Palesa Mokubung
Tribute
We should pause for a moment to acknowledge how South Africa's Palesa Mokubung designs fashion collections with the same attention to detail she brings to shaping her child's character. Outside of her Mantsho label and iconic collaborations, we honour the lessons on what makes the heart beautiful that happens at beauty salons and at home, the design inspiration drawn from both global trends and family experiences, and how she has made her child's development her most important design project.
Profile
Palesa Mokubung is a renowned fashion designer, celebrated for founding the Mantsho Label in 2004. Her career commenced in 2000 as an in-house designer at the local fashion brand Stoned Cherrie. After three years, she departed to participate in the S’camto Groundbreakers design competition, which she won, leading to international exposure in New York and Mumbai. Mantsho, meaning ‘black is beautiful’ in Sesotho, has since graced runways globally, including in Greece, India, the USA, Jamaica, Nigeria, Botswana, and Senegal. In 2019, Palesa made history as the first African designer to collaborate with the Swedish fashion company H&M, creating a collection that showcased her distinctive African-inspired designs to a global audience. Her accolades include nominations for the South African Art and Culture Award in 2011 and the Mercedes-Benz Award for South African Art and Culture in 2009. She also secured victories at the 73rd Annual Fashion Forward International Thessaloniki Show in Greece and received the Fashion and Innovation Award at the Mbokoko Women in the Arts Awards in 2014. Palesa is a mother of one child.