When Anna Wintour was introduced to Ellen Whippy Knight as the founder of Fiji Fashion Week, the Vogue boss exclaimed, “Fiji has a fashion week?!” Sure does, Anna. It turned 16 last year, and is an established force in a small yet burgeoning Pacific fashion scene.

White sands and turquoise waters. Surf breaks. Rugby. Fiji is rightly famous for these things, it’s also an international garment-manufacturing country with an independent design community, mainly focused on the local market and the Fijian diaspora.

Now Ellen, a formidable fashion force in her own right, is determined to bring sustainability and technical design education into the picture.

NOTES

If you haven’t yet listened to Ep 199 with Vanuatuan climate activist Flora Vano, please do – it’s an impassioned story about climate impacts and extreme weather in the Pacific, and building a women’s movement to fight its causes.

SUVA Fiji’s capital is on the southeast coast of the largest island, VITI LEVU (“Great Fiji”). It’s the country’s chief port and commercial centre, and is one of the largest urban centres in the South Pacific islands. It’s still relatively small though - around 100K people call it home.

FIJI FASHION WEEK happens annually in late May / early June, in Suva. Shows take the form of ticketed multi-designer collection shows, held in the hanger-like Vodafone Arena. It’s a highlight of the social calendar in Fiji and guests get dressed up to the nines. The many side events include a seminar and workshop series, and an enormous student fashion design competition - high school students from across the country design, sew and model their own original collections during a big-ticket runway event - fabulous! fijifashionweek.com.fj

Fiji Fashion Week’s mission is : “To provide a platform for local designers to show their creative skills, to encourage the proliferation of globally competitive fashion design and in turn drive export receipts via international demand for our local designs.” As well as supporting the development of Fashion and Design education in Fiji.

Says Patty Huntington of BAZAAR Australia: “Resortwear isn’t so much a fashion category, as a way of life in Fiji and there looks to be an untapped business opportunity for an expanded luxury resortwear offer.” More here.

While accessing high-end fabrics is challenging in Fiji, the country has its own sustainable textile traditions, based in First Nations knowledge, natural fibres and dyes and traditional artisanal techniques. In 2023, many fashion week designers were “inspired by, or directly using, the archipelago’s diverse textile traditions”. See the pics & read the GUARDIAN’s take on last season here.

NAMES TO KNOW

HUPFELD HOERDER. His work (below) was featured in the Commonwealth Fashion Exchange at Buckingham Palace in 2019. Clare mentions Ep 30 with Australian designer Kit Willow, who was also part of the showcase - teaming up with Pasifik Creations from the Solomon Islands. NZ designer Karen Walker (Ep 20) also participated - she worked with Kuki Airani Creative Mamas from the Cook Islands. Discover here.

Now studying his Doctor of Creative Arts (DCA) at Western Sydney University’s Institute for Culture and Society, Hoerder told the university newspaper he wants to: find “sustainable solutions to help future-proof the Fijian fashion industry. My work integrates the old and the new and promotes a strong sense of cultural theme, an identity and heritage that is so important to us in Fiji and the Pacific.”

Working with natural fibres sourced from the Pacific and traditional techniques led him to apply for the Fashioning Fiji project and scholarship program.

“The environment is a reoccurring theme in my designs. As is climate change and its detrimental effect on the rising sea level. Fiji is at a crossroads where we need to come together and address sustainability as a nation, including in our vibrant and unique fashion industry,” he said. Read full article here.

LETILA MITCHELL is an artist, dancer and academic who also creates beautiful sustainable fashion collections. Letila’s work explores Rotuman creative practice in the context of Indigenous Oceanic knowledge. Don’t miss her on next week’s show!

Another multi-disciplinarian, TEMESIA TUICAUMIA studied in LA before launching his label in 2020. He also co-runs an independent boutique in Suva supporting young talent. He says: “Temesia.Co offers timeless and fashion-forward pieces, inspired by everyday beauty.”

LAISASA DAVETAWALU (above) received the Fiji Fashion Week Rising Star of the Year Award 2022, and closed the event a 15-piece collection, under the ELARDI label. Subsequently sponsored by FJFW to attend FDS (TAFE) in Sydney, after graduation he went to works for Zimmermann.

SAMSON LEE is much loved by the diaspora for his vibrant resortwear. Expat Aussie TRACEY FARRINGTON’s glam gear has many loyal fans. Ellen mentions Michael Mausio’s HOUSE OF MAUSIO, which was founded in 2010. Ethically produced in Fijom he says: “The company strives towards promoting Pacific Art and Culture through Fashion while preserving its traditions and improving the standard of living for Pacific Islanders.” Natalia Larsen's MALIA Fiji label (Polynesian for “calm waters”) stands out for its elegant, timeless designs, airy natural fibres, quality make and original prints.

TIKI TOGS (above) was a Suva-based fashion brand big in the ‘60s and ‘70s. According to the Fiji Sun, “It was the first all locally owned and operated by Cherie Whiteside who was eventually joined by her son Des, daughter Tanya, and husband Laurie. So really Cherie Whiteside is the founder of our local fashion industry.” Read the rest here.

MANUFACTURING

The GARMENT INDUSTRY in Suva began with Indo-Fijian tailoring businesses mid-last century, and flourished in the ‘80s when Australian and New Zealand brands first looked for offshore production opportunities. It now faces new challenges as it seeks to modernise and stay price competitive.

Today best-practice CMT factories include: MARK ONE APPAREL (pictured) owned by Mark Halabe. UNITED APPAREL is in the uniforms business and employs over 800 people. DANAM is highly certified.

The Australian brand KOOKAI is made in Nasinu, Fiji by MAGI ENTERPRISES, which employs “just under 1,000 Fijian residents, 78% female employees who produce the majority of the KOOKAÏ Basics collection.” More here.

During the pandemic, Fashion Journal reported that luxury Australian womenswear brand Scanlan & Theodore was “repurposing it’s Fiji factory to make much-needed PPE”. They’ve since exited the country.

SPARTECA The South Pacific Regional Trade and Economic Co-operation Agreement was a nonreciprocal trade agreement in which Australia and New Zealand offered duty-free and unrestricted access for specified products originating from the island member countries of the Pacific Islands Forum. The agreement was signed in 1980 in Tarawa, Kiribati, and subject to Rules of Origin regulations, designed to address the unequal trade relationships between the two groups. The textiles, clothing and footwear industry was a major beneficiary, through preferential access to Australian and NZ markets. In 1997 the TCF industry accounted for 26% of Fiji’s total domestic exports. SPARTECA expired in December 2014. It was replaced by the Developing Country Preferences under the Australian System of Tariff Preferences.

WAGES In March 2022, Fiji’s Minister for Economy announced a minimum wage increase. The rise was planned in stages, from $2.68 to $3.01 p/h, effective from April 1, 2022, to $4 p/h by January 2023.

COUPS There have been four recognised Fijian coups d'état in the past forty years: 1987, 2000, 2006 and a constitutional crisis in 2009. 1987 resulted in the overthrow of the elected government of Fijian Prime Minister Timoci Bavadra, and in the declaration of a republic. Via Wikipedia. Obviously political instability affects the trading conditions and the economy. More here.

HISTORY

“Traditional Fijian society was hierarchical. Leaders were chosen according to rank, which was based on descent as well as personal achievement. Organised through residence and kinship (in the latter case through mataqali, or clans, and residential subclans), Fijians participated in a flexible network of alliances that sometimes brought communities together and at other times caused them to oppose one another. By alliance or conquest, some communities formed confederations led by paramount chiefs; warfare was common.” Via Britannica.

Fiji was settled by both Polynesian and Melanesian people around 1500 BC. The first European raiders began to arrive in the early 1800s. Fiji formally colonised by Britain in 1874. The first governor was ARTHUR GORDON.

Gordon “saw himself as the protector of the Fijian people and thus initiated policies that limited their involvement in commercial and political developments. Sales of Fijian land were banned; the Fijians were taxed in agricultural produce, not cash; and they were governed through a system of indirect rule based on the traditional political structure.” Via Britannica. Read the rest here.

Fijians had no tradition of WHALING before the C18th. In the C19th, commercial whaling arrived, dominated by Americans and Britons. Read about David Whippy here.

The BRITISH SLAVERY ABOLITION ACT came into force in 1834, so how were the colonisers going to get their work done? Enter the INDENTURED LABOUR program, which lasted from 1834-1917. Under this, the British employed Indian labour for five-year terms, with more than a million Indians roped in, working largely as plantation workers across the world.

“Though billed as a revolutionary moment in world history, the wheels of slavery were reinvented and renamed, and the indentured labour system was instituted throughout the Empire … In Fiji, more than 60K Indian indentured labourers were recruited to work in the sugarcane plantations. While the system differed from slavery in that workers were hired for periods of five years, it was still based on deceit and exploitation, with recruiters targeting mostly illiterate people, often in districts beset by droughts and famines, promising the riches that awaited them in Fiji. Many stayed on.” Read the rest of Rajendra Pradad’s article here. Today around 34 % of the country’s population is Indo-Fijian.

INDEPENDENCE Fiji became an independent nation in 1970.

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