Designer calls for avenues to showcase work

By CLARISSA MOI
ONE of the challenges for the fashion industry in the country is there are no avenues for designers to showcase their work, according to a local fashion designer.
Wandid Amini Korimbo, from Alukuni village in Central, is a self-taught fashion designer and director for her business Niugini Native Ltd.

Korimbo started her business about four years ago and has also registered Niugini Native Ltd with the Investment Promotion Authority which carries her corporate line.
She told The National that fashion was an emerging industry in the country and there were a lot of designers coming up.
Korimbo said one of the challenges they encountered was that there were no avenues for them to showcase their designs.
“There’s a lot of new emerging designers and at the end of the day, it is quality that puts a benchmark for us designers,” Korimbo said.
“The fashion industry in PNG is just emerging and so we are still learning as we are progressing.
“During fashion shows, we showcase our products, but nothing happens after because is no avenue.
“When the show is over, designers go and there’s no avenue to sell your products because these are all one-off pieces that we do for the runway show.
“Therefore, my friend, who is the owner for Shady Rest Hotel, came up with the idea of having an avenue about promoting local designers to cater for the fashion lines that I promote on the runway.
“We also promote a lot of the local SMEs (small and medium enterprises) especially to empower women.
“Jewellery are made by local women like the Sepik Sisters who make earrings. We do uniforms for big meetings that are held here. We do polo shirts, sports uniforms, corporate uniforms and school uniforms which have PNG designs. One of our major highlight as a business was the Apec meeting in 2018 where we made corporate wears for the delegates,” she said.