adminLovemore Meya Arts Correspondent
Chitungwiza-based fashion designer, Tarisayi Gweje, believes determination and hard work will take her to her dream fashion land. The soft-spoken 28-year-old lady is destined for greater heights judging from her works that are produced under the designer label “Chaivo Designs”.
Having studied fashion design in 2003 at Amazing House Designers, a college owned by Creed Katsande, Gweje went on to pursue the art with passion until she established her brand.
Armed with a diploma in Fashion Art in Designing and a certificate in Pattern Making from Harare Polytechnic in 2005 the designer began her journey and slowly went up the ladder of fashion success.
Her latest work was an exquisite dress she designed for artist Nancy Mteki for the official opening of her solo exhibition “Mbereko” at National Art Gallery of Zimbabwe recently.
“I can say that fashion designing was an inborn thing since I started doing it at home alone and later enrolled with colleges to fine tune my works.
“No one inspired me though I can give much credit to my parents who are tailors and I remember helping them to do one or two things,” said Gweje.
She specialises in “Avant-Garde,” a fashion design dealing with fashion art in abstract that is created from anything which is not fabric.
She also does “Haute Couture,” a fashion art made from fabric and is mainly for different functions, good for actors, performers and stage wear.
Gweje said she has never exhibited at Zimbabwe Week Fashion, but was part of Cottco Fashion Wear at the age of 17.
She also designed for Harare International Festival of the Arts show titled “Tad Show”, which she considers as one of her high achievements due to the challenging demands of the showcase.
One of the major events she partook in came in 2012 when she designed outfits for a boot camp photo shoot for contestants at the Miss Zimbabwe beauty pageant.
Gweje also dressed models at the Miss Carnival Zimbabwe, Miss Tourism Zimbabwe and was chosen to represent the country in France at the “Africa Fashion Reception”.
She says her experience in France was an eye-opener that has inspired her to work harder and make her presence on the local fashion scene felt in a big way and believes the sky is the limit..
Online Reporter