Pigeonholed in Threaded

In a pigeonhole in Threaded Issue XI

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Part of an international tribe

How as a nation do we build a sense of belonging? New Zealand’s hosting of the Rugby World Cup in 2011 has been thought-provoking for textile designer Margaret Lewis, stimulating her thinking around tribalism, gangs and that tricky notion of belonging.

One of her garments ‘Wanna be in my gang?’ shown in the Colonial Collection section of Style Pasifika (international showcase of fashion and culture) is an exploration of belonging to a time, place and society. This idea made her think further about all of the people who have travelled to New Zealand, now home to over 163 first languages. Lewis acknowledges that people have sailed, motored and flown – ending up here by mistake or intention and may not have too many options about going back to where they came from. Are they pakeha [different] or could they be tangatawhenua [people of the land]?

Wanna be in my gang? offers a Kiwi way of belonging and a tribe that anyone can belong to. It is interpreted in 20 different languages on the garment’s front with the tribe’s name on the back: Ngati Aotearoa.

Wanna be in my gang? fits perfectly with how Lewis’s design methodology, using found fabrics and handcrafted approaches [knitting, crochet, embroidery, tapestry], creates a style where craft meets couture. The craftwork is done by hand using skills that she should have learned from her nana (if at the time she had thought to listen, she says). Much of what she does now is learned from books and people of her nana’s generation who, she says, are “so generous with sharing their learning”.

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