Print article   email story

‘I am an urban optimist. I love this city and I am passionate about Afrocentric fashion,” says Rees Mann, the property developer responsible for the recent opening of the brand spanking new Fashion Kapitol, currently still in an awkward phase, complete with construction tape, scaffolding and giant holes in the foundation, none of which hides the area’s potential. Nor did anything get in the way of Joburg’s creative set buying fully into this dream and brainchild of Rees Mann. Mann and award-winning journalist and author, Adam Levin – the project’s Specialist Fashion Consultant – worked hard at ensuring that this dream becomes reality.

The Kapitol will serve as the nucleus to the broader Fashion District, which extends over 30 blocks. “Within the fashion district there will be over 30 Pan-African fashion boutiques, fashion institutions, training centres and coffee shops,” says Mann, whose family has been involved in the fashion trade since 1948, making him the 3rd generation of Manns in Joburg’s fashion district. In addition to the shops, the space will also have a gallery space, cafés and restaurants.

According to Sammy Mafu, the JDA’s executive manager of marketing and communications, the idea is to create a ‘fashion hub’ that serves the continent’s designers, manufacturers, retailers, fashion suppliers, property owners and their customers.

Tall order? Maybe. The fact that the JDA – whose sole mandate is to pump money into, and oversee the completion of, the transformation of Jozi and its surrounds’ gentrification – is pumping in excess of R23 million into The Fashion Kapitol, however, makes this mountain of a project certainly seem much more surmountable. Which must come as a welcome relief to Mann, who has been working on getting the project launched for the last 10 years. “We have been waiting all this time for the city council to agree to the project,” says Mann.

The Kapitol’s target market comprises three main groups, in the hopes that they will stomp their well-heeled feet along its mosaic-lined pavements. Firstly, there are the inhabitants of the immediate area and local downtown shoppers; secondly, the tourist market (the “proudly African flavour will be a draw card for tourists”.) Then, the market Levin believes will be hardest to attract to this area (for some reason still associated with crime), the fashion conscious suburbanites. Still, Levin believes: “The fact that, for example, Clive [Rundle] will have his coffee shop there should help with that.” Other designers who have agreed to establish retail stores selling their wares include Bongiwe Walaza and Ephraim Molingoana. This should serve as pretty exciting news for these latter two designers’ many followers, especially seeing as, as yet, they do not have their own retail space.

Molingoana, who specialises in menswear, accessories and shoes, is particularly excited at the prospect of opening this, his flagship store. “I am so looking forward to it. I cannot wait,” an excited Molingoana tells me. With rumours doing the rounds that the rentals of the spaces available for letting are pretty extravagant, I ask Molingoana whether he is happy with this situation. “Well,” he says, “it is expensive, but these guys have pushed to maintain a really high standard and this makes it worth it.”

About his relationship with his prospective landlord (Mann), he says: “He really has vision. Every now and then he would call us up to give us a kind of a pep talk, motivating us, which is really cool. It is so refreshing to see people who are in the industry not just for the money but rather to look out for the industry as a whole.”

What Levin is particularly excited about is playing host to the world’s first outdoor catwalk ramp. Says Levin: “The public runway and amphitheatre will host fashion shows and special events throughout the year. There will be modelling agencies who will want to test their models and designers wanting to test their designs or shows or whatever and this will be ideal for that.

“Ultimately we aim to host daily fashion shows for emerging designers. With restaurants and coffee shops spilling on to the public square, this unique public space in the city will buzz with fashion students, artists, musicians, fashionistas and shoppers. Twice-weekly the Kapitol plans to host a fashion market with a wide range of African craft and fashion.”

Any inner city regular (or even occasional visitor), no matter how loyal they are to it, would tell you that there are very few – if any – public spaces in Jozi’s schizophrenic inner city. The launch of the Fashion Kapitol looks set to change this situation around. And it’s just as well, because the rather unfortunate reality of people associating fashion with the hallowed-yet-über-kitsch consumerist nightmare that is Sandton needs to be changed.

pulseditor@gmail.com

Subscribe to the print edition of City Press