Festival for African Fashion and Arts – FAFA

It was bigger, better, and run for two days this time. The FAFA Gala night on 30th October was the essence of glitz and glamour! Whilst some of us were slaving away backstage ensuring the show was a success, the crème of Nairobi was treated to a game drive, cocktail reception and 5star dinner courtesy of Sarova. The backstage crew was super fantastic! How can it not be, with Randolph and his Revlon team on hair, top make-up artistes Sam, Suzie and Muthoni, former top model Waridi on choreography with assistance from Dorothy, and myself piecing everything and everyone together as Backstage Manager.

I have to give a big-up to the FAFA team, and Mwaniki mageria - and his team - of Balozi for piecing together a fantabulous event!

And the designers were:

Kiko Romeo



Deepa Dosaja





John Kaveke (Pics coming up)

Nkwo (from Nigeria)





Mustafa Hassanali





Koo Roo





Patricia Mbela





Nike Kondakis





Moo Cow





Betty vanetti






Monica Kanari






African Mosaique (Ethiopian designer based in South Africa)






Photos Coutresy of Conrad Samanya.

As if that wasn’t enough, FAFA had to celebrate Kenya’s upcoming designers during a second emerging designers’ show on Sunday afternoon. And the designers were:

(Pictures to come)

FAFA Styling Workshop

The styling workshop, organised by FAFA and run by Lara Ubago, was more than I expected going into it. Day I was general information on Styling and different approaches one can take. Day two was planning for a fashion shoot, preparing briefs, selecting clothes, and making accessories – hey I made a flower chocker from manila and paint! And the third day was the photo shoot, where I had Emily as my model, Randolph who put stunning bangs on her bald head, and Sam who did fierce make-up as usual. The resulting images, photographed by Abraham Ali were:

Outfit by Deepa Dosaja, Jewellery by Le Collane Di Betta


Outfit and jewellery by seed of Hope (and my flower...woohoo)

Baby Banda Maternity Beauty Pageant

For the first time ever! We had a Maternity beauty pageant in Kenya. It was held during the Baby Banda Exhibition in Sarit Centre from 15th – 17th. The motions sponsored show was a climax of the exhibition on Sunday afternoon. I had a fantastic time with the mums-to-be during their catwalk training sessions the previous weekends, and I have to pass out a HUGE KUDOS to all who participated.

The exhibition itself, organised by Beauty Bee Ltd was funn of fun and activities for mothers and their children, mothers-to-be and even fathers and fathers-to-be. There was a baby shower organised that had a whooping 500 pregnant women! All in all, it was one of those events that leave you feeling rather broody ;-)

Congratulations to Khadija Mohammed who came all the way from Mombasa and Won first place.

(Picture’s to come)

The African fashion Fair – TAFF

Third year running, The African Fashion Fair has the potential of achieving what Kenya Fashion week never could. Organised by Lucy Rao with support from Monica Kanari, the three day event involved fashion exhibitions, workshops and fashion shows with designers from Kenya, Rwanda and West Africa. And they were:

Vaishalli Morjaria






Benzele (From Burkina Faso)





Intrinsic Designs






Occassions and Days





Ox Designs



Di Maximo (From Rwanda)





Zulu Designs





Glow Designs




Rialto Fashions






Ally Dio (From Senegal)





Ally Rehmtullah




And then there was Kiko Romeo!

Pictures courtesy of Andre!! ;-)

For more details on the event, go to: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=30752916929&ref=ts