The sophisticated sensuality of the 90s, intertwined with layers of nude, black, and sometimes vibrantly colored mesh. This is the essence of Nensi Dojaka and her eponymous brand.
Nensi Dojaka is an Albanian-born designer who completed her master's degree in fashion design at Central Saint Martins in 2019 – a couple of years before Maxime Black and Charlie Constantinou. Following this, her designs were quickly picked up by SSENSE.com, and she was selected for talent incubator Fashion East, in London. The incubator has helped platform and grow some of the biggest names to come out of the British fashion scene, including JW Anderson, Martine Rose, Craig Green, and more. She produced three collections at Fashion East, and won the revered LVMH prize in 2021. Her brand has been called “one of the most talked about” in London Fashion week by Vogue.
Why do Nensi Dojaka’s designs provoke such a strong reaction? Is it their unbridled, wild sexuality? Is it that they are unashamedly exploring feminine desire in a way that speaks to women?
In many aspects of art, including fashion, female sexuality is seen as something dangerous. Advertisements use the idea of a good girl gone bad to make the audience indulge in a perfume that oozes sex appeal. It’s understood that a woman who uses her sexual power to her advantage is intimidating, almost scary. She triggers a strong response: her confidence is loved or hated by others. What many don’t see about a woman like this is that this power is molded by years of sensitivity and emotion - how else can one manipulate others if they don’t understand and empathize with them? That is the Nensi Dojaka woman. She has a softer, more delicate side that has been ripped to shreds. And rather than mourning this aspect of herself, the Dojaka woman proves that sensibility, even when it has been abused by others, is a strength.
It can be seen in the specific materials and design choices Dojaka uses for her brand. The typical lace that would be used for lingerie and dresses inspired by intimacy is replaced by mesh typically in black or nude colors. The mesh is contrasted with more glamorous materials such as silk satin, to create a balance of fresh opulence. Fresh opulence is opulence that is more light, not as heavy, more easy on the eyes. If typical opulence is Dolce and Gabbana in fashion or the Baroque movement in art, then Nensi Dojaka’s fresh opulence is like surrealism in art, where things are not quite as they seem at the first glance.
Dojaka also uses recurring visual motifs to explore the power of the female body. She combines the organic lines of the body with geometric shapes that are usually seen in underwear so they can enhance one another to create one of a kind evening dresses and gowns. In doing so, she has created a specific brand language that makes her ideas instantly recogniseable. This allows her to play with new ideas that reflect the general mood and atmosphere of the times we are living in. An example of this can be seen in her collection after the pandemic, in which she played with rouge shades such as baby pinks and darker, more intense pinks that explored the need for fun and playfulness in fashion.
Her approach also relies heavily on contrasts and layering. Much of her work features a technique of layering translucent fabrics atop each other to create an interplay of light and shadow. In other cases, her work contrasts these translucent fabrics with deliberately opaque and heavy-seeming ones. Her constructions are often asymmetric and seem inspired by the deconstructive tendencies of the Antwerp Six.
Interestingly, the brand does not seem to put in too much effort into curating a visual identity or in world-building. Perhaps this is where the hesitation to install Nensi Dojaka as the creative director for Blumarine came from, as she was rumored to have been in the running for the position. Her “lookbooks” for most years are simply images taken from the runway presentations. The ones that aren’t are just set against simple white or beige background. Of course, this is an aesthetic choice in-and-of itself. The brand’s Instagram, similarly, doesn’t seem to feature many campaigns, as such. Where the brand excels, however, is in dressing relevant people. Vittoria Ceretti, Alexa Chung, Bella Hadid, Gigi Hadid, Zendaya, Anya Taylor Joy, Emily Ratajkowski, Irina Shayk, Kylie Jenner, Madison Beer. How many indie brands can boast that kind of clientele? The association with so many famous faces makes her brand always in-demand.
Nensi Dojaka has incredible potential to impact the way we see the female body in fashion - she focuses on body positivity in her runways by using a range of body types - and the strength of female sexuality.
