African Fashion had to be mixed by Amanda and her crew. They are mixed to suit the various countries that will be represented by tourist. To make the designs interesting she and her crew create Western designs that look African.
Amanda Laird Cherry
