Perhaps the biggest theme at this year’s Design Indaba in Cape Town was the use of improvised and recycled materials. Driftwood, plastic bottles, discarded packaging and elements of secondhand objects (amongst other items) found their way into the South African exhibition. It was also a global theme with several international speakers at the conference touching on the trend as a result of both recessionary times and a growing eco-conciousness.
The Design Indaba often felt like a meeting point between movements coming from two very different roots: one from the developed world’s angst about destroying the environment and the other being inspired [...]

Cape Town’s Design Indaba took place last week, a yearly event that includes a conference featuring some of the world’s leading thinkers in design with an exhibition championing South African products, furniture architecture and fashion (amongst other disciplines) attracting visitors from across the globe.
One of the interesting trends from the conference was the rise of objects with detailed narratives connected to them. Just as furniture and products are able to tell visual stories (e.g. wood carvings) modern designers are using digital tools to add a storytelling layer to physical objects. The movement runs in parallel with a broader trend of [...]

Self described “undercover photographer” JR has created a giant photo exhibit in Kiberia, Kenya. The photos taken of women from the slum cover 2000 feet of roof tops, as well as being wrapped around the local train service (which completes the image twice a day). The exhibit, which also doubles as a second roof for the shacks it covers, is part of the photographers 28 Millimetres project.

[via Wooster Collective]

The Grand Daddy Hotel has recently opened in the centre of Cape Town, with a twist on the boutique hotel experience in the shape of a rooftop trailer park. The park consists of seven vintage Airstream trailers customised by local artists and are available for guests to stay in. Each of the polished chrome trailers sleep two people, and are embellished with design themes that include, among others, polka dots and The Three Bears. The trailers customisation provides all the facilities (including bathrooms) required for the hotel to earn a 4 Star hotel rating.
The Grand Daddy Hotel is owned by [...]

We’re looking forward to reading more issues of Chew, a new contemporary culture digital magazine produced in Cape Town.  Describing itself as a collaborative magazine, it is put together by its readers who are invited to pitch content for each issue. If you have even a passing interest in what’s happening in pop culture down at the end of Africa this is a great place to start.
You can download the first two issue here: Chew Magazine

Modepass.com, the latest social networking spot for fashionistas, has recently launched. Although it still has some teething problems (occasionally the odd French word or phrase spills over into the English version) it is already buzzing with content. The site feels like a next generation version of Myspace, with customised personal pages and easy to use ways to upload photos, video and articles. However the user experience, because all the content is fashion related, is more like exploring a seemingly unending style blog or browsing through flickr. It will certainly appeal to fashion bloggers as its a great source for photos [...]

Launched by Cow Africa, the Five Black Bins project has done its bit to beautify Cape Town by abducting wheelie bins from the suburb of Woodstock and subjecting them to a vigourous design makeover by some of the city’s best graphic artists.
Five Black Bins brings together five Cape Town design studios to redesign five garbage bins in Woodstock, Cape Town. The urban design project was conceptualised and curated by non-traditional agency, Cow.
Five random addresses in Woodstock were selected. Designers were briefed to use the bin as a canvas but to take into consideration the context of its surroundings as well. [...]

What If The World, an arts/design collective based in Cape Town, are bringing the local creative community together through a series of dinner parties held in the window of their design studio. The aim is to pick a different set of six people (who don’t know each other) for each party.
“Dinner Dates are intended to bring people from the creative community together to meet, chat, exchange ideas and get tipsy…6 people are invited, you’re only allowed to attend once, and I try my best to make sure that you won’t know anyone else at the table…” says organiser Liam.
What If [...]

The Give-It -Bag was the brain child of a German couple living in Cape Town, Philip and Regina Booth. It looks like a miniature rubble bag (the kind you get on building sites) and is made from recycled shipping bags that have made their way to South Africa. Part of the fashion appeal is the randomness of the graphics as the makers are dependent entirely on what materials come in – the ViralCool packaging shown here seems like a particularly apt choice.
Fifty percent of the profits go to deserving causes personally chosen by the couple such as footballs for township [...]

Ama Kip Kip, is possibly one of South Africa’s hottest underground t-shirt labels and has been driven almost entirely by word of mouth and use of Facebook (their brand website is just a holding page). Ama Kip Kip means multi coloured popcorn, the snack of choice in Jo’burg’s minibus taxis. Only available from a small store in Rosebank Mall, Jo’burg (which also sells Bape sneakers and “replica” Kanye West style shutter shades) Ama Kip Kip is leading the pack of a number of similar homegrown brands that operate in the same way. Although they have their roots in township and [...]

The township of Soweto is famous worldwide for its apartheid era images of riots and poverty. Images coming out of the area these days however are often of fashionable young South African’s partying, as numerous brands are using the township as staging post for reaching a rapidly growing black middle class (nicknamed “black diamonds” by marketers for their increasing spending power).

The Soweto Wine Festival expects over 5,000 visitors and is an essential part of the Western Cape based wine industry’s attempt to reach this new market. They describe their audience as:
“black middle [...]

There is a palpable sense of Fashion Week fatigue in recent coverage of the spring/summer shows. The problem seems to be just the sheer amount of events: a fashion editor or buyer could almost spend the entire year attending fashion weeks as almost every city from Lagos to Singapore now has one. Even major events seem to be under pressure with the recent LA Fashion Week attracting some criticism for a lack of the usual glitterati and industry heavy weights at shows.
A number of major buyers were reported in WWD as opting out of the recent L.A. event:
“I couldn’t sit [...]

Matjiesfontein, a small town about four hours into the semi-desert Karoo from Cape Town recently played host to the gloriously odd ball Show ‘n Tell weekend. With a maximum capacity of 100 (that’s the most Matjiesfontein can accommodate) and a marketing plan of word of mouth and a blog it is a distinctly under-the-radar event. Part music festival, part art happening, part picnic but mostly a celebration of the deeply eccentric, the event is built entirely by the people that attend it (everyone is asked to make a creative contribution). A large part of the appeal is the town itself [...]

Australia Fashion Week (which finishes today) is now promoting itself as a “trans-seasonal” event as a result of climate change.  The event, held in Sydney, would normally be the autumn/winter edition (the opposite of the recent northern hemisphere weeks) the current edition however concentrates on collections more suitable to a milder climate year round. The move may actually be more about breaking old world fashion week conventions that were never relevent to southern hemisphere events in the first place (and a cunning PR move to cash in on climate change hysteria) however it raises interesting questions. With the fashion industry becoming more global [...]

The 80’s grip on popular culture may finally be slipping as the next generation is increasingly looking to the early 90’s for inspiration.
The first half of the noughties gave us unashamedly 80s fashion, music (the entire electro movement) and even hair cuts (asymmetric fringe anyone?). Since ‘05 however nineties influence has been creeping into youth culture.  
The UK’s New Rave movement which has had a massive impact on fashion and music is probably the most obvious example. The scene, depending on who you believe, was invented as a marketing gimmick by The Klaxons (who are now rapidly trying to disown it) [...]