Oumou Sy

Oumou Sy ( born 1952 in Podor, Senegal ) is a Senegalese fashion designer. She now lives in Dakar.

Oumou Sy is one of the most important personalities in the world of African fashion and is sometimes called " Lagerfeld Africa " or referred to as Senegal 's Queen of Couture. She became famous first by the creation of a school for fashion design in Dakar in the early 1980s. Today the brand Oumou is a small empire of fashion, art, theater and film projects and hangout. Her collections were shown on the big fashion shows in Europe, Asia, Africa and the USA; it also has its own stores in Geneva and Paris. On several film festivals, she won awards for her film costumes; they also designed the wardrobe for the Senegalese singer Baaba Maal and Youssou N'Dour. Oumou Sy is professed illiterate. In 1997, she founded the annual Semaine Internationale de la Mode de Dakar ( SIMOD ). In 1998 she received along with two other African fashion designers the main prize of the Prince Claus Award for The Art of African Fashion.

Exhibitions

  • Documenta 12, Kassel, 2007
  • Hamburg Museum of Arts and Crafts, 2005
  • Ifa galleries in Stuttgart / Berlin, 2001
  • Expo 2000, Hanover
Karl Lagerfeld Name Authority File
627680
de