Showing off agency: Africa Fashion exhibit in Montreal goes beyond the seams

For Montreal designer Angy Foly, dressing women in her glossy and colourful boubous, a popular West African robe, is her way of instilling confidence in others and of staying connected to the Ivorian women who came before her.

"It helps to keep something from your past and not lose your identity," she said. "To blend it with something new and something maybe more adapted to this generation."

The 25-year-old is one of six Montreal designers who got to present her pieces at a fashion show on the opening night of the Africa Fashion exhibition at the McCord Stewart Museum Thursday. 

The Montreal museum is the only Canadian stop for the touring exhibition, where African tradition and innovation are stitched together, as pieces by fashion pioneers from the 20th century share space with those that have graced runways in the new millennium.

"I recognized myself in some of the designers," said Foly, adding that she hopes the exhibition will leave a mark on Montrealers.

"To understand the heart of someone, you need to understand the story behind that heart," she said.

Christine Checinska, from London's Victoria & Albert Museum, is the lead curator behind the exhibition which will be on show at the McCord until February 2026. 

"The story that this exhibition wants to tell is a story of agency, abundance and unbounded creativity across the African continent," said Checinska, a former designer herself.

Featuring the work of 45 designers, it places an emphasis on today's creators, which is significant given that some still struggle for more exposure at the North American level, according to Arlette Éhode. She's the director of philanthropy at the Montreal Afro-Canadian Cultural Centre (CCAM), which partnered with the McCord Museum to stage Thursday's fashion show.

"Everything happens through the internet and word-of-mouth," she said, referring to sales. "With an exhibition that puts African creatives at the forefront, it helps create a link with the diaspora that's here."

It also allows people who aren't of African descent to familiarize themselves with fashion that goes beyond folklore, reaching into high fashion and, of course, everyday casual wear, she added.

Agency is a key theme woven throughout the exhibition. Seventeen African countries achieved their independence in 1960, henceforth known as the Year of Africa. 

It's also the year Shade Thomas-Fahm came on the scene as Nigeria's first fashion designer with the opening of her boutique Maison Shade. It quickly became a place where on-the-go women, as Checinska describes them, could access the convenience of western designs all while representing their Nigerian pride and heritage.

"There was a sense where young people … wanted to show themselves as cosmopolitan, as independent, as people with style, you know, with money, with means to show off new fashions and homegrown fashions," said Checinska.