UMAKOTI Royal Bride, a clothing label by Nkanyeziyethu “Nka” Malunga and Nomakhosazana “Zana” Ncube, is going head to head with American labels as the pair known as “Nkazana” attempt to invade the United States’ market.
A month back Nkazana hosted a successful exhibition at the National Arts Gallery where they showcased hand sewn clothes made out of cow and sheep hides.
“The success of our exhibition gave us motivation to push our work forward. We are taking our work to the United States of America because we think our design can compete with other designs from America,” said Malunga.
They realised that America has a lot of African American big-bodied women — the label’s main target.
“We are celebrating fashion from a cultural perspective and we are fighting against body shamming. America has a large population of women with big bodies and a lot of cases of body shaming and our aim is to grow the fight against it and making big women feel good as they model in our designs while they get attention and praise from the crowd.
“We are different from all other fashion designers where only women of a certain body shape get to be chosen,” she added.



