Fashionistas Enhancing Nigeria’s Economy Using Decent Modeling

Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt

A fast-growing fashion world, The Nook International Fashion Weekend, has re-strategies to contribute to the growth of the nation’s economy.
The Nook International is a multi-day branded fashion environment providing activities and opportunities for fashion designers, models and sponsors to come face to face with principal tastemakers, celebrities, the media and consumers.
The fashion group also strives to elevate the fashion scene in Nigeria to become more relevant and influential in the fashion world. The group shifted focus from modelling being synonymous with indecency to decent fashion.

The 2023 Nook International Fashion exhibition and modelling held in Port Harcourt at the weekend attracted designers from Nigeria and abroad. The exhibited designs, which met international standards at the event, had fashion designers from Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria, and others.
Speaking to THISDAY at the event, the convener, Dame Ochuko Momoh, said the goal was to redefine fashion by promoting decency in dressing and also using the NOOK brand to bring together all well-meaning fashion enthusiasts to an annual or bi-annual fashion event through advocacy, partnerships, promotions, sponsorships and training of fashion entrepreneurs.

Dame Momoh noted that the fashion industry is a growing community of innovative designers and a major area of apparent talent that paves the path for newness. She said through the programme, lives have been elevated, adding that the fashion industry is contributing to the economy’s growth.
Momoh who revealed that Nook International Fashion is two years old, disclosed that it has touched so many lives by providing scholarships to some youths to further their studies in the university, pulling out the young people from a negative lifestyle to industrious and fulfilled life.

The fashionista said, “We decided to come up with a Nook International Weekend Fashion Show to be able to give back to society. Like you were here with those two models, which we also did last year and out of the crowd, we’ve been able to get people that donated about a million. Now because of what we have seen, we decided that we will train the models. We need to go a bit further to train the models, and among the crowd, the people volunteered to train them for free. So it is looking like we are going to go into a modelling school so that the models will work better.

Momoh explained that at the end of today, “we are aiming to be at the international level with the youngsters, and you can see that they have dreams, and like we said, when you speak to them because they lack good education, they can’t speak properly. So the main reason for us is to give back, and this is the only way we can give back to society.”

She added that the event was “our second edition” which started last year, stressing her love for fashion and attributing it to divine inspiration.
“I won’t say it was my idea, I heard from the Holy Spirit, and when I obeyed, it started revealing as we went along. So this year, what we did, we had a fashion summit where we brought people that have been designers that have been in the industry to come and speak to them, to come and teach them how to do their bookkeeping, how to take a loan from the bank,” Momoh pointed out.

She brought a creative person who taught “them how to create their design, not copy other people’s designs.
“But for us,” said Momoh, “they said we are the first fashion house that has a summit outside fashion contest that is calling the designers together to see what they did wrong and how they can do it better.”
“The fashion industry helps the economy a lot in the sense that when it comes to materials, it comes to labour, it comes to machines,” the fashionista state. “So widely it affects the economy is not just about wearing a dress and coming to run on the runway. You buy fabrics; you are patronizing the fabric industry. You have models that you have to pay. You are helping the youths.”

Another thing she mentioned is “bringing decency into the fashion world.
“Because I am of the philosophy that believes that you do not have to be naked to look beautiful. You don’t come on my runway and expose your body, is not allowed,” she said. “So our theme is “Bringing Decency into the Fashion Industry.”
Barbara Manuel, co-conveners of Nook International Fashion Weekend, said they have given out scholarships to some youths, fully impacting the lives of over 20 youths who are contributing meaningfully to the country’s economy.
“We have been able to elevate them by giving out scholarships and funding for the youths and see how we can assist them. We gave out scholarships to some of them for their Master’s programme in any of the universities in the country,” Manuel explained.
She added, “For the past two years, we have touched about 20 youths. We turn their lives around for the better. Apart from the male phase and the women phase, we have been able to impact their lives.”