Afrogoth is a movement that resists being caged in the box that limits what African fashion is and who an African fashion designer is. Afrogoth redefines both Goth fashion and African fashion. Afrogoth also redefines the processes of fashion design by exploring the use of artificial intelligence tools, social media and storytelling.
"African fashion as a voice of identity and power is not a trend. It is a legacy. It is a call to remember , to resist, and to redefine." Afrogoth takes inspiration from these sentiments written in Afriklens in May 2025.
Afrogoth remembers Kenya's (and other Commonwealth countries') colonial past. I am intrigued by Kenya's Victorian era remnants due to the country's colonial history. My hope is to explore this in a creative way, through writing, poetry and fashion, with help from artificial intelligence tools.
Remembering with Afrogoth: Colonization of Africa coincided with the Victorian era. Afrogoth's Afro-Victorian-Goth designs are a nod to Kenya's and Africa's past while at the same time, via African fabrics such as the leso, acknowledging the African roots of even the most "British" African country. The leso itself is steeped in history. According to lifeinmombasa.com "Originally, the leso was just a white plain coth worn by slave men and women...but upon coming across the new found freedom, they redeemed the clothes worn, began printing elaborate and beautiful designs on them...making a visually striking statement that says 'I am a free woman.'"
Redefining with Afrogoth: In July 2023, one of my first adventures into the world of generative artificial intelligence was via clipdrop of stabilityai. My prompt was: A beautiful [colour e.g. burgundy or purple] Victorian gothic gown with African fabric elements." In his May 2025 article "Fashion Designers: Are They Becoming Prompt Engineers?" Richard Yang notes that "AI Is Reshaping Fashion Design Workflows".
Artificial Intelligence is also redefining the fashion show. In July 2023, via Plazmapunk, I used images generated via clipdrop of stabilityai to create a video of 3 celestials from my musical "Void". I also combined fashion and poetry - I created a music video featuring my two haiku published in Leaf issue 5 and 6, paired with African models wearing lovely Victorian Goth outfits. The music was created with Suno.
In February 2024, I set my 2002 poem "February Fun" to music, thanks to Suno. I then used Pixverse to make a music video.
In 2023, the first-ever A.I. fashion week debuted in New York. In an interview by NBC News, Sinead Bovell, a model, said: "The purpose of fashion is really to push the frontier of design and creativity forward. That's what we see when we see design in a computer or A.I. generated image. But at the same time, it raises questions about the future of the industry." One question that arises is the idea of fake diversity, where, what is created for the screen is diverse but the people behind the screen are not diverse. In Afrogoth, the person behind the screen is an African woman.
The entry level to the fashion industry for Africans and amateurs is very high. Artificial Intelligence allows us to break those barriers to entry.
