Alisa Dudaj is an Albanian fashion designer who has just appeared on the fashion world’s radar. In May 2022, the Parsons School of Design graduate won the Muza competition against more than 350 Albanian competitors. Scooping a EUR 20,000 prize, she donated half to the designer who came in second place while using the other half to set up her company and start work on her first formal collection.
Now back in Albania, after graduating from Parsons, one of the top design schools in the world, which counts Donna Karan, Marc Jacobs, Alexander Wang and Tom Ford amongst its alumni, she is working with local women to create contemporary fashion with a traditional twist.
But her route to success was not entirely straightforward.
“It is very competitive because, for me, coming from Albania, our background is very different. The requirements, the portfolio- we are not used to the idea you have to have a portfolio even if you know how to do it,” she explained over a coffee in Tirana.
After studying in Albania, she moved to the US to complete her senior year in an American high school. This, she said, helped her somewhat, but it was still a challenge to meet the requirements to get in and even to find herself in a new country.
“In the beginning, I really enjoyed it, but after a while, it was a bit hard to make friends. But you get used to it…it is a different mindset and a different culture,” she explained.
After she graduated, she came back to Albania and applied for the Muza competition- just two days before the deadline expired, with her collection from Parsons. The concept for her designs focussed on minimalism and neutral colours, interspersed with nods to her Albanian heritage.
Describing her own style as very minimal, she said this translates to her work but that it was important to include some Albanian processes in her work.
“Not all of the motifs were there, but rather it was about the way you produce the clothes. Felting, knitting, embroidery, the shapes and techniques,” she said.
In terms of felting, she explained how she worked the wool, adding hot water and soap to the fibres, mixing it, and applying it with pressure. “Then they just start to knit together, it is a very interesting process,” she said.
As for knitting, this technique holds a special place in Alisa’s heart and was part of the reason she pursued this avenue in life.
“My passion started when I was five years old and me, and my grandmother and I would watch soap operas together. She would knot, and I would knit with her, I really enjoyed it.” Once becoming a designer, she wanted to incorporate this technique into her work, not just because of her own memories, but because “most of the Albanian women are used to knitting.”
This also led her to explore other techniques that Albanian women use in their day-to-day life, including making doilies.
“The little doilies that everyone has in their home in Albania. The ones they put on the TV or have lying around the house. I had some at home and was given others by people I knew, and through experimentation and trying new methods, I arrived at a sculptural piece.”
Many of her garments are inspired by the finely crocheted pieces which have been repurposed and reinforced to create spectacularly eye-catching items.
“The doilies are very fun to make sculptures out of them, because it’s something very different that I haven’t seen before. So I really enjoyed doing that. Because it’s a very organic process. You work with a doily, and then you see how it turns out. You never know how it will look in the end, until you put it on the button,” she said.
But it wasn’t just doilies, knitting, and felting that inspired Alisa. Albanian embroidery also caught her eye and that of some leading stylists.
“Mostly, I’ve been reached out by stylist in LA and New York, like magazines there and Germany as well which is which was very, very, very surprising for me, and everyone was either a person of color or like Mexican or like, very foreign that has nothing to do with the Albanian culture, which is like crazy”, Alisa said. She went on to explain that Albanians are very much fixated on foreign fashion, at the expense of anything related to traditional clothing or styles.
“People here just think I am a seamstress,” she said, shrugging.
While including traditions in her work is important, Alisa did have difficulties in finding local women to help her.
“I think women in Albania still carry out the carry on the traditions- there are still grandmothers and will teach their nieces how to knit and crochet. But they are dying out in a way because they don’t do it for money anymore. They just do it for their own free time or like for fun,” she said, adding that this makes it hard to produce items on a larger scale.
“It is very small quantities because it takes a lot of effort. It is a niche market.”
But Alisa is persevering. She has found three women to work for her and others to help with embroidery, and she is now putting together her first collection.
“It’s very similar to my winning collection; very white, very monochrome… I’m doing some things that are a bit unconventional, like the doilies, I really enjoy that I’m doing different experiments, different shapes that I’m working with and including silks and natural fabrics.”
While she is adamant to produce her collection in her home country, she does not see much of a market for her clothes here and instead will focus on foreign markets.
“Albanians are very foreign-brand driven. I don’t think there is a market for me here, but I see a big market for me in the US, UK and other places outside of Albania. Mainly from foreigners, not Albanians.
In addition, she is keen to employ local women and give back to the economy.
“I found a bit of support here like some doors open for me here so I think I can give back so I want the money I can put the money back into the economy. Plus, a lot of people are leaving, and I would like to help some of them,” she adds.
Albania has suffered a mass exodus of citizens since the fall of communism in 1991. Over 1.4 million have left since then, 700,000 of them in the last decade and over 32,000 mainly youth in 2022.
“It is very sad. Even me, I don’t want to leave. Even though some people here are not supported by their country, I think it’s important to stay, make the decision not to go, and to work.”
“If I don’t make it here, I will try to go somewhere else,” she adds.
Alisa plans to make small collections with sustainability in mind. “There will be a limited number, I don’t want to make a lot because I don’t want to contribute to fashion waste.”
She explains she felt conflicted at fashion school; on the one hand, she was pursuing her dream, but on the other, she was aware of potentially contributing to the millions of tonnes of clothing thrown away every year.
“You don’t have to burn them or throw them or take them to a landfill. The most important thing for me is not to be mass produced. That is my goal, through limited numbers and pre orders.”
With her first collection due in “a couple of months”, Alisa aims to make four a year.” I think that is enough as I am a small brand, just one designer.”
But in the future, she has her eyes on menswear, childrenswear and homewear such as rugs and even chairs.
As for advice she would give to young Albanians interested in following a career in fashion, she urged them not to copy, but rather to find their own style.
“If you don’t experiment, you don’t know how things evolve, you just get stuck here. Do not copy people, strive to do your own thing,” she said.
She also advises them to try and study abroad. Despite schools in Albania that claim to make you a fashion designer, Alisa thinks they are not all they are cracked up to be. But for those that do go, she adds they should try find a way home- eventually.
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