The idea of getting seven local fashion brand owners in a single photo shoot was challenging; ambitious, to even begin with. Yet, they all arrived bright and early at the newly revamped Semua House, armed with fresh pastries, enough coffee to power a grid, and piles of clothes from their respective brands. Having a stylist on set is redundant when you have a room full of fashion-savvy ladies—we instantly knew it was one of, if not the best, depiction of “better together”.
It seemed like a hectic morning for these ladies, but it was, in fact, just another regular day. Petit Moi co-founder Iman Kamarudin reached for her second cup of coffee as she picked up what seemed like a never-ending stream of phone calls, while Gempikat’s Dahlia Nadirah excused herself for
an unplanned conference call with a supplier in China. “Do I ever feel like giving up? Always. Every day,” to which everyone in the room nodded in agreement.
ON CHALLENGES
Challenges come in various forms for fashion businesses, but support comes in one. As Hanya co-founder Veen Dee Tan puts it, having a community is a way to pool resources without conflicting with each other’s interests. While the local fashion scene is still in its infancy, the common goal is to grow collectively as well as sustainably. From striving to stay relevant alongside fleeting trends to getting the right packaging, running a business is a steep learning curve.
“They are our peers, friends, and also customers at this point,” said Jaja Anuar, the other co-founder of Hanya. As an entrepreneur in an ephemeral sector, witnessing the scene’s growth with an increasing number of up-and-coming local brands is bittersweet. Mimpikita co-founder Amirah (known affectionately as Mira), confessed that even for someone who has been in the industry for more than a decade, she feels the constant pressure to be in peak form and that having a supportive community with these peers is, perhaps, one of the many reasons why the brand and the people behind these labels chose to retain and strive.
Local businesses had it the worst and were put at stake following the global pandemic. Many have unfortunately left, but even for those who remained, it’s a rough sail nevertheless. “Let’s just say, not all bosses want to be a boss,” Nelissa Hilman said after a brief pause. It takes courage for an entrepreneur to recognise and acknowledge their weakness and for Nelissa, managing a business, especially with human resources, is her Achilles heel—worse when the pandemic aggravated the situation. As she struggled with not just the decline in retail sales but also her postpartum blues, the thought of giving up surfaced. “We started a group chat post-COVID and met up often to check in with each other, for work and also personal matters.”
It’s not hard to see how this “peers-turned-friends” relationship came alive with their overlapping life experiences, not just as female entrepreneurs but also as mothers. “I tend to turn to my peers,” Veen Dee said, explaining that as a leader, they’d try to refrain from adding weight onto their team members’ shoulders. Boss or not, the feeling of having healthy grown-up friendships is universal. “It doesn’t even have to be a light-bulb moment, it could just be a simple, ‘Everything will be alright’,” Dahlia agreed.
“Or a, ‘Just stay in the car!’ when you tell them you don’t want to go to work,” Veen Dee laughed. “It’s nice to have someone who recognises your struggles. Instead of asking you to get over it, they reassure you that it’s alright to feel this way; to feel vulnerable.”
ON BEING “RIVALS”
“Businesses are rivals” seems like an obsolete statement among this group. It’s especially evident when they start grooving along as the music plays, dancing together in between shoots, and chatting about things as superficial as recent TikTok trends to deeper topics like business hiccups and matters deemed sensitive like pricing. “We’ve known each other for so long and we see each other very often, hence sharing our ups and downs comes very naturally to us,” Jaja shared, reassuring us that while healthy competition is inevitable, she perceives it as motivation to propel her in the industry.
From a business perspective, we’ve witnessed sufficient real-life examples to acknowledge the fact that competition is, to a certain extent, the catalyst to healthy growth, while peers keep each other on track. “I think the ladies in this room are confident enough to know this,” Dahlia said. With age and experience comes maturity that sees past the competition, or better, stand shoulder to shoulder with. “The
best part of this relationship is that they know me and my brands so well that they would come together to brainstorm for my businesses. Some of us went to Seoul recently, and when they saw something interesting, they would turn to me excitedly, saying that I could try it too because ‘it fits my brand’,” she trumpeted as she changed into her second look, a crisp white sundress from Hanya.
“I’ve always been told how much of a dog-eat-dog industry it was for a local fashion brand to thrive, but when they welcomed me, a novice back then, I was genuinely grateful,” Iman chuckled, insisting that a community like that would elevate the industry as a whole and encourage more newcomers. “From a consumer perspective though, I wouldn’t view us as rivals. See, we have our respective traits that are instantly recognisable. I’d rather enjoy the diversity I could’ve harvested from these offerings,” she added.
This brings us to collaboration—a format vastly adopted by many fashion brands, not just locally but also globally amongst the big players. “Collaboration is a healthy relationship. It’s a joint effort not just for businesses to exchange knowledge and skills, producing something out of our comfort zone, but also an opportunity to reach out to more potential audiences,” Mira delineated precisely. Millennials are collaborative, and I think we fit the stereotype,” Veen Dee quipped as the other ladies chimed in with their respective thoughts on collaborative projects they had in mind. Birds of a feather truly flock together, and it’s evident when everyone in the room replied in unison that they want to draw a bigger picture, creating a physical platform for local brands to come together as one. Whether a carnival-like fest or a permanent setup, they wanted a version of “Hannam Dong”—a vibrant shopping neighbourhood lined with global but mostly local brands that champion in visual merchandising.
When asked if cannibalism would be a concern if the vision is visualised, Veen Dee phrased it beautifully: “The cake is big enough for everyone.”
Photography: Amani Azlin
Hair and Makeup: Nicole Ng, Wanning Ler, Rachel Diong
Photography Assistant: Azuan
Location: Semua House