- Texture will become the print
For years, international conversations about African fashion have often defaulted to print. SS27 could continue moving the conversation somewhere much more interesting: the construction of the textile itself.
Expect crochet, weaving, knotting, fringe, embroidery, raffia, openwork, beading, hand-finished surfaces and fabric manipulation to provide visual interest that might once have come primarily from a printed textile.
There is already evidence. For SS27, I A M I S I G O showed pieces incorporating fabric offcuts, crochet and intricate weaving in Copenhagen. Ahluwalia’s London collection incorporated jacquard knits, organza, embossed and debossed surfaces, and fringe.
What we predict we’ll see: woven dresses, crochet separates, heavily textured skirts, fringed hems, dimensional tops, tactile bags and garments where the technique is visible from across the room.
The result isn’t a rejection of print. It is an expansion of what African textile identity can look like.
2. Raffia will move beyond the accessory
Raffia has long appeared in African design, particularly through bags, hats and artisanal objects. For SS27, we predict designers will push it further into the garment itself.
There is a wider global signal behind this. Pre-season SS27 forecasting noted designers in Copenhagen constructing entire looks from raffia and straw, while retail data cited by Vogue showed raffia-bag sellouts increasing substantially year over year.
African designers have an opportunity to approach this material from a different position, drawing on existing craft traditions rather than treating raffia as simply another seasonal trend.
Expect: raffia skirts, sculptural bodices, exaggerated fringe, woven panels incorporated into dresses, raffia mixed with silk or cotton, oversized woven bags and dramatic natural-fibre accessories.
We also predict a move away from raffia’s predictable neutral palette. Imagine black raffia, saturated red, cobalt, deep green or multicolored weaving.
3. The silhouette gets bigger
After years of body-conscious dressing, African fashion may be ready to take up more physical space.
Ahluwalia’s SS27 collection offers an early clue. Draping expanded outward, including puffball forms and increased volume rather than simply pulling fabric tightly toward the body.
We predict this idea will continue across African designers.
Think balloon skirts, sculptural hips, enormous sleeves, exaggerated shoulders, cocoon dresses, wide trousers and skirts with architectural volume.
Importantly, oversized will not necessarily mean shapeless.
African designers are particularly well positioned to play with the tension between a defined body and dramatic volume: a fitted waist beneath a huge skirt, a sculptural shoulder above a narrow dress, or a tiny top against an exaggerated trouser.
The silhouette itself becomes the statement.
4. Sheer, but constructed
Sheer dressing isn’t disappearing.
London’s SS27 runways have already pushed lingerie dressing, transparent layers and organza back into focus. But we predict African designers will make transparency more textural and deliberate.
Instead of the ubiquitous naked dress, expect organza layered over prints, transparent skirts over structured shorts, mesh combined with crochet, sheer panels interrupted by embroidery, translucent kaftan-like shapes and layers that reveal another textile underneath.
Ahluwalia has already incorporated organza across menswear and womenswear this season.
The most interesting versions will treat transparency as a construction tool rather than simply a way to expose the body.
5. Earth tones get interrupted
Brown, sand, terracotta, cream and ochre aren’t leaving African fashion. But SS27 may make them considerably less quiet.
Ahluwalia’s current palette provides an interesting early example: creams and browns form the foundation, interrupted by red, blue and green.
Our SS27 African palette prediction:
Chocolate brown + electric blue
Sand + tomato red
Cream + emerald
Terracotta + cobalt
Black + acid green
Deep burgundy + pink
We also expect red to have a particularly strong season. It works equally well as an accent, a monochromatic statement and against the earthy palettes already prevalent in African fashion.
6. Prints will clash instead of match
African fashion certainly isn’t abandoning print. But the way print is styled could change.
One of the broader SS27 signals is “printmaxxing”: stripes against florals, multiple scales of the same motif and deliberately imperfect combinations. New York’s collections embraced print mixing, while forecasting ahead of the shows anticipated increasingly expressive pattern clashes.
For African designers, the possibilities are enormous.
Instead of a coordinated printed set, imagine two unrelated prints worn together, traditional textile references against graphic contemporary patterns, checks mixed with handwoven cloth, stripes against florals or a printed dress interrupted by an entirely different textile.
The styling looks collected rather than coordinated.
7. Tailoring loosens up
We expect suiting, but not corporate suiting.
SS27 tailoring is likely to become wider, softer and more playful. London has already shown subversive approaches to tailoring, while Ahluwalia continues to make tailoring one of the foundations of its collection.
For African designers, that could translate into oversized blazers, elongated jackets, wide-leg trousers, sleeveless suits, cropped tailoring, dramatically shaped lapels and suits cut from unexpected textiles.
And we predict more women wearing traditionally masculine silhouettes without designers feeling compelled to feminize them.
The African power suit may get bigger.
8. Craft and futurism will coexist
Perhaps the most exciting SS27 direction will be clothing that refuses the assumption that heritage has to look historical.
African designers increasingly appear interested in taking a technique with a long cultural lineage and giving it an unmistakably contemporary silhouette.
That tension is visible across the current landscape. MaXhosa’s design language has long translated cultural references through knitwear and contemporary luxury, while I A M I S I G O continues to explore weaving and material experimentation through highly distinctive forms.
For SS27, expect traditional techniques applied to asymmetric dresses, woven materials shaped into futuristic silhouettes, heritage motifs enlarged until they become almost abstract, handcrafted surfaces combined with technical fabrics and culturally specific techniques presented without nostalgia.
The point isn’t “modernizing” African craft.
The craft was never incompatible with modernity.
9. The accessory becomes enormous
If clothing is becoming more expressive, accessories cannot remain quiet.
SS27’s broader rejection of restrained styling creates room for African designers to go further with bags, jewelry, shoes and headwear. London’s collections have already treated accessories as a major source of personality.
We predict oversized woven bags, sculptural jewelry, dramatic cuffs, elongated earrings, unconventional headpieces, charms, heavily embellished footwear and bags constructed from materials normally associated with clothing.
Some accessories may border on sculpture.
And that is precisely the point.
10. Clothes will move
Fringe may be one of the clearest design details to watch.
It has already appeared prominently during SS27 in New York, and Ahluwalia incorporated fringe into tuxedo-inspired pieces and knitted mini dresses in London.
But movement has particular possibilities within African fashion.
Long fringe, tassels, loose weaving, strings of beads, feathers, fabric strips and cascading fibers transform when the wearer walks or dances.
Instead of embellishment being static, the garment performs with the body.
For spring and summer, that makes particular sense.
11. Sustainability stops looking like sustainability
Some of the most interesting sustainable African fashion won’t immediately announce itself as sustainable.
We expect more designers to work with deadstock, offcuts, reclaimed textiles, local materials and slower craft processes while allowing the finished clothing to lead with desirability rather than environmental messaging.
I A M I S I G O’s use of fabric offcuts alongside crochet and weaving for SS27 is one early example.Lagos Fashion Week itself now explicitly identifies responsible sourcing, production, circularity and artisan collaboration among the qualities it encourages in participating brands.
The next evolution of sustainable African fashion may therefore look less like a sustainability category and more like simply good African fashion.
12. African fashion becomes harder to define by sight
And perhaps that will be SS27’s biggest development.
Mowalola’s London collection exists within a provocative world of sensuality, rebellion and subculture. Ahluwalia is drawing from FESTAC ’77 while simultaneously engaging sportswear, tailoring and contemporary London. I A M I S I G O explores African material traditions without producing clothes that can be reduced to a conventional idea of “African dress.”