Cheap Chic
Cheap Chic is a continuation of a street photography project I started in early 2022 that documented the fake designer fashion brands being sold in Namibia’s Chinatown. I shot that project using a cheap Chinese digital camera from the early 1990s, to keep with the theme.
I always find it amazing how Namibians make knockoffs look good with their styling. Sadly, there seems to be a hunger to wear fake European designer goods made in China; it appears to be seen as a sign of sophistication and elegance. And sometimes you’ll even notice a clash of culture, with a fake Chanel broach adorning a traditional Namibian outfit or Herero hat, or an African fabric dress with a ‘Gucci’ belt.
For this second series, I decided to approach the Cheap Chic concept as a conceptual fashion shoot with an up-and-coming Namibian model named Ndamona Nakalemo.
To start with, I purchased fake designer accessories from Chinatown and explored their use within traditional African settings, as well as locations recognisable from modern African cities, such as corrugated iron shacks.
I then took the theme further by using traditional and antique African jewellery and accessories, such as East African bangles, a Nigerian Chief’s necklace made from a wild animal’s vertebra, hand woven straw hats & bags and, of course, colourful fabric dresses. I juxtaposed these against a modern setting to show that African jewellery and accessories do not look cheap. On the contrary, they are classy and elegant.
I shot this series on black & white and colour film using a Hasselblad, Mamiya and Leica to keep that classic time-honoured fashion feeling.
It’s time that African accessories, jewellery and crafts took their rightful place as global icons of beauty, not to be looked down upon as touristy or old fashioned, but to be held in the same regard as their European counterparts.
