Millones de Maneras

A Million Ways through a Bead-Woven Pluriverse

Shakira is the best-selling Latin American female musician of all time. She is hailed the “Queen of Latin Music.” As she rose to superstardom with her first English-language album an American journalist offensively dubbed her “Colombia’s second finest export.” This wouldn’t happen now. Shakira says so herself. “Millones de Maneras,” the name I chose for an expanding collective, which now dominates my creative practice, was translated from a lyric taken from that English language album. Meaning ”millions of ways,” it has served us well on our journey, this quest for alternatives.

I’m a Colombian fashion academic, based at Parsons School of Design in New York. In 2019, I was living in London, England, which had been my home for 20 years. The Colombian embassy contacted me to curate a stand for The International Fashion Showcase (IFS), an annual event to be held at Somerset House on London’s The Strand.  This task led a direct path to Laura Laurens, a fashion designer based in Bogotá. Catching my attention was the outsourcing arm of Laura’s design operation, employing a small group of Indigenous trans-women to develop her ideas and designs using their artisanal technique.

Roxana Panchí Gutiérrez, Yina Tascón, Marcela Panchí, Alexa Yagarí and Jaima Yagarí, are part of Colombia’s Embera People living in Karmata Rua, a 200-year-old reserve, in the Andes Mountains, 4 hours drive outside Medellin, department of Antioquia.

Roxana Panchi Gutierrez, Millones de Maneras” Catwalk. Medellin, October 2019, Photo: Pedro Santos

They are among the first in their community to live as out trans women. They have learned the traditional bead weaving which represents part of their cultural identity, handed down from mother to daughter.  We have worked together, now, across eight projects over five years. They are at the heart of “Millones de Maneras.”  They are the reason we must find more ways and they are the ways.

I completed highschool in Cali, Colombia’s second largest city, having learned little about the Indigenous people of my homeland. Our education was colonially driven in the 1980s.  I went on to study architecture at Universidad de los Andes, Bogota. There I became familiar with the concepts of minimalism and deconstruction, learned to laud Greece as the origin of architecture; we were taught to design as though for Barcelona, like descendants of Le Corbusier,  the great Swiss-French architect. I left Colombia in 1998 to study and work in fashion, in Europe, where fashion belonged, in London, where fashion was having a big party.

Strange then, that in Europe, in London, at the 2019 International Fashion Showcase, my learning of Colombia’s Indigenous cultures began with that inaugural collaboration of “Millones de Maneras”.  I had arrived in London, viewing Europe as the “birthplace” of fashion design, believing that success in this discipline meant meeting Western standards.  Through the collaboration I began to understand that this was, by no means, hard fact.

It seemed to me, essential that the indigenous women attend Somerset House for the IFS in person. This wasn’t easy.  The women held no national ID’s or passports, no visas, even their unregistered names hadn’t  been changed to reflect to their gender identities. Still, with none of these Western constructs and a lot of effort, we succeeded and two of the women traveled from Karmata Rua in February 2019 and  “Millones de Maneras” was born. This first success was swiftly followed with an invitation from the mayor of Medellín to deliver a catwalk show at the city’s Festival de la Diversidad, also in 2019.  Claudia Fischer filmed an award-winning documentary, “Werapara,” which charts part of these first two events alongside interviews with some of the women at Karma Rua.

“Millones de Maneras,” has no hierarchy with each participant being visible and equal, in each outcome. We represent a confluence of Indigenous experience and knowledge, making use of Western reference points, in the field of fashion.  We see ourselves as an alternative to the globally dominant and frequently invasive Eurocentric vision.  This vision, though at odds with the trajectory which brought me to academia, has helped me to appreciate that to learn, we should be prepared to de-learn.

Laura Laurens launched her eponymous label in 2014, using eco-dyeing processes, reshaping dead stock and military fabrics, with aims to reduce water waste and promote vegan leather, all together the summation of what we expect from a brand in the 2020s.  Less affected by fashions crisis of conscience in the face of ecological catastrophe,  the Embera Chami craft of traditional bead weaving has been handed down through generations. There are two methods in use today—by hand, using needle and thread to create a flat “fabric” and three-dimensional shapes, or by way of a homemade loom, crafted out of found materials and nails. When we first met, Laura and the Embera trans community had formed the time-honored bond, with money exchanged for outsourced work, yet it was the strong connection to the community which first attracted me. In 2019, with two successful projects setting the pace, I began to consider how a model may be refined and refocused toward becoming more specifically identifiable with the community of trans women.

Marcela Panchi, Karmata Rua, January 2024. Photo: Liliana Sanguino

The year 2019 soon took on a more ominous significance when the birth year of “Millones de Maneras” became overshadowed by the onset of  the Covid-19 pandemic, ushering in a whole new set of obstacles for my friends in Karmata Rua as their outsourced beadwork dried up.

Our third collaboration, “No Corona,” was one of the many pandemic-born projects that rallied to “do something” against advice to “do nothing.” The aim was to develop accessories and trinkets for sale online and provide the women some financial relief.  The collection’s trademark: the likeness of figures, icons and characters who exhibited majestical behavior, yet never got their crown.The collection features Divine, Marilyn Monroe, Amy Winehouse, Whitney Houston, Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, Joan of Arc, Joe Exotic, JT Leroy, The Suxesses, Judy Garland, Walter Mercado, Fidel Castro and Roux Panchí. All in Embera traditional bead weaving, naturally.

Part of this collection was bought by the Museo Banco Republica and exhibited in Bogota, as part of the first Indigenous representation exhibition in 2023. Although the business plan faltered in the face of increasing Covid restrictions, “No Corona” turned up something else, quite unintended. The experimentation, repeating bead woven images caused the women to hone an expertise in photographic reproduction and something aesthetically new emerged.

“Chaq-e-scanner,” a made to order service, is now an ongoing business controlled by the community to aid the women’s transition to financial independence. The customer, submits an image to be woven in bead, the women respond with their interpretation for purchase. The first orders were placed in May 2024 at a Design Conference called Pabellon in Bogota.,The initiative later traveled to Photo +, a biennale for the Visual and the Sonic Media, at the invitation of Wild Palms Gallery in Dusseldorf, Germany and a second batch of orders were received.

“Chaq-e-Scanner” Photographs translated using traditional Embera technique.

As a collective, we do not necessarily envision a fixed end point, we are focused, we trust our process, an ongoing journey of discovery and development. Each encounter, meeting, event has the potential to unlock our next project together. We live far apart and communicate by phone.  between meetings. An event requires a meeting of some of the members. Any meeting becomes an event. This process is about asking questions, more than getting answers. It is an opportunity to learn, de-learn, listen, understand and embody new ways of being.

The aim is to identify innovative and unique outcomes in fashion design through the juxtaposition and confluence of aesthetics of the participants exploring the potential to elevate the work to levels expected in a global fashion market. It is my hope that we challenge and explore the possibilities of collaborations and fashion design and find new ways to define fashion today.

By fashion, we understand a creative discipline, uniquely engaging with the human body, it utilizes clothes, accessories, and other objects as a medium, through this fashion is able to create and communicate culture.

This field extends beyond creating garments, it involves a complex interplay of art, craftsmanship and cultural commentary. Cultural comment is vital, as are the different, often undiscovered voices, to be heard—in this case these voices belong to a community of trans women from the Embera Chami reservation, Karmata Rua.

The collective has snowballed to include practitioners, specialists, creatives and a driver, joining for projects at a time.  Projects include workshops, networking events, fashion shows, product development, showcases and festivals.  Each of these interactions is designed to empower the women. The collective, led by myself , Laura and the women, has drawn in international members living in Colombia, USA, Britain. The central principle has remained: the consultation and well-being of the core community.

Jaima Yagari and Alexa Yagari , La Colegiatura, “Millones de Maneras” Catwalk Medellin, October 2019. Photo: Pedro Santos

Once pandemic restrictions began to ease, we received an invitation from The Museo de Trajes ( Costume Museum), a part of the Universidad de las Americas, to participate in the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in Bogota 2023.

The intention, as always, to showcase the collaboration—the women would model in a fashion show. The overall aesthetic would be assembled during a workshopping event held during the two days before the show.

The emphasis was on producing accessories which might effectively demonstrate the collaborations’ spirit. “Shades of Millones de Maneras” revived, repaired and remodeled second-hand eyeglasses.

What emerged was the notion of a service provision, to salvage and upcycle worn out eyewear, using traditional bead weaving to breathe new life into worn out frames. Two shows were produced, in the Universidad de las America and in the Museo de Trajes, attracting coverage in the national media.

Our next opportunity came in October 2023 from Pabellon, an international conference that explored practice-based research in the creative disciplines organized by Universidad de los Andes.  The aim was to present an atmospheric snapshot of the Future of Fashion Design in which the collaboration and participation between the collective and audience happens. At the core of this exhibition was the representation of Embera Chami culture.

The concept for the space was realized in situ by community members Marcela, Roux and Jaima who traveled to Bogotá for the event. The women wanted to recreate the story of a mythical woman turned monster who lives in the vegetation of the mountains in the Tunnel of Kerapamia.

This other world, was crafted out of a native species of bamboo which fulfilled the women’s aim to spend no money on production.  Within this other world we also created a meeting place, and a point of sale for Embera-produced goods.  I have come,now, to see beyond the “one world” view, to a “pluriverse,” many worlds, with fashion belonging in each. This has enabled me to touch upon and embed subjects such as inclusivity, diversity, sustainability and environmental and social justice in my teaching and practice.

Yina Tascon, “Shades of Millones de Maneras”. Bogota, March 2023 Photo: Alex Duwan Gil Morales

On January 24, 2024, six members of the wider collective, met in Bogota and drove to Karmata Rua with a sewing machine in the back of a car. This journey was made possible using a grant from the Arnhold Forum Fellowships from Conservation International.

Karmata Rua sits between the towns of Andes y Jardin in Antioquia. Arriving from the road we were met by a big sign announcing Resguardo Karmata Rua , founded in 1823, population 1825, 25km2.  The closest buildings to the road are a shop, selling snacks and drinks, a small handcraft store and the school and sports center.  A pedestrian track beyond, leads to a close cluster of family homes, each building is different, some have porches, some have bathrooms, some are one room spaces. Most of the houses have speakers facing to the outside. I recognize hits by Yuri and Lisandro Mesa among others, playing on Shami Stereo, Karmata Rua’s local radio station. Marcela, Roux and Gilma, each have dwellings here, Gilma is Roxana’ mother and Marcella’s sister. There is one separate communal kitchen among the buildings.  This is only a small part of the community, together they make use of the kitchen cooking and eating communally. Jaima and Yina live 30 mins walking distance, but this is as far as we go carrying the sewing machine from the car, we set up the “studio” in Roxana’s home.  Alongside the machine’s installation and a brief induction, several garments were created by machine, including a look for each of the trans women  followed by a short fashion show, by way of a finale.

Following the central principle of “Millones de Maneras,” to bring together all visible styles and create something new, we developed “The Great Stitch Up,” a short film, a compilation of footage from three telephones, which was edited together and sound tracked remotely to document this latest achievement.

An unexpected and delightful offshoot of our collaboration came amidst the community’s plans to Commemorate 200 years of Karmata Rua reservation. Impressed by their successes, community leaders requested a fashion show. The women took charge of the whole show, set, music, looks, casting, hair and make-up.

I produced a short film mixing this footage with footage from the women’s fashion show at Museo de Trajes in March 2023. The soundtrack was created using cheers, claps and horns taken the from the phone recordings of the show, to build a trance music sound bed.

Assisting the women to gain wider visibility inside as well beyond their own community has increased their standing at home, it has brought respect from community leaders and allowed them to contribute financially. A second fashion show has already been requested since the arrival of the sewing machine.

This practice-led collective has evolved to represent a compelling intersection between fashion and social justice. Through the juxtaposition and confluence of aesthetics a new collaborative system has been allowed to develop, creating new fashion outcomes. Through this practice I aim to revise, reposition and consolidate global concepts of fashion, identifying a contemporary meaning of fashion, through a non-western lens and at times, more specifically, using a Latin American viewpoint.

Liliana Sanguino is Associate Professor in Fashion Design and Social Justice and Donna Karan Co-Director MFA Fashion Design and Society. She was born in Cali, Colombia, and studied BA architecture in Bogota and Dublin before settling in London to study Fashion at LCF and Central Saint Martins.  She began work as an academic in 2008 vacating her final UK post as course Leader, MFA & MA Menswear, University of Westminster, to join Parsons in January 2023.

Liliana.sanguino@newschool.edu