Slow Unfolding: Former Halohalo Founder Cara Mia Limjap Launches Her New Brand

Less than a year after announcing the closure of Halohalo, Cara Mia Limjap listens to her own voice and finally lets herself create from the heart.

It feels like a lifetime ago, Cara Mia Limjap tells Vogue, “but I also feel like it was just yesterday when I felt the unexplainable urge to close Halohalo.”

The designer and creative director is on the heels of launching her brand Cara Mia, following the furniture and fashion label she co-founded with her brother Rocco in 2013. Over its 12-year run, Halohalo’s recycled plastic banig were woven into bags, accessories, and homeware that frequently sold out. To this day, their signature Trabaho tote is listed for up to three times its retail price on the resale platform Carousell, and there is enough persistent demand for their wares that just this April, Halohalo is officially open again to take orders occasionally.

When they abruptly announced their closure in January 2025, clients were left in shock. From the outside, business was thriving: just less than a year before, Halohalo built their first physical store, and within the boutique, their Halohalo Bar. They had finally ventured into clothing, introducing a steady stream of new designs throughout the year. One would have thought that after more than a decade of operations, they had finally arrived at where they wanted to go.

For Cara, it turned out to be the opposite.

“I literally couldn’t anymore,” she recounts matter-of-factly. “I was depressed and very sick. My body was telling me something I didn’t want to face.”

Things happened quickly after that. Their brick-and-mortar would shut its doors nine days later, and their website would cease operations two weeks after that. They issued a last call for orders, and that was it.

What ensued was a chapter of healing, whose early stages prompted a wave of creativity. During that period of quiet, the designs for her new brand simply came to her. Together with her team (composed of some original members of the Halohalo crew), the research and development process became fun and playful. Cara thinks herself a perfectionist, but as she revisited fashion anew, she and her team found themselves creating together not for an end product or goal in mind, but for the plain joy of the act. “The unevenness between the sides of the garments is just like how our bodies are not symmetrical. And I felt the beauty in that. We’re so fixated on improving ourselves; I am one who aims for perfection, but that mindset doesn’t serve me anymore. Showing the beauty of who and how we are feels like the next step for me,” says the creative director.

Each piece is made-to-order in their atelier, with all materials locally-sourced. Those first few months of experimenting culminated in an introductory offering of hand-smocked manipulations in linen, crumpled silk flower tops, woven organdy skirts, and more. Cara explains, “The different weaving styles felt like bandages to parts of my body. The airy pieces are like a veil I needed around me to protect me. The designs are basically the inside showing outside.”

Like many independent Filipino brands, Cara Mia does away with the confines of a typical fashion calendar that requires seasonal collection drops. Instead, they label every release as an “expression,” and she makes it clear that these may manifest in a full-fledged collection or something completely different, expanding their possibilities. She laughs, “I want the universe to surprise me as well.”

Even before opening public orders for their first expression, Cara reveals that they’ve been doing bespoke commissions for a while now, and that these collaborative projects have felt rewarding each time: “For now it’s what feels right for me and the team. Being allowed to create a unique piece for someone is such an honor.”

Cara Mia might not be the designer’s first brand, but it certainly feels novel in many ways. For one, it’s the first time Cara is using her name. “Never did I think I would do such a thing. I loved the idea of hiding behind a brand [name], but honestly that’s where I struggled so much. I wanted to express myself in so many other ways before, but it never felt on brand. Using my name allows myself to just be me. I can effortlessly evolve as an artist as I do in life.”

She continues, “I am basically allowing myself to create from the heart. To explore deeper inside. I was too insecure and scared to fully explore the design and production process this way, but my heart and soul was always here. This has always been inside me but I only allowed it to flow out now.”

Sweetly, Cara reveals that the catalyst for these internal and creative journeys was a gleaming new presence in her life. “My son has been guiding me since the early stages,” intimates the new mom. “I was pretty much isolated my entire pregnancy, and I felt like he was guiding me into a life that I always wanted. Taking it slow was something I never really allowed myself before, but motherhood pushes you to do so. And suddenly you see that the slowness allows the beauty to unfold.”