Diary 001: What is archiving.fashion?

If you asked me five months ago, I'd have told you the plan is to tell cool stories about Nigerian fashion history with video essays. However, publishing my first prototype has changed my plans.

Background story

My earliest documented memory of this project is a comment I left under this YouTube video over two years ago.

The earliest record of me “writing down the vision” is my comment on Khensani Mohlatlole’s video over two years ago.

Reading the last sentence out-loud is hilarious because I only made progress and spoke to the group of young Nigerians I described in the comment in 2023.

So, what changed?

Well, I travelled. I travelled to Dakar for my birthday this year and that experience fuelled me with the needed inspiration to kickstart this project. It was my first experience travelling solely for pleasure, rather than for work or study. The details of my trip that led to my commitment to this project can wait for an in-person conversation.

A picture of me running to pose for the tour guide to take a picture in Goree Island.

And then?

I returned to Lagos after my 9-day holiday/birthday celebration. My contract at work ended in the same month, and I moved to Abuja. For the next 3 months, I had no job. So, I spent time thinking, ideating, researching and planning my prototype - a video essay on the evolution of Nigerian wedding fashion in the 2010s.

I talked to everyone I met about my plans and learned the importance of sharing. The more I spoke to people, the clearer my thinking became.

Initially, I had this grand idea of sharing my project on Instagram and TikTok. But after hitting a brick wall while researching for my first video, I started to rethink my strategy. I realized that Instagram alone wasn't the best fit – a bit of a change from my comment on Khensani's video two years ago. The reason? Instagram's search feature is pretty much non-existent. And for me, the whole point of archival work is to inspire further research. People should be able to easily find and use the information they need. If my findings are buried in a platform without a decent search function, then what's the point?

The first video essay 🥳

About three months ago, I took the plunge and published my prototype – a 30+ minute video essay. That single step was the moment I felt like archiving.fashion truly came to life. I was also super excited to receive a lot of feedback on the video. It was amazing to see people (mostly my friends 😂) engaging with my work and contributing to the direction of archiving.fashion. As exciting as that felt, it also meant I had my work cut out for me. To address some of the feedback, I did the following:

• Sound - I got a rode mic,

• Video length - I am making shorter videos in future,

• Visual - I hired an illustrator to design the thumbnail,

• Obvious script reading - I have been practising speaking to my camera,

• Research depth - I’ve been meeting with other people doing archiving work in Nigeria to build relationships for information exchange, and

• Better transitions - I’ll spend an hour on Friday brainstorming with the video editor.

But what changed about archiving.fashion’s vision?

Not a whole lot. Three months ago, my heart was set on telling Nigerian fashion stories with the depth and care they deserve through video essays. While that's still my core mission, I've realized that my research output won't always be limited to video essays. So, what's the current vision?

1. Fashion archiving: Culture and history of garments - textiles, form, and construction. 

2. Digital curation: Digital experiments to critique the past and imagine new futures for fashion storytelling.

While my research for the next two years is focused on Nigeria, my vision extends far beyond Nigeria's borders.

This image has nothing to do with the story besides being an image to divide this article into sections.

Over the next year, my priority is to improve the quality of production and explore more effective ways to share my findings. Someone asked me if there's an audience for this in Nigeria, and I firmly believe there's always an audience for knowledge. Besides, I'm not solely thinking of Nigerians as the consumers of this knowledge. To me, Nigerian history, whether it's fashion-related or not, is an integral part of global history – it's simply a matter of perspective. My research calendar for next year is packed with four exciting projects, and ambitious plans to share my findings with the world.

Why am I doing this? 🤔

I love asking questions - figuring out why things are and questioning why they aren’t different. It gives me so much joy! I’m lucky I get to do that for a living - I am a UX researcher with a research and design agency. But archiving.fashion is my passion project, where my quest for answers comes to life in a realm that's new to me – the world of fashion. While I wear clothes and try to keep up with fashion news, analysing fashion stories and images is an entirely different endeavour. That to me, is the fun of it all - the newness.

If this sounds like something you’re interested in keeping up with, subscribe on YouTube and follow on Instagram. If you’d like to collaborate with me on this, please send me an email at ibethakpan@gmail.com.