How FUNMI AJILA LADIPO Celebrated Her 60th Birthday

•Family & Friends Reveal A Lot About Her

Funmi Ajila Ladipo is a popular fashion designer who has paid her dues. She is a fashion icon who served as a 2 term President of the Fashion Designers Association of Nigeria (FADAN).

The big news is that she is 60 and she recently held a Thanksgiving Service to mark her birthday. It was a classy event at the RCCG Redemption Pavilion Parish, situated at 295, Jide Oki Street, Off Ligali Ayorinde, Victoria Island, in Lagos. The birthday girl, whose full names are Oluwafunmilayo Agness Mary Yemisi Ajila-Ladipo looked  so beautiful as ever; especially in her Gold birthday dress. You could actually have mistaken her for a newly wed bride.

Her 60th birthday thankgsgiving service had many dignitaries, ministers of God, friends and family were in attendance. Her husband is the great Advertising guru, Rufai Ladipo. Her birthday had in attendancethe Martriachs of t he fashion industry.

If you are reading about Funmi for the first time let us quickly tell you all you need to know about.

Funmi Ajila Ladipo the renowned fashion designer and a master of creativity. Over the years she has repeatedly transformed herself and the creative industry. She is the Creative Director of Regalia By FAL.

Funmi started her career as a model and spent several years as a professional model for many top Nigerian brands before she began her fashion story in 1987 when she founded Regalia International. Regalia is a bespoke haute couture fashion brand which recently has been rebranded as Regalia By FAL. In that same year she was awarded the Afriprint best designer in Nigeria (1987/1988) for her first individual collection, and since then she has won many national and international awards.

Over the years Regalia by FAL has maintained its unique identity as a brand constantly creating innovative designs, one of the trends she birth is the Ankara and Adiire patching design which is a zero-waste movement, where left over pieces of fabric and Ankara are stitched together to create unique outfits. This movement has since grown and has been used by many other designers worldwide. Another innovation popularly initiated by Funmi is the Denim hand painted skirts, an “art-fashion movement” where Demin skirts are hand painted with unique designs.

Regalia has exhibited and represented the Nigeria in New York, Paris, Japan, the UK, South Africa and many other countries worldwide.

Confident that Africa is the Future, Regalia by FAL has evolved into a ready-to-wear brand that focuses on infusing more local Nigerian and African fabric like adiire, batik, aso-oke and kijipa in the creation of its unique creations.

Funmi also expresses her creativity in costume design for films, stage plays and large shows. Some of which are the kanekalon hair fiber collection where all the deigns were made from hair extensions, Ovation paper collection where all the designs were created from ovation newspaper pieces and her collector’s African royalty doll which are custom handmade with African Fabrics. She also designs high end couture pieces and customizations for individual clients. One of her well-known clients are the richest woman in Africa Mrs. Folorunsho Funmi is a two term past president (2013-2019) of the Fashion Designers Association of Nigeria (FADAN). During her tenure In FADAN the country and most especially the Nigerian Fashion industry felt the impact of her leadership. Being a strong advocate for governmental support in the fashion industry, she is always vocal about the need for the establishment of a fashion council to ensure proper regulation and the creation of mass production hubs which will largely contribute to the country’s economic growth. In 2020 during the pandemic, she was appointed as the coordinator for the creative sector by the National Council for Arts and Culture by the DG, Otunba Segun Runsewe.

She also worked with Bank of Industry (BO!) to initiate the one billion naira loan for the fashion industry of which many designers were beneficiaries. The FAD Fashion week, FADAN subskill training for unemployed youth and the FADAN designers Mart are some of the many advantageous programs she developed to support SMEs in the creative and fashion industry.

Popular for her philanthropy, Funmi initiated a program in FADAN titled “Clothing Our Children” where designers from all over the country donated clothes to 5,000 vulnerable children in the IDP camps in Maiduguri, Abuja and Bassi. The pandemic wasn’t overlooked, Funmi turned the Regalia Factory into a face mask production plant, where she made thousands of fabric face mask that were donated to local communities as her contribution and a measure to prevent the spread of COVID 19 virus.

Aside from fashion designing and philanthropy, Funrni is passionate about youth development and empowerment, she uses her influence to facilitate, sponsor and host programs aimed at training Nigerian youth in the creative industry. In agreement with the American embassy Funmi nominates upcoming young designers for the international visitor’s leadership program (IVLP) for training and development. She mentors and lectures young upcoming designers within the country and is regularly invited to host and talk at fashion seminars and workshops around the world. In 2020, Funmi established The FA foundation to empower children and youth with creative skills.

Funmi studied Fashion & Textile Design at the Yaba College of Technology, after which she worked with popular brands like Fascinations.  Funmi is the first of 5 children and hails from Ekiti State.