with a beer-based sauce) or drinking vinho verde. To discover the undercurrent of growing creativity here is surprising at first sight, but not hard to fathom: rents are cheap, as is dining out. This opens up time and financial space for creativity. Some 55 designers are listed as participating in Portugal Fashion, and the vast majority work with Portuguese manufacturers based mainly in the north of the country, outside Porto. Rather than travelling to far-flung production sites in places such as India or China, these designers produce locally. This cuts their costs, while also letting them keep a close eye on the quality of the fabrics. “I came to Porto to study fashion design in 1992 and, as the north of Portugal is strong in the textile sector, it made sense to me to stay and find work in the area,” says Catarina Sequeira, the designer behind Portobased label Say My Name. “Porto has a strong manufacturing industry and the quality and price is quite attractive. All that is inherent in this area, which makes my job easier.” Hugo Costa is a menswear designer based in the city’s outskirts at the Oliva Creative Factory, a culture and artist space. Like Sequeira, Costa trained in Portugal and chose to remain in the country rather than moving to a fashion capital like Paris or London, citing Porto’s proximity to production and the quantity of available materials, as well as the quality of the manufacturing process. “We want to stay close to what we produce,” he says, a strategy echoed by designer Mafalda Fonseca. “Being based in Porto is important to our brand because of the proximity of the textile industry,” she says. “We choose to keep our production here because Portuguese industry is really strong in fabrics, leathers and textile manufacturing. We can afford high-quality products here.” International fashion companies have also taken notice of these factors. Many now look toward Porto for production. In addition to affordable manufacture, high-quality materials and detailed finishings, Porto’s location on the coast of Western Europe facilitates easy inter- and intra-continental connections. For many European brands, the prospect of working with manufacturers within their home continent is an opportunity to keep ecological footprints down. One such textile manufacturer is Flor da Moda, located just north of Porto. A vast roster of international brands such as Paul Smith, Karl Lagerfeld and Victoria Beckham rely on Flor da Moda’s production capacity, which has risen to 4,000 pieces
Catarina Sequeira holding a dress by her label Say My Name, in front of Galerias Lumiére.
a day since the firm was established in 1981. The company has invested heavily in technology – a zigzag machine for intricate decorative details is a new addition, as is a rotating thermal binding machine for dyeing fabrics – enabling it to develop innovative products. Thanks to such investments, Flor da Moda is able to produce trousers with memory adjustment, jeans that moisturise the legs through a bioactive finish of shea-butter oil, and aromatherapy fabrics that release scent through microcapsules. Although the demand for such singular textiles is debatable, their production is nonetheless a display of the technical skill of Porto’s industry, as well as its willingness to respond and adapt to buyers’ demands. Nuno Sousa, the chief executive of Flor da Moda, credits the industrial base of Porto as a major factor in the region’s regeneration and recent economical strides in the fashion and design industries. “With the worldwide crisis, brands had to change their
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