“People underestimate the power of fashion”—Ib Kamara on his BFC Honor and making memorable fashion imagery

In 2015, Ib Kamara met up with the photographer Kristin-Lee Moolman in South Africa with a plan: create imagery to represent what menswear will look like 10 years in the future. Their collaboration, styled by Kamara using thrifted clothing and photographed by Moolman, restructures ideas of race, gender, and identity. They titled it “2026.” 

I’d say they overshot by five years. In 2021, not just menswear, but much of fashion is shaped by Kamara’s vision and taste. As the editor in chief of Dazed, he has created poignant pandemic imagery of vaccination, he’s costumed Rihanna as a joint, and he outfitted Harry Styles in archival John Galliano. His reach extends well beyond his own magazine: Comme des Garçons called on him to make headpieces for a recent menswear show, H&M asked him to creative direct its first circularly-designed collection, and Erdem, Kenneth Ize, and Lorenzo Serafini collaborate with him on their runway shows. For this, Sierra Leone-born and London-based stylist is being honored with the Isabella Blow Award at the British Fashion Council’s The Fashion Awards on November 29th. 

Kamara’s resumé is impressive, but it’s his imagery that really wows. With his frequent collaborator, photographer Rafael Pavoratti, Kamara has developed a freewheeling, yet poised look dominated by saturated colors and contrasting prints. The striking images that have appeared in Dazed, System, and Vogue Italia have little to do with fashion’s 2021 headwinds—camp, glamour, or celebrity—instead reading as sincere, emotional, and honest, like documentary photography of a world that doesn’t quite yet exist. 

That’s sort of the point. When we speak on a video call, Kamara gets most excited thinking about the future. “I think people underestimate the power of fashion and the power of an image—it can completely change your perspective,” he begins, retelling the story of his arrival in Europe and the harmful way the Western world portrays Africa in imagery. “I didn’t realize what poverty was until I moved to Europe. I was quite happy with what I had because I didn’t know any other life. When I came to Europe and saw all the images of where I came from, it really had an impact on me. When you create a picture, it can inspire, it can cause confusion. It can cause emotional damage or emotional positivity. Fashion has all of that in it. I always think, if we grew up in a time where we saw images that reflected us, I think the images we would create would be completely light years ahead of where we are now.”

For as fantastical as Kamara’s images are, they sting with reality. His first Dazed cover depicted models waiting in line for the COVID-19 vaccine. A 2020 portfolio for System was made up of 86 images to represent fashion during the pandemic—gas masks, plastic wrapping, and surgical gloves abound. The fashion industry has often been trite in its relation to reality, prizing aspiration over truthfulness, but Kamara marries both in a forthright, canny way. Growing up, he says, “I was more intrigued by what people were wearing and BBC and CNN—those were my superheroes, because that’s what I grew up watching. I guess that wast my first point of contact with fashion.” 

Taking on the editorship of Dazed has also positioned him at the fore of media—an industry amidst a generational shake-up with social media conversations brushing up against traditional media practices. At Dazed, the goal is to “talk to as many people as we can.” 

“I am looking for ways we can even connect more young people globally,” he says. “I hope it will really change the image makers who are going to come in the next generation. Can you imagine seeing themselves in images that can inspire them to make even better, maybe even, the most incredible imagery that we’ve seen? That’s what I want to see when I’m 40.” 

Not many in fashion would be so excited to encourage the next gen who will one day take their jobs. Consider it another testament to Kamara’s deftness and expansiveness. Plus, like all the greats before him, he’s got an even bigger plan: “I want to make films, I want to make furniture, I want to be expressive in different forms.”

This article first appeared on Vogue.com.