Kenneth Ize

Kenneth Ize is a Nigerian fashion designer born in Lagos on 5 October 1990. He grew up in Austria and studied fashion at the University of Applied Arts Vienna, where Bernhard Willhelm and Hussein Chalayan were among his teachers. He later developed an eponymous label centred on Nigerian textile production and close relationships with weaving communities and artisan groups.

Ize’s work gained international attention through Lagos presentations and his place as a finalist for the 2019 LVMH Prize. His collections centre on handwoven aso oke, translating narrow woven strips into tailoring, coats, shirts and gender-fluid garments with strong colour and geometric rhythm. The label has used contemporary fashion production to extend the economic and cultural life of established Nigerian craft.

In 2021 Ize became the first Black designer collaborator formally named by Karl Lagerfeld’s eponymous house. Working with Hun Kim and the brand team, he created a genderless collection released on 7 July after a pandemic delay. The project brought Ize’s woven stripes and Nigerian craft into Karl Lagerfeld tailoring and accessories, with Ize retaining clear external authorship.

Ize’s practice begins with cloth and the people who make it. His label works with Nigerian weavers and artisan groups, using established textile knowledge as the basis for new fashion production. Aso oke is especially important because its narrow loom width determines how panels meet, how stripes change direction and how a garment can be engineered from the available fabric.

Tailoring gives those textiles structure. Ize cuts handwoven cloth into jackets, coats and trousers and uses colour and stripe placement to make construction visible. The clothes move across menswear and womenswear with the directness of the textile intact, and controlled silhouettes give craft irregularity a precise frame.

His Karl Lagerfeld collaboration placed this method inside an established house. The collection used the Paris brand’s jackets, shirts and accessories as a framework for Ize’s weaving and colour. Credit remained with both sides of the project, making the capsule a meeting of distinct design practices with identifiable material authorship.