Kirsten Relegado
Q: Does any native and tribal Philippine fashion influence your work?
A: In the place where I grew up, in Bacolod city the City of Smiles - we have a Masquerade festival by the way. I was raised in La Castellana, a small town where bananas are very abundant. We have over 100 species of bananas growing there, so people there are really incentivized to celebrate our crop at the beginning of the world. I think it's amazing to create something from such a beautiful organic plant.
Q: What parts of the banana plant are used for the fabric?
A: We used the banana bark. We scrape out the fiber for threads, to create a costume or wardrobe. I designed a gown once for Ms. Puerto Rico when she competed for Ms. International. Our inspiration for her costume was the “Rainforest of Puerto Rico.” We used banana bark materials, abaca, and coconut husk which is also abundant in my region. She won best in national costume that year.
Q: Do you extract the fiber from the banana bark yourself in your studio? How do you work with the material?
A: We have the raw material sent to us. My mom brings over the raw materials that are cut and dried from La Castellanas to Miami. When I run out, I can try to make it here since we can also grow the banana plant here.
Q: Can you describe what it is like to work with the abaca material?
A: When you work with abaca threads and you want to bring color to it, you have to dye it more than once. It’s like a woven fabric.
Q: Is it versatile to work with? Can it be translated from casual to formal?
A: I love the fabric because the aesthetics are nice. You see the natural texture of the abaca which has a woven look to it. After it is processed, it which gives an off-white color. I’ve made a corset from this material, and I absolutely love it. You can combine it with pearls, coconut shells, and other various natural products.
Coconut shells are a bit hard to manipulate because you need a special kind of machine to cut it. I work with ready materials in my studio.
Q: Do you have any favorite native textile patterns?
A: Pina. We have new materials available in our country, but the pineapple fabric is the best for me. All you have to do is line it with silk, and it is so wearable. If you wear a Pina gown, or a man wears a Barong Tagalog, it suits a tropical climate. Pina fabric for men is similar to our tuxedo.
Q: When people see your work, what do you want them to think about?
A: A Filipino-American designer. My heritage is very important to me. I was born and raised in the Philippines. I want to incorporate our cultural values like hard work ethic, and compassion. On my travels to New York, I see my people working so hard, and I admire them even more. We have so many positive traits that mold us into a Filipino people.
Q: What is the story of how you got started designing gowns for the pageant world? Could you describe the style of the first pageant dress you designed?
A: I dressed my friends in a mock pageant when I was 6 years old. I wrapped them with blankets. I made one sided or criss cross sleeves with floor sweeping tail. I called them one by one to walk on top of the bed.
When I moved to Miami, Florida, I met the director of Miss Miami Tropic, Miss Rose Martinez, 16 years ago. She referred me to her delegates competing for Miss USA and Miss America. My very first pageant designs were featured during Miss Florida, USA, I dressed 6 delegates. The gown that made to top 15 is made of white, doped dyed chiffon materials, one sided strap, soft and flowy skirt with one sided high slit.
Q: What types of eco-friendly materials do you use?
A: I use banana bark, coconut shells, Abaca, and I reuse and recycle fabric as much as possible
Q: What are some examples of luxury materials that you use for your couture gowns?
A: Custom made embroidered and hand beaded lace with crystals, real pearls and diamonds.
Q: What is your favorite dress that you have designed so far?
A: All my dresses are my babies. there’s one very special I custom made recently for New York Times best seller author, Roshani Chokshi. She flew me to Atlanta and showed me her book cover and requested me, “Kirsten, I want to wear my book! “ ..
Q: What was your experience like designing for Druscilla Gucci? How did you decide what style direction to go in with her dress?
A: Drusilla is my good friend and like a sister to me. I was invited to have dinner with her family, We supported Charities in Miami, She walked during the finale and modeled my designs. Stefania said I like you to design a white gown for Drusilla’s 21st birthday. I showed the sketch to Stefania, I called it the Goddess gown and I used soft and flowy materials showing her shoulders. Drusilla got the same size as my mannequin. I ended up making two gowns for Drusilla.
Joey Omila
Joey is the executive director and head costume and set designer for the Philippine Performing Arts Company. He is also the Head of the Cultural Filipino American Association of Tampa, FL. He has specialized in designing native costumes and indigenous dances for over 20 years.
Q: I learned that you are originally from Bugusan, Cotabato, a southern island in Mindanao. Can you tell me more about the native clothing and jewelry of this region?
A: Bugasan, Cotabato is a very Muslim area. I have not returned to my birthplace since I was five years old. My family had the biggest coconut plantation in Bugasan. In 1954, Moros (Muslim rebels) attacked our plantation and hacked to death most of our workers including Muslims for working with Christians. My parents evacuated to the City of Cotabato during the attack and left the plantation to the Moros who till this day occupies our land.
As far as my memory can remember, Bugasan was a very rural town with probably 95% Muslim Filipinos living in harmony with Christians like us.
My mother actually opened a convenient store at the plantation so the Muslims could trade their goods (vegetable, live chickens, egss, fish, in return for food or amenities they needed in their everyday life.
It was here that I remember very clearly how the Muslims of this area were dressed so elegantly. The ladies as well as the men, wore most of the time the “malong,” which is a tubular fabric that can be wrapped around the body in many ways. But both men and women wore it like a long skirt, folded several times in the front waist to tighten the waistline so it does not fall.
The ladies would wear a long sleeves brocade fabric blouse cut like a jacket then overlapped in the front and secured by a sash fabric. I believe this type blouse is of Chinese influence. The men on the other hand would simply wear a white or colored t-shirt. Some wear a vest over the t-shirt the others wear just the vest with no t-shirt.
The ladies also wear on their head a brocade “turban” to cover their head from the sun. I believe this is of Indian influence.
As for jewelry, women normally wore beautiful handcrafted earrings and lots of bangles all made of solid 22-24 karat gold. Mindanao is know to bountiful in gold even to this day. It is believe that the more gold one wears, the higher the stature of the person within the community. When going to a local event, the women would add gold necklaces. The jewelry the Muslims wear in Mindanao are normally pure gold with other ornaments of precious stones.
Q: How does native culture most influence your work as a costume and prop designer for the Philippine Performing Arts Company?
A: I love being born in the Philippines. I was lucky to have been born in Mindanao, one of the most beautiful and intriguing island of the Philippines where more than 2 millions of our brother and sister Filipino muslims still live to this day, who, in the 15th century refused to embrace Christianity from the occupying Spaniards.
Mindanao to this day is rich in culture from all over the world. The Chinese were already trading with the people of this island way before any conquistadors came to our shores. The in the 14th century, Islam was introduced to all our islands. Then came the Spaniards in the 15th century with all their European influence in clothing, jewelry, music, art, and the Spanish culture.
Having lived in many different cities in the Philippines, I was lucky to have seen so many different tribes and cultures of my country. I have always been fascinated with everything that was around me. That when I finished high school, I enrolled in college and took up Fine Arts which covered painting, fashion and interior design.
Then joined the world-renowned Bayanihan, the Philippine National Dance Company and was exposed more to the beauty of our culture not only in our folk dances, but also of the variety of costumes we wore, the music and the props we learned from our artistic staff who were connoisseurs in the Philippine history and culture.
Q: Are there any times where you had to redesign or adapt cultural garments to be danced in? For example, do you ever have to change the material of native clothing, but keep the style?
A: Yes, definitely. Nowadays it is very difficult and very expensive to buy the real authentic materials that the natives or tribes sell. Sometimes, trading something with them is more appreciated than paying them.
So, when we can not afford authentic materials to use for my dance company, I improvise and search for something that would look similar on stage and still keep the authenticity of the dance. This is where my knowledge in fashion designing became of use.
Q: What kinds of native clothing do you absolutely enjoy working with as a choreographer?
A: I enjoy most designing costumes from Mindanao. Not only from the Muslims but also from the indigenous tribes like the “T’Boli’s,” the “Bilaans’s,” the “Bagobos and Manobos” whose costumes are believed to have originated or influence by some far away tribes of China.
Q: What role does Philippine native culture have in today’s modern fashion?
A: It plays a big role specially today. In the last 15-20 years, Philippine designers have discovered so many unique fabrics different islands in the Philippines offer. Today, every Philippine designer compete in designs using local fabrics from all over the Philippines. I have never seen this explosion of designs from the Philippines in the past or during my era in the ‘70’s.
Q: Who are some fashion designers that translate Filipino culture in a ready to wear context? Who are some that translate Filipino culture in an upscale context?
A: Top of the line is PATIS TESORO, Richard Papa, Edgar Madamba, Edgar San Diego, Alfonso “Boy” Guino-o, just to mention a few.
Q: Who are some Filipino designers, past and current, that you admire?
A: Alfonso “Boy” Guino-o for his used of native materials and jewelry from the different indigenous tribes of Mindanao.
Q: What are the factors that drive you and your artistic visions and interpretations of Filipino folk dances?
A: The beauty and uniqueness of our folk dances interwoven into different unique cultures influence by hundreds of years of occupation, legends, and myths.
Q: What advice would you give to up-and-coming Filipino designers and creatives who are striving to keep native cultural traditions alive?
A: Travel around the Philippines, meet all the different Indigenous, exotic, and tribal people and get inspired with your creations using locally made jewelry and fabrics.