Creating and Developing Global and Futuristic Fashion Brands

The fashion industry in Africa is becoming a global market, and many African designers continue to deliver surprises to the International stage. Africa’s creativity has always been one to reckon with. Recently, the energetic youths of Africa keep bringing back proud highlights to Africa from the International fashion sphere, where they ably represent the continent.

Gradually Africans are making what other Africans can be proud to put on, and now they are steadily finding their statement in the market. Going far from the expectation of people about what African fashion should look like, they are fast exploring futuristic African style with a perfect blend of the traditional.

African fashion is expressive, bold and colourful, and Ms Farai Simoyi, a Zimbabwean designer, is a great African fashion flock member.

Ms Farai Simoyi is a notable fashion designer and business leader featured in several magazines such as Forbes, Vogue, FastCompany, Newsweek and many others. She has previously designed for really great celebrities, including Beyonce, JayZ, Nicki Minaj, Rachel Roy, Anne Klein and many others.

She is also an international designer who is not just touring the world but also uses her identity to address topics bordering on Global Fashion Development, Sustainability, Manufacturing and Diversity/Inclusion in Africa.

With her brand, “The Narativ House”, she makes sure to promote other artisans and designers with whom she works. Since 2020, she has been the Program Director and Professor of Fashion Design Programs at Thomas Jefferson University. She also identifies as the founder of Farai Inc, founded in Brooklyn in 2010. and her brand focuses on creating sustainable and ethical styles. 

Debutting Farai Inc.

Growing up in Harare, Zimbabwe, where her aunt owned a Lingerie company, Ms Simoyi got exposed to the world of fashion and textiles. To do her high school and University studies, she returned to the US, where she studied Fashion & Design and began to weave her African experience into all that she learned. After graduation, she studied at the Nuova Accademia Di Belle Arti in Italy. After studying, she started her fashion by combining all her adventures from Africa and Europe.

Not jumping directly to become a designer, she first went to work as an assistant, and there she evolved into a technical designer. From thence, she went on to work as a Senior Denim Designer for House of Dereon, owned by Beyonce and Tina Knowles. This place allowed her to work with celebrity clients.

Currently, she fills the senior designer position for Nicki Minaj’s fashion collection. Her innate trait is that she never ceases to push against challenges and rose from being the lady hoping to design to becoming a lady whose designs are sought after.

Still working under Nicki Minaj’s collection, Ms Simoyi began to create her brand, and though it was difficult, she was able to achieve it. Though she once admitted to Farai Gundan in an interview that it was tough as both brands are different and to design for each, she had to switch often.

Daily, Africans stand up to create enterprises that reach the international market, and their creativity is always applauded. Ms Farai Simoyi is an example of the rising African prowess. She makes sure to make a statement with her design, which has featured in very notable places that have made them unforgettable and marked with endless recognition.