There is a firm belief that if something looks the same and comes from the same place, it is most likely the same.
Taste one fish and you have tasted them all.
Similar to the horror stories clients will tell you about their previous designer…
First of all, you do not own a designer and secondly, everything is circumstantial. There is a huge difference between lobster and prawn and you would have to have tasted both to make the distinction.
I recently had lobster for the very first time. Before that I had assumed it would taste similar to other shellfish. I mean it’s ‘fishy’, after all.
I was wrong.
There is something about lobster that made me feel the same way I feel when I see or wear the colour red. The same way I feel about drinking a Martini Bianco… Lobster is elegant and rich.
This may be a strange way to describe it, but it is. Sort of like the designer you have never really had the opportunity to work with but will not risk it because ‘word on the street’ has it that Namibian designers are crap.
In all honesty, I do not know why we should do better… Why should we spend tireless hours on garments that are worth more than our clients are willing to pay?
I cannot stress this enough – you get what you pay for.
This is not West Africa where you can have a garment done in three hours –- with treads and bubbled seams, and this is not China where cheap labour has been perfected so you can pick up your dress in three days.
This is Namibia where fabric is limited, good designers are under-valued and over-worked, where fashion is loved yet there is no love for the person who made it. Where likes and follows depend on your circle or the depth of your pockets, where reaping depends on where you sow and how deep you sow. Where nothing grows – not because there is no potential, but because no one cares.
To them, you are not a lobster.
I don’t blame Namibians for this mentality. Everything we know is based on education or experience. Namibians are not truly educated or experienced in the fashion business and those who are have a lot of ground to cover.
If you intend to stick around these parts of the waters, you better be ready to rough it out. That is what makes you a lobster. You have to develop a shell so hard that it will protect what you have inside – your creativity, your value and your will to be great.
Otherwise you prove them right, you are just another fish in the sea. We have yet to teach Namibians to equate good taste and quality to its true value.
Namibians like brands and will Instagram shop all day. If most Namibian fashionistas will never pay the real price for international designer brands like Hermes or Prada, when will they ever pay fairly for a Namibian brand?
Personally, I like quality and I know the number of times I’ve had to cover my eyes and simply swipe my card to pay for something way outside of my budget… But I would do it again because I still own all those items years later. So if you ask me, I’ll have the lobster, please. Any day.
– leah@lmlamode.com.na;
@LMLAMODE on
Twitter and Instagram; lmlamodestyle.com
