Spotlight: Sri Lanka Overview

Design Another Day

The designer community of Sri Lanka was a sprightly lot. And then the pandemic brought them down, mostly small businesses, virtually to their knees. It was tough, but now they have got going.

Long Story, Cut Short
  • Post-war, post tsunami, post-Easter Attacks, is there a ‘post-COVID' yet? The designer community gives resilience a new meaning; all it does is adapt.
  • People may forget but the designers’ supply chain were first hit by the Easter Attacks of 2019 and then the pandemic of 2020–21.
Sri Lanka has its own design community, a vibrant fashion week, and an ecosystem that keeps doing niche, cutting-edge work—almost a world apart from the mainstream industry.
A World Apart Sri Lanka has its own design community, a vibrant fashion week, and an ecosystem that keeps doing niche, cutting-edge work—almost a world apart from the mainstream industry. Colombo Fashion Week

Whenever the talk is about Sri Lanka’s textiles-apparel-fashion industry, it is apparel (for export markets) that overwhelmingly dominates the discourse. For good reason, of course.

But the country has its own design community, a vibrant fashion week, and an ecosystem that keeps doing niche, cutting-edge work—almost a world apart from the mainstream industry.

While tomes have been written about how the apparel sector withstood the COVID-19 pandemic and workers bore the brunt (all fair and fine), the design community has barely been written about.

Annika Fernando
Low Risk Operations "When we produce small numbers, our costs are also higher. We’ve been all keeping our risks low and working on smaller collections, but the consumer often doesn’t realise this process and are frustrated at higher prices. The cost of slow fashion." Annika Fernando

The Designer and the Pandemic

Paradise Road, established in 1987, was as a quaint store selling olde worde handpicked antiques and contemporary local handicrafts. PR, the concept store of the chain, started as a curation front for select designers before Annika, the elder daughter of founder Udayshanth Fernando, started her own label Maus in 2013. Fernando exudes what PR stands for: a confluence of art, design and fashion. Here, she talks about the pandemic.

Designers the world over have been severely hit by COVID-19. How are you staging a personal recovery? How badly hit were you? What did you personally do for a course correction?
Annika Fernando: I don't know if I can even view it in stages of recovery. Sri Lanka has had an additional year (2019) to ‘recover’ from and who knows where we are even now?

Our little island shines so bright in its strengths that from outside few really see the challenges businesses have faced over the years. It’s like we keep coming up for air, while we are being sucked down under at the same time. Post-war, post tsunami, post-Easter Attacks, is there a ‘post’ COVID yet?

We give resilience a new meaning; all we do is adapt.

This period of time has been challenging, but we are a small team at PR and even smaller at Maus who multitask, stepped often out of our usual roles, learned new skills and rode the wave.

Financial growth was disturbed no doubt; our goal for the hardest times was ensuring our team was supported and paid. That literally became our sole goal during the most difficult times, just keeping our designers supported, overheads covered, and staff paid with no delays. We succeeded.

Designers do not have deep pockets like big brands and manufacturers. How are you holding up at a time of constant supply chain bottlenecks and the financial crisis in Sri Lanka?
Annika Fernando: Maus is small. We have no choice but to rely more on local supply fabrics which comes with its own set of challenges due to the small market, along with huge delays in orders. We are trying to get the timing of orders right, but production for small labels is anyway challenging here. Our garment production is set up for the big numbers and local labels don’t always have easy access to this. Therefore, our design and process are often worked around what is actually possible, not the reverse. I’m currently in the middle of changing our manufacturer for Maus Swim and for Maus Organic. Local designers who work with batik for example, are struggling with fabric supply and quality dyes and increased costs.

When we produce small numbers, our costs are also higher. We’ve been all keeping our risks low and working on smaller collections, but the consumer often doesn’t realise this process and are frustrated at higher prices. The cost of slow fashion.

The poor economy means we are concerned about the dependence on the local market and hopeful that the tourist arrivals continue to increase as the exchange rates are attractive for the visitor. We are taking bigger steps to protect our savings.

Now, it’s about steering through the local challenges. We’ve definitely been relying more on local labels and #madeinsrilanka which was always the core of the business. We used to have more Indian designers in store, which with the import challenges and exchange rates is less desirable. We are playing it safer and really studying our numbers.

On which front were you adversely affected the most: raw materials, staff shortage, liquidity?
Annika Fernando: Staff shortage is hitting businesses now and most sectors. Many locals want to leave and for some reason it’s just near impossible, even with better salaries to attract staff. Many have moved on to small businesses of their own, changed course and perhaps even enjoyed more flexible hours.

Limited fabrics means I design around what we can access and with the knowledge that supply is limited. Print and packaging has been affected too, so we see prices rising and quality often dropping.

There’s an uncertainty even in numbers—suppliers may just raise prices because of demand, or because they foresee a raise in the future. Is it really because their costs have risen, we don't always know? Beggars can't be choosers.  

I think we’ve been hit by different challenges at different stages of these last few years. At the moment, it’s staff shortage and a certain level of constant uncertainty and insecurity in the future.

But look, we have been smart and managed to stay afloat and look after our team and we've grown in different ways, I’m so proud of that.

Annika Fernando
Annika Fernando
Owner
Maus

This period of time has been challenging, but we are a small team at PR and even smaller at Maus who multitask, stepped often out of our usual roles, learned new skills and rode the wave.

Colombo Fashion Week
Sustainability Week Colombo Fashion Week is a development platform with a strong sustainability DNA since 2012. Colombo Fashion Week

The Fashion Week and the Pandemic

The Colombo Fashion Week was conceived in 2003 by Ajai Vir Singh. The various companies of CFW Holdings focus on different aspects of fashion—from fashion week platforms and creative events to education-based programmes and fashion brands. The three-day fashion event this year, which kicked off on February 26, showcased 30 collections presented by emerging and prominent Sri Lankan and international designers. Here, Singh speaks of fashion week in the new normal.

Designers the world over have been hit by COVID-19 even though many events have gone phygital. According to you, how badly hit are the designers of Sri Lanka?
Ajai V Singh: The impact of stay-at-home or work-from-home is first on the importance or a reduced priority on clothes. The 9-to-5 wardrobe is rested and the post-7pm wardrobe is not used. This was a global erosion. But in Sri Lanka it was more, and it still continues. Sri Lanka is a nascent fashion market, and most fashion businesses are new. People may forget but the designers’ supply chain were first hit by the Easter Attacks of 2019 and then the pandemic of 2020–21. Sri Lankan designers had to deal with another year of crisis. Sri Lankan fashion also relies on tourist arrivals. Few new design enterprises have shut shops; we are trying to help them through funding, etc, and new outlook.

Designers do not have deep pockets like brands and manufacturers. How is the design community holding up at a time of constant supply chain bottlenecks and the financial crisis in Sri Lanka?
Ajai V Singh: It has been tough, though weddings have provided a glimmer of hope, as they have come back with a vengeance. Designers were also mentored into changing direction and adding a new line that focuses on new flexi-workwear and multipurpose homewear. We have created funding opportunities. In addition, designers were also encouraged to use locally available fabrics. CFW started the responsible fashion movement in 2017–18. We had started the process of converting all the designers into circuarity through focused programmes.

How are you positioning Colombo Fashion Week? Especially at a time when travels restrictions, quarantines, new variants are keeping everyone on tenterhooks.
Ajai V Singh: Colombo Fashion Week is a development platform with a strong sustainability DNA since 2012. CFW started in 2003—this is our 19th year. It has revived the fashion design industry since from the middle of the civil war. The pandemic started when we had introduced our unique garment evaluation tool. We continued our work on it. This tool measures the environmental and societal impact of a garment.

Last year—2021—we realised that when the world wakes up to the new normal there will be a need of sustainability-sensitive conversations and this tool would encourage just that. We continued our work to make us competitive in this way. We just announced the new season with string collaborations like UNFPA for societal-based impact and WNPS (Wildlife and Nature Protection Society), the third oldest in the world, which works with us on environmental impact issues. The fashion narrative is changing and hence fashion platforms need to adapt to include the new narratives.

Ajai V Singh
Ajai V Singh
Founder
Colombo Fashion Week

The 9-to-5 wardrobe is rested and the post-7pm wardrobe is not used. This was a global erosion. But in Sri Lanka it was more, and it still continues. Sri Lanka is a nascent fashion market, and most fashion businesses are new.

 

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  • Dated posted 7 March 2022
  • Last modified 7 March 2022