Inside the studio
With the current wave of gender fluid thinking in fashion, it’s not difficult for Namila to stand out. The sassy Berlin-based label has been taking New York by storm since winning the VFiles prize, which granted them a year-long mentorship programme and the chance to present their collection during this year’s NYFW. Nan Li and Emilia Pfohl met while studying at Berlin’s University of the Arts and decided to launch their joint label, which also happened to be Nan’s MA project at the Royal College of Art. Namilia’s fashion is sporty, feminine and sexy with a liberating approach to female aesthetics. Heavily inspired by pop culture and pop art, their signature piece – the dick bra – is everything it can be: brash, cartoonish and above all it reduces phallus power to fallacy.
For their AW16 collection they created a series of looks based on six girl gangs – Orgasm Clinic, Come & Play, Wet & Wild, Nude & Rude, Hush Hush and Feel the Heat – in what’s become their feminist statement that celebrates femininity and challenges the male gaze. We met Namilia in their studio near Moritzplatz to talk about the Kardashians, their next collection and their California dreams.
Why did you decide to start a label together?
Nan: We had already worked together on a project in Berlin and thought it’d be easier to start something together. For me fashion is about telling your story and visualizing what your message is. We both had worked for other designers including Christopher Kane but I always felt that there was something missing. At uni they asked me what my future plans were and they adjusted the programme to that. So the whole MA was a preparation for the label.
Emilia: We’re a good match because I really like doing the production, business and pr and Nan is more like the creative director.
Why is Namelia special?
Especially in New York there is a whole new wave of gender fluidity that, for us, is more about empowering women. I think there are so many restricting gender rules that we don’t even think about, despite having grown up in a freer society. So it’s about breaking those rules and clichés. Fashion for me is more about the message rather than just the clothes, and I want to contribute to our society and time.
Namilia gets Bieber fever with the Penis Bra
Tell me more about your involvement with VFiles.
So we won the VFiles competition and the prize was a show in NY. They work closely with celebrities, which is our main approach, too. We’ve created outfits with pop stars like Miley and Rihanna in mind and our inspiration was very musical, so we decided to create different looks for different personas rather than have one big homogeneous collection and use the same print and fabrics. We’re also working on a collection inspired by the Kardashians, which we then will offer to them.
What influences your work?
We really like Jeff Koons and lots of pop movies too, especially 90s teen movies. For the “My Pussy my Choice” collection, we looked at loads of stage costumes, too – including Miley riding the inflatable dicks. So there are a lot of pop references.
Could you tell me more about your next collection? I can see posters from “The Craft” in your mood board.
The new collection is about how to transition from the whole gang character. The last two seasons were more about sportswear and being young and because we don’t want to become a sportswear brand we want to add new moods to our language. So it’s going to be a lot darker.
What’s been the response so far to Namilia?
It’s been love or hate basically. There’s quite a big group of young people who really relate to it especially in NYC. But there have also been quite a strong reaction from older women who have been in fashion forever; they just can’t handle it, they think it’s sexist and ask why we put a 17-year-old model in a penis bra. They don’t get that it’s a cartoon and it’s made to empower girls.
We have four stockers: two in Italy, one in the US and one more in China. And the penis bras sold out in the first week.
Emoji detailed dress
What’s your relationship like with the other brands that won the VFiles competition?
We’ve met them, Moses Gauntlett Cheng , Fengchen Wang and the others. We hang out and are very open but it’s not like we exchange ideas because we are so different.
What are your plans for the summer?
Prepping the new collection and making it bigger than ever – we need to look for funding and so on. Last March we did a presentation with Milk and now they’re officially in NYFW so it will be so much bigger than a presentation.
And what about Berlin?
For now we’re staying here but ideally we’d work in Los Angeles. We were there for six weeks already and Hollywood was very receptive. We often got requests from the stylists of people like David LaChapelle who was working with Pamela and they were like “fine then we’ll pick it up in an hour,” whereas here it would take at least a week plus shipping time; it’s just not the same. LA as a city is fun and so chilled.
Namilia is currently available for purchase at shop.namilia.com
Studio images courtesy of Will Furtado, all others courtesy of press office