Proudrace’s MNL Fashion Week Finale is a Tribute to the Strange and Unusual

For Proudrace’s closing collection for MNL Fashion Week, the designer finds his anchor in curtains, community, and couture.

Curtain. Kurtina. Kukurtinahin. Kukur.

The latter expression is commonly used by elderly Pinoys to describe that which is strange, odd, or difficult to explain. It’s a word that stayed with Rik Rasos through childhood, which was the same period he fashioned his first makeshift dress: a floral curtain draped on a younger cousin. One might read it as providential, how up to now, much of Rik’s design language is occupied with deconstruction; with making clothes from existing garments or twisting materials in directions they weren’t initially meant to go.

His resonance with the term kukur isn’t just confined to his sartorial practice though, and in reflecting over his label Proudrace, Rik gleaned a long-standing fascination for “unique people, the ones with small quirks others might overlook but I would always notice and remember.” The connections forged with these individuals range from tender and sensual to strange, and all have directly or indirectly left their mark on the designer.

For his latest collection for MNL Fashion Week (which is both named after and anchored on kukur), he honors the singularity of all the company he’s kept. “This is about the people who have moved, challenged, and inspired me,” he tells Vogue. “This is an homage to the beautiful traces they’ve left behind.”

Much like objects and people described as “kukur,” the collection isn’t about uniqueness for its own sake. It’s an appreciation for what’s unorthodox, like Rik’s casual one-off tees, button-downs, and jackets that cannot be replicated, not even by him or his team.

This time, he sought to incorporate more tailoring into Proudrace’s vocabulary, evident in the opening look of an oversized blazer mini dress with an exaggerated scarf spilling out. 

Then, a succession of off-kilter maximal looks: multi-colored stripe fabrics and Carhartt utility jackets spliced together, coats featuring Proudrace’s signature extended lapels, and tops with elongated frontal hems, their cropped backsides revealing tight-fitting hot pants. There were fringes in reference to the mantón de Manila, and words and phrases embedded onto garments and models’ bare skin: Submissive, Spoiled Brat, I Miss You. Adidas’ three stripes even made multiple cameos on track shorts, jackets, jerseys, and footwear, perhaps teasing their next collaborative chapter.

Despite the appearance of more gown-like silhouettes and suiting fabrics than usual, “The idea was never to make something overtly formal, but to take clothes that feel familiar and lived-in and reinterpret them through a more meticulous, almost couture-driven approach to construction,” the designer remarks, citing marabou feathers, sequins, and hand-applied embellishment as some of their novel explorations.

As someone who considers himself and his team to be “comfortable in the ready-to-wear space,” they found the idea of delving into an artisanal collection exciting. A departure from what’s familiar allows Rik to push his own creative boundaries but also his team’s, to see how far they can take an idea; sometimes, he says, to the point of screaming matches in the studio.

In looking back at their process, Rik muses, “It forces me to be more obsessive, more demanding, and more instinctive. In a way, these collections become a form of self-discovery.