Raised in the Peruvian Andes, Fernanda spent her childhood immersed in the magical dualism of the Inca culture. In those early years in the jungle of Peru, Fernanda explored color, the natural dyeing processes, textures and the handmade weaving textiles made by the indigenous people who inherited the ancient Inca techniques.
Then in 2016 Fernanda went off to New York. She left Cusco, Peru to study at Parsons School of Design at the New School after finishing her Law and Political Science Degree in New York City.
New York City was another world. People commuted on trains not looking each other in the eye. The streets had a fast beating pulse she had never felt. It pushed her forward, and off the soles of her feet, which she liked. But it hurt her to absorb the suffering of the men and women leaned up against the buildings, sitting all day in the sunshine of SoHo as she went to school each day.
Still, she took her classes. She studied and tried to keep her senses from roaming too far out of reach until one day during her first semester she suddenly had an epiphany:
“What if,” she thought, “I could transform into yarn and plain fabrics those natural fibers such as vicuña and alpaca that are so abundant in the Andes and the biggest source of livestock supported by the brave herder’s wives of Peru by using the highest quality of Italian craftsmanship?
“And, what if,” she continued, “I could somehow create a woman whose values of strength and warmth and beauty – the very traits I was raised to respect and embody from my mother – what if through my own decisions in cuts, patterns, colors and textiles I could share with a woman my feeling of Peru so the strength of a Peruvian woman embodies her when she wears my garments?”
This idea struck Fernanda during her Textile Materials class. The professor was discussing the vicuña, a camelid animal she knew very well, and like a lighting bolt the idea came.
And right then, she grabbed her bag and walked out of class.
Fernanda left Parsons and went off to Northern Italy. For the next four years, she traveled to and fro factory towns where fathers and sons across the Piedmont region, in the tiniest, most discreet little nests hidden beneath the Alps, and with sometimes only a handful of mills per factory were the epicenter for bottegas and garments from the most recognized fashion brands in the world.
The whole experience was enlightening. It showed Fernanda that the world of fashion – that’s to say, the distance between the herd animal and the experts who industrialize its fiber – was far smaller than she realized. And what’s more, connecting with those unsung master-craftsmen who actualized such designs by Loro Piana and Celine were really just simple father and son folk – the kind of warm Italian souls who would stop their work at any moment, at any hour, just to sip an espresso with a friendly face, and to laugh, always laugh and enjoy the good life they lead where meaning is found in the making of beautiful things.
It was through all of this that Fernanda’s latest collection was born. A collection that blends her Peruvian heritage with her selection of the finest fibers and textures. Together with her admiration for Paul Gauguin, whose most colorful depiction of Tahiti found in his painting “La Semilla de Areoi,” reminded Fernanda of her early years living in Quillabamba – a hidden village in the Amazon – during a stage in her artistic development when she grew a strong relationship with nature.
After finishing her collection Fernanda spent a lot of time questioning how she would share it with the world.
“I am a humble, a very complex woman from the Andes,” Fernanda thought, “and maybe my story is not the usual story of a fashion designer . . . I can’t, not even this second, understand why I love Fashion. Fashion doesn’t even exist in the Amazon. But it did for me. It took me time to understand that through clothes I am able to tell a story. Maybe my mother’s story? My grandmother’s? Maybe an unknown woman’s story that has been in my head since I was born? Whatever is the reason, with fashion I find the power to communicate without words but clothes.
“That’s because fashion is a unique form of art that embodies aesthetics, roots, culture, progress and strength. It does not tell you what to think. Nor does it expect one’s interpretation to be the same way either. It is just a feeling. A personal experience one has when stepping down into the street on a cold night with a pair of pants that fit exactly the way you want and in a way that makes you feel ‘that thing,’ whatever it is. I have defined my version of ‘that thing’ that is inside me. And so, for this collection I have done my job.”
Raised in the Peruvian Andes, Fernanda spent her childhood immersed in the magical dualism of the Inca culture. In those early years in the jungle of Peru, Fernanda explored color, the natural dyeing processes, textures and the handmade weaving textiles made by the indigenous people who inherited the ancient Inca techniques.
Then in 2016 Fernanda went off to New York. She left Cusco, Peru to study at Parsons School of Design at the New School after finishing her Law and Political Science Degree in New York City.
New York City was another world. People commuted on trains not looking each other in the eye. The streets had a fast beating pulse she had never felt. It pushed her forward, and off the soles of her feet, which she liked. But it hurt her to absorb the suffering of the men and women leaned up against the buildings, sitting all day in the sunshine of SoHo as she went to school each day.
Still, she took her classes. She studied and tried to keep her senses from roaming too far out of reach until one day during her first semester she suddenly had an epiphany:
“What if,” she thought, “I could transform into yarn and plain fabrics those natural fibers such as vicuña and alpaca that are so abundant in the Andes and the biggest source of livestock supported by the brave herder’s wives of Peru by using the highest quality of Italian craftsmanship?
“And, what if,” she continued, “I could somehow create a woman whose values of strength and warmth and beauty – the very traits I was raised to respect and embody from my mother – what if through my own decisions in cuts, patterns, colors and textiles I could share with a woman my feeling of Peru so the strength of a Peruvian woman embodies her when she wears my garments?”
This idea struck Fernanda during her Textile Materials class. The professor was discussing the vicuña, a camelid animal she knew very well, and like a lighting bolt the idea came.
And right then, she grabbed her bag and walked out of class.
Fernanda left Parsons and went off to Northern Italy. For the next four years, she traveled to and fro factory towns where fathers and sons across the Piedmont region, in the tiniest, most discreet little nests hidden beneath the Alps, and with sometimes only a handful of mills per factory were the epicenter for bottegas and garments from the most recognized fashion brands in the world.
The whole experience was enlightening. It showed Fernanda that the world of fashion – that’s to say, the distance between the herd animal and the experts who industrialize its fiber – was far smaller than she realized. And what’s more, connecting with those unsung master-craftsmen who actualized such designs by Loro Piana and Celine were really just simple father and son folk – the kind of warm Italian souls who would stop their work at any moment, at any hour, just to sip an espresso with a friendly face, and to laugh, always laugh and enjoy the good life they lead where meaning is found in the making of beautiful things.
It was through all of this that Fernanda’s latest collection was born. A collection that blends her Peruvian heritage with her selection of the finest fibers and textures. Together with her admiration for Paul Gauguin, whose most colorful depiction of Tahiti found in his painting “La Semilla de Areoi,” reminded Fernanda of her early years living in Quillabamba – a hidden village in the Amazon – during a stage in her artistic development when she grew a strong relationship with nature.
After finishing her collection Fernanda spent a lot of time questioning how she would share it with the world.
“I am a humble, a very complex woman from the Andes,” Fernanda thought, “and maybe my story is not the usual story of a fashion designer . . . I can’t, not even this second, understand why I love Fashion. Fashion doesn’t even exist in the Amazon. But it did for me. It took me time to understand that through clothes I am able to tell a story. Maybe my mother’s story? My grandmother’s? Maybe an unknown woman’s story that has been in my head since I was born? Whatever is the reason, with fashion I find the power to communicate without words but clothes.
“That’s because fashion is a unique form of art that embodies aesthetics, roots, culture, progress and strength. It does not tell you what to think. Nor does it expect one’s interpretation to be the same way either. It is just a feeling. A personal experience one has when stepping down into the street on a cold night with a pair of pants that fit exactly the way you want and in a way that makes you feel ‘that thing,’ whatever it is. I have defined my version of ‘that thing’ that is inside me. And so, for this collection I have done my job.”