Over the summer season, as Kanyinsola Onalaja was making ready for her namesake womenswear model’s London Style Week debut on the official calendar, a fire ripped by means of her workplace and warehouse. Almost the entire demi-couture label’s earlier collections, samples, materials, archives and sketchbooks had been destroyed. Fortunately, Onalaja and her total workforce had been protected.
Moderately than dropping out, the British Style Council/Vogue Designer Style Fund 2026 finalist revisited an unrealized assortment she designed in 2020 entitled “Rising From the Ashes.” Maybe in a stroke of serendipity, Onalaja reworked her unique sketches by means of the lens of a phoenix, drawing upon her expertise with the devastating hearth and her braveness to begin from scratch. The notably poignant assortment, which debuted at LFW on Sunday, explores “a brand new story of a rebirth, transferring from the darkness into a brand new life,” Onalaja tells Fashionista.
Onalaja Spring 2027
Photograph: Launchmetrics Highlight
Separated into three levels — The Burn, The Ash and The Rebirth — Onalaja’s Spring 2027 providing begins with textural burnt oranges mirroring crackling embers and molten lava earlier than settling right into a smokey grey shade palette representing stillness. Simply because the mud settles, flashes of shade and light-weight emerge from the darkness, symbolizing a model reborn. Deliberately damaged beads embellish night robes, whereas fringe and feathers abound, fusing the label’s signature ’70s “disco glam” aesthetic with phoenix-inspired motifs.
“We’re in an in-between [moment] the place we all know who we’re as a model, however it’s like a brand new starting and it’s a time for us to discover a barely completely different path,” she says.
Photograph: Courtesy of Onalaja
Rewinding to Onalaja’s vogue beginnings, the British-Nigerian designer pursued a grasp’s diploma in vogue design at Istituto Marangoni and later labored as an embroidery marketing consultant. Whereas collaborating with different designers, Onalaja acquired a first-hand have a look at the business’s size-inclusivity challenge: She observed most sizing stopped at a U.Ok. 12 (U.S. 8), with the biggest she noticed going as much as a U.Ok. 26 (U.S. 22).
“I wished to create a model that fused the dimensions inclusivity facet, but additionally it was an expression of my heritage and with the ability to take issues that I’ve realized over time, cultures that now we have in Nigeria, and fuse it with my love for textures and embroidery,” Onalaja explains.
Photograph: Courtesy of Onalaja
Thus, in 2014, Onalaja based her personal luxurious label, which she calls a “maximalist dream.” Rooted in craftsmanship and cultural storytelling (the designer hails from the Yoruba and Edo tribes), Onalaja’s vibrant providing explodes with beads, tassels, sequins, feathers, fringe and crystals. The designer’s penchant for intricate embroidery shines all through the label’s assortment, which already stands aside within the occasionwear area because of its prolonged 2XS to 5XL dimension vary.
“Once you stroll right into a room, individuals can hear you,” Onalaja mentioned, reflecting on what initially drew her to textural methods. “It was about creating very assertion items with the embroidery.”
And assertion items are precisely what the model’s buyer is looking for. The Onalaja girl is a “international citizen,” filling her social calendar with events and galas. With the label’s costs starting from $130 to $6,680, the Onalaja client is searching for clothes with a deeper connection. This isn’t an viewers merely in search of overpriced elevated fundamentals; Onalaja’s tactile wardrobe, which is constructed on three-dimensional ornamentation, caters to its group’s urge for food for individuality.
Photograph: Courtesy of Onalaja
Onalaja already counts a number of celebrities amongst its followers — Chloe Bailey, Jennifer Hudson and Lizzo, to call a number of — and it additionally just lately crafted a customized search for Olivia Dean’s “The Artwork of Loving Stay” tour. At her Atlanta live performance, Dean donned the label’s Zellie Slip Maxi Costume, an elongated robe with three-dimensional embroidery impressed by the African custom of physique marking. “A number of the scars and numerous the bead placements could be precisely the place they might be on a physique,” Onalaja notes.
However how do these glittering robes truly come collectively? For every assortment, Onalaja begins by nailing down her materials, embroideries and prints. Then, she “work[s] backwards” to include her beloved ’70s references, typically turning to Studio 54 or Diana Ross. “I all the time give attention to texture and fabrication first after which infuse the silhouette after in order that the embroidery is the standout after which the silhouette enhances it,” Onalaja says. The label collaborates with artisans worldwide, however the designer handles all last finishings.
Photograph: Courtesy of Onalaja
As a demi-couture label, Onalaja operates on a made-to-order enterprise mannequin. Every garment is hand made with intention, which helps forestall overproduction. As she continues to steadily scale the enterprise, the designer notes that the label is exploring extra capsule collections, together with increasing into footwear and equipment. At present, Onalaja is stocked at main gamers like Revolve, Saks Fifth Avenue and Cult Mia, along with its international retail presence throughout the U.S., the U.Ok., the UAE, Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa.
“We cater to ladies that luxurious forgot, particularly with the dimensions inclusivity and each girl being a distinct physique sort,” Onalaja mentioned. “So our retailers actually respect that they usually actually champion our bigger sizes and our very small sizes as properly.”
Photograph: Courtesy of Onalaja
Trying forward, retail enlargement is on the horizon for Onalaja. With one brick-and-mortar flagship in Lagos underneath its belt, the designer needs to proceed constructing out the model’s retailers in numerous areas, together with internet hosting extra IRL activations with its group. In any case, Onalaja’s tactile items — clothes dripping with beaded fringe and glowing with sequins — profit from in-person discovery.
“We’re at such a crossroads of rebuilding and looking for out what our new story is,” she says. “Despite the fact that we do have some core pillars, for me, it’s an fascinating journey as a result of we’re additionally seeing and studying and seeing the place this rebirth will take us.”
