Thebe Magugu’s New Dresses Pay Homage to Eight South African Tribes

Growing up in the South African cities of Kimberley and Johannesburg, designer Thebe Magugu was exposed to a variety of African tribes and traditions from a young age. The diverse beauty of his country has always informed his design work. “I’m always focusing on stories that are quite niche, but run the risk of being forgotten,” Magugu says. For his latest project, Magugu wanted to continue this spirit by creating a dress inspired by each of South Africa’s eight prominent tribes: Zulu, Tswana, Swati, Vhavenda, Pedi, Xhosa, Tsonga, and Sotho. “I wanted to memorialize the main eight cultures that we have here in South Africa because I so deeply appreciate my own,” says Magugu, who is of the Tswana tribe. “We’re best known for our storytelling and our handwork, but all the other cultures have their own traditions and quirks that I really wanted to represent in a dress.”

The designer collaborated with the South African illustrator Phathu Nembilwi to capture each tribe as a design. “I asked her to paint her own interpretation of the eight tribes in a beautiful, abstract way,” Magugu says. Nembilwi’s illustrations were then printed onto crepe fabric and constructed into “bohemian-style dresses with open necklines,” Magugu says. “It’s a proportion that looks good on everyone. I wanted anyone who sees that dress to be able to see themselves in it.”

Although each dress in the collection—which will be available in early June on Magugu’s website and select retailers—is graphic and summery, Magugu wanted each to have its own individual flair. The Tswana-inspired dress, for instance, depicts two subjects beating on a drum that they made, a nod to the tribe’s tradition of beadwork and handiwork. For the Soto tribe, Magugu incorporated their traditional dress onto the garment. “They wear a very specific hat that’s in a triangular shape, and they’re often clothed with these really big wool blankets around them, so you can see it in the artwork,” Magugu says.