Text by Bandana Tewari

When a Newsweek article of July 26th 2004 announced the list of 'The World's Best Countries' to be a technocrat (China), musician (France), artist (Germany), idealist (Netherlands), depressed (Argentina), young (Turkey), South Africa stood out as the best place to be a fashion designer! Since then much has been written about SA fashion, from the rivalry amongst SA's fashion triptych - Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town who all host individual fashion weeks - to the commercial 'weaning' of a clothing industry (whose annual value is pegged at two billion dollars) to think out of its 'territorial' box and capture that, ah unwelcoming and tough nut, 'international market'.

In many ways, it's no different from what Indian fashion is going through what with its glut of fashion weeks; the seemingly predatory arrival of international fashion conglomerates that is threatening to bulldoze the indigenous fashion designers with their financial clout and marketing savoir faire; speculation about which home-grown designer will be the global export; and of course the inexhaustible need amongst local designers to find an identity that is local but international.

One long chat with Athi Patra Ruga and the similarities ended there. This 21-year-old who had a tiny stall at the event with street vintage, is vociferous about his cult label, JustNje, that sees itself in the cutting edge of a socio-realist movement. His previous documentation ("We don't call them collections here," he says) titled 'The Revenge of the 9Foot Ma Benz and Her Toothless Taxi Kings' was influenced by the post apartheid group of very flamboyantly rich township matriarchs called the Ma Benz because of their blingworthy Mercs. This particular Ma Benz happened to get her taxi mogul husband assassinated so as to get all the man's fortune, making her the most powerful taxi queen in Africa! Interestingly, the clothes that were designed were very much a part of the social narrative, nothing opaque and distant but an intrinsic part of a thriving, living, socio-economic culture.

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