How Mowalola Ogunlesi Became One of Kanye's Favorite Designers

One fashion label that’s constantly appearing on our timelines right now is Mowalola, namesake label of 29-year-old British-Nigerian designer Mowalola Ogunlesi.

Chances are you’ve come across Ogunlesi’s designs through news about Bianca Censori, the 29-year-old architect who has been married to Ye (formerly known as Kanye West) since December 2022. Ogunlesi is the mastermind behind many of those near-nude looks that Censori’s been wearing with Ye at events like the Super Bowl LVIII. In January, Ye even collaborated with Ogunlesi to sell one of those pieces his wife was wearing—a see-through tank top that reads “WET” in bold black letters. 

But who is Ogunlesi and how did she become one of Ye’s favorite designers of the moment?

Ogunlesi was born in Nigeria but attended an all-girls Catholic boarding school in Surrey, England, when she was 12. She grew up around fashion design. Her Scottish grandmother moved to Nigeria in the ‘60s to start a fashion label using locally produced textiles. Her mother worked on that line, and her father designs traditional Nigerian menswear. Despite fashion being the family trade, Ogunlesi says in Nigeria fashion wasn’t considered a field that was worth studying in school or pursuing as a career. “It’s a very money driven society,” she told SSENSE. “Having children who do creative things, changes the world in a different way.”

Ogunlesi, who also considered being a plastic surgeon, says her parents supported her moving to England to study fashion. So she went to Central Saint Martins for her BA and studied fashion textiles. While there she spent three years working for Grace Wales Bonner. “She got me to see that creating a collection is more than just the clothes, it’s the whole story. I got a lot from her, but I’ve executed it in my own way,” Ogunlesi told SSENSE.

Ogunlesi’s BA menswear collection, which she presented in 2017, was titled “Psychedelic,” and was influenced by Lagos petrolheads and the country’s psychedelic rock scene in the ‘70s. She described the line as “unapologetically black and pan-African.” Here we get a first glimpse of the designer’s genderfluid aesthetic and interest in treated leathers. The male models wore low-slung leather pants and cropped leather jackets that came in an array of vivid colors. 

She went on to continue her MA studies at Central Saint Martins, but dropped out after a year telling SSENSE the college was “just a bit too dated.” She continued: “There’s not really a lot of variety, tutor-wise. Everyone’s white, British. Or like white-European. There’s not really any people of color teaching us.” Eventually, she found mentorship in Ye, who first reached out to Ogunlesi while she was studying at CSM. 

“I was in the MA programme at CSM having the most miserable time ever and then I got this email [saying] Kanye wanted to call me and I was like, OK! He called and we had an hour-long conversation about a lot of bullshit,” Ogunlesi told Dazed. “Then I went out to LA to see if [working with him was] something I would do. At that moment I felt like I still wanted to figure out who I was and what I wanted to say, so I didn’t work with him then.”Mowalola London Fashion Week debut via Fashion East in 2019.

In January 2019, Ogunlesi made her London Fashion Week debut via Fashion East, a nonprofit organization founded by Old Truman Brewery and Lulu Kennedy in 2000 that supports young designers and gives them a platform to show at London Fashion Week. This is where she showed her innovative take on womenswear for the first time. The theme was exposure, whether that’s emotional or physical, and models wore sculpted leather jackets with cut-outs, coated leather jackets, and skinny leather pants, and ultra-mini miniskirts. By this time celebrities including Solange and Skepta, who sat front row at this show, had worn her pieces, which she describes as unisex and influenced by her country.

“I’m Nigerian, so whatever I create is automatically going to be Nigerian work. I don’t feel like I have to brand myself as ‘the African designer,’” she told Vogue UK. “The conversations that I want people to be having in Nigeria are the same conversations that people are having here in London. At the end of the day, I’m just a designer making shit that I want to make.”

She went on to show at London’s Fashion East show again in June 2019, expanding on her aesthetic and presenting glossy leather jackets treated with custom spray-painted art, leather suits, halter dresses, along with moto jackets and pieces made from a neon green and brown cowhide. Ogunlesi added a bloody gunshot wound to a few of the pieces. The detail was meant to symbolize the dangerous side of falling in love. Following this show, Drake wore a custom leather jacket by Ogunlesi that was spray-painted with an illustration of Halle Berry as her character Jinx from the 2002 James Bond movie Die Another Day. 

Naomi Campbell wore one of Ogunlesi’s halterneck dresses with a crimson gunshot wound to the Fashion for Relief show in London in September 2019. To clear up its interpretation, Ogunlesi posted its meaning on Instagram shortly after Campbell wore it, stating: “I make clothes to challenge people’s minds. This gown is from my collection ‘Coming For Blood’—a delving into the horrific feeling of falling in love. This dress is extremely emotional to me—it screams my lived experience as a black person.” She continued: “It shows no matter how well dressed you are or well behaved, we are time after time, seen as a walking target. I’m in a privileged position to be able to speak on issues that others would be silenced on. Inequality is still rife and newspapers clawing at my work is testament to that.”

Other milestones  from that year included dressing Barbie to celebrate her 60th anniversary—she was one of six designers chosen for that project—showing at Arise Fashion Week in her hometown of Lagos, Nigeria, being picked up by retailers including SSENSE and Dover Street Market, and styling the models in Skepta’s “Pure Water” video. By then, Mowalola’s offerings expanded into leather handbags, knee-high boots, and leather belts. Brigitte Chartrand, the senior director of womenswear buying at SSENSE, told 1 Granary that Ogunlesi’s line had a very successful sell-through shortly after it went live on the site. Ogunlesi ended the year displaying her capabilities as a designer and artist with “Silent Madness,” an exhibit that opened at the NOW Gallery in London in December 2019. She created a stage featuring a rock band of mannequins wearing Mowalola bodysuits that was surrounded by her printed fabrics draped throughout the space, a photograph by Lea Colombo, and a trippy video she produced with Yves Tumor, Jordan Hemingway, and Dazed’s art director Jamie Reid. 

In June 2020, Ogunlesi’s name was thrown into the spotlight when it was unveiled that she would become the design director of Yeezy Gap—Gap’s defunct collaborative clothing line with Ye that was originally set to run for 10 years. Ogunlesi’s creative partnership with Ye was teased months before the announcement. In a viral  Father’s Day photo posted by Ye’s ex-wife Kim Kardashian, his entire family was dressed in Ogunlesi’s wares. In her interview with Dazed, Ogunlesi said she got offered the Yeezy Gap position after working on a project centered around North West’s birthday in 2020. Ye is always known for having a keen eye for design talent. Alumni from his design studio DONDA included the late Virgil Abloh, Givenchy’s old creative director and Alyx founder Matthew M. Williams, and Fear of God founder Jerry Lorenzo. Mowalola’s appointment was significant because it marked the first time Ye publicly named another designer to lead one of his own projects.

“That’s when we started working together and we’ve had a lot of conversations about many different things over the years,” Ogunlesi told Dazed. “So I really understand his design language. He also gets mine and even though we don’t do the same things, we love what each other does.”

However, Yeezy Gap was short-lived and folded in September 2022 due to business disagreements between Ye and Gap. Ogunlesi, who took a three-year hiatus from her label to pursue her role at Yeezy Gap, actually jumped ship early. She told Vogue Business in a June 2022 interview before her Spring/Summer 2023 show that she left her position at Yeezy Gap to focus on her own label again. 

“I only wanted to do it for a year,” she said, telling Vogue Business she enjoyed working for Ye but disliked working under a large corporation like Gap. “I prefer being able to create without any kinds of restrictions. The experience gave me confidence to find my own voice and figure out how to work in my own way. So, I was ready to move on.”

Ogunlesi’s collection that season was titled “Burglarwear” and inspired by thieves that ranged from Wall Street brokers to credit card scammers. It marked a new direction for the label, since it leaned into more experimental silhouettes. Although it wasn’t on the official Paris Fashion Week calendar, it was Mowalola’s debut in Paris and the first show Ogunlesi presented solo instead of being a designer within a larger showcase. The presentation was sponsored by New Balance and drew some attention from sneakerheads since Mowalola unveiled a New Balance 9060 collaboration. At this time, Ogunlesi told Vogue Business that Mowalola hired 14 employees and was a profitable business but still making under £1 million in revenues—with most of her sales coming directly from her own ecommerce site.

Mowalola followed up that show by releasing a Bratz collaboration in December 2002 and then returning to London Fashion Week in February 2023 to present her Fall/Winter 2023 collection, “Dark Web.” The collection was a tribute to New York City street style and leaned into more casual garments. The line was also inspired by what Ogunlesi imagined people would wear if society collapsed. Many pieces were covered with New York Yankees logos—including a Timberland 6-Inch Boot that made rounds on social media. Models like Rico Nasty stepped out in oversized leather bombers, saggy denim jeans, V-neck jersey mini dresses, and cropped leather biker ensembles, which looked sensual yet rugged. 

Mowalola’s Spring/Summer 2024 collection was presented during London Fashion Week in Sept. 2023 and was one of her most provocative collections yet. Tilted “Crash,” Ogunlesi told Vogue she “was really excited by the fetishization of pain through crashing” and inspired by the 1996 film of the same name, which follows a film producer who fetishizes tragic car accidents. Models like Irina Shayk walked down the runway with makeup that resembled bruises and black eyes. There were plenty of NSFW looks, like graphic tops depicting nude anime characters masturbating and booty shorts that barely covered one’s private parts. 

A miniskirt featuring a Saudi Arabian flag drew a huge amount of controversy. Arab and Muslims found it to be offensive since Islamic Shahada is written across the flag, specifically sacred Muslim text that translates to "There is no god but God; Muhammad is the Messenger of God." Social media accounts called Ogunlesi out for blasphemy, and she originally defended her design choice by saying, “A miniskirt being an act of war in 2023 is so dystopian.” After popular Arab and Muslim fashion accounts threatened to boycott one of Mowalola’s stockists, Farfetch, she issued an apology on Twitter and said it would be removed from her collection. Despite releasing provocative clothing, Mowalola still landed major collaborations with brands like Beats in 2023, releasing a pair of Solo3 wireless headphones complete with a campaign featuring JT.

What became clear at Mowalola’s Spring/Summer 2024 show was that she maintained a very close relationship with Ye even after leaving Yeezy Gap. The rapper sat front row at her show and even shared an unreleased song for the soundtrack. In an interview with Dazed, Ogunlesi revealed that she was unable to find a sponsor but Ye saved the show by paying for all of it. When asked why she maintained her relationship with Ye despite the controversy the artist has drawn since making a series of antisemitic rants in 2022, she said it was because of Ye’s unwavering support. 

“If not for him, I would lowkey be dead in the water. He’s one of the greatest designers ever yet people don’t want to give him his flowers; they keep trying to marginalize him,” Ogunlesi told Dazed. “I feel like he doesn’t want that same thing to be my story. He wants to make sure I also get the opportunities I deserve.”

Granted that Ye’s power in the fashion industry has softened since losing major brand deals and press due to his antisemitic comments, it’s clear that he’s supporting Ogunlesi as an emerging designer. We’ll likely continue to see Ogunlesi’s relationship with Ye blossom further in the foreseeable future. Ogunlesi expressed in her Dazed interview that Ye is the only other designer she collaborates with because he “suits the way I create because he lets me do what I want.” She went on to say that she wants to build a community that goes beyond her fashion brand and expressed that larger houses are not spaces that embrace Black women.

However, after Vogue questioned if Burberry came to mind when she rolled out trench coats that revealed model’s bare bottoms when presenting her Spring 2024 show, she hinted that she expressed some interest in working for larger houses in the future.

“You know what? I used to want Givenchy: but now that McQueen is open…”