SALT LAKE CITY – The second annual Utah Indigenous Vogue Week occurred on the Leonardo Museum in Salt Lake Metropolis on Saturday.
The occasion, organized by a bunch of volunteers identified collectively as Utah Indian Vogue Week, represented 12 completely different tribes made up of fashions and designers.
The style present featured 19 designers from throughout the state exhibiting every thing from fashionable takes on conventional designs, ready-to-wear, couture and avant-garde collections.
For Jessica Wiarda, director of Utah Indigenous Vogue Week, the occasion is a chance to raise Indigenous creators and their cultures.
“We all the time categorical ourselves by what we put on,” Wiarda mentioned. “So it's an ideal approach to categorical extra about what we consider, what we really feel and thru a really indigenous lens.”
Whereas the occasion was organized by a bunch of volunteers, the annual vogue present ultimately hopes to change into a nonprofit group subsequent yr, Wiarda added. Changing into a nonprofit would enable the group to entry grants and pay staff.
The success of the style present was evident by the enthusiastic, sold-out crowd that greeted the fashions and designers with loud cheers and applause as they walked the runway. The occasion was made much more distinctive by utilizing on a regular basis Indigenous ladies, youngsters and males from all walks of life as fashions.
Rica Benally, a mannequin who wore a design created to lift consciousness about lacking and murdered Indigenous ladies, says the occasion was a imaginative and prescient of the way forward for Indigenous vogue.
“I really feel like Indigenous vogue has come a great distance,” Benally mentioned. “There are conventional types which might be being utilized to items which might be, you possibly can say, from the 2000s period, from the '80s. It's very attention-grabbing as a result of you possibly can actually put a gorgeous sample on one thing so fashionable and it ties it collectively very properly.”
For Gabe Brody, one of many attendees, the style present was a particular gathering place to share one another's cultures and lift consciousness of Native American expertise.
“Every tribe is exclusive,” Brody mentioned. “Each tribe is completely different. They’ve their very own tradition, their very own customs, their very own songs, their very own dances. And we now have individuals who come collectively like that. It's a gorgeous factor. “Indigenous voices are being raised.”