When seeking insight into the history of South Africa, there are a number of avenues — the extensive biographies, the legion of famed activists and, if you lean a little on the lazy side, a plethora of heated manosphere podcasts that have their version of events.
However, thread by thread, Thebe Magugu has sewn the tale of our country, one collection after another. The designer's main works are themed around academia, taking on a subject and using fashion as a textbook that unravels the ups and downs of what makes South Africa tick.
Magugu paid homage to women spies in his spring/summer 2021 Counter Intelligence collection that featured fingerprints from Olivia Anne-Marie Forsyth turned into a textile.
He also tackled corruption in “Doublethink” when reimagining the whistle-blowers who fight it as cowboys. But while previous capsule collections have explored the concept of extracurriculars, the school of Thebe Magugu had never gone out of the playground and on to the sports pitch.
So for those not versed in Magugu's work, it came as a surprise that he was tapped to tell the story of Orlando Pirates when designing their new kit. A surprise some expressed with heated Tweets and Facebook comments that mocked the young designer.
“It's the shock of the new,” he says, “which I have always understood. I am confident in the jersey and so were my partners Adidas and Orlando Pirates, and if you look at the opinions now, I have received a number of apologies because the fans are seeing it more and more in real life.”
Magugu's work is often a window into the experiences of the matriarchs in his family — but this collaboration took a peek into the men in his life.
“My dad and uncles used to watch Orlando Pirates matches because they are diehard fans, and to see the camaraderie and unification of people who otherwise have opposing views of the world shows what a powerful ability sport has to build communities — it's been a point of interest for me ever since.”
Other than falling in love with the football club's history that found its defiance in apartheid, Magugu has often found solace in sport. In a recent conversation, he shared his love for quad-biking — an escape that allowed him to take a break from his crazy world of Paris Fashion Week and rubbing shoulders with Anna Wintour. But, ultimately, it was built as something he would not commodify on social media or in designs.
This has extended into a deeper interest in keeping fit and transitioning from couture to crunches.
“It's quite critical to me. I face immense pressure every day and need to have my body and physical health in check to act as the first barrier to worldly stresses. I am not in the gym to look a certain way but just to deal with the severity of pressures on my physical and mental health,” he told the Sunday Times.
It's the same serenity that drove him to create yet another series of artworks inspired by nine cultures in South Africa to celebrate heritage. Titled Thebe’s Mother and Child he worked with garments hung on raw oak to capture the histories of people so that they are not forgotten. The work features a series of essays written by top cultural and nursing professors and lecturers at Unisa to preserve the cultures in cloth and in text.
“This is just the beginning — it's nine cultures that will extend to other cultures until hopefully one day I have captured cultures both known and unknown as an overarching, lifetime body of work.”
The artworks come with his and her shirts which will be made available this Wednesday.
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