With an ode to his early 2000s design sensibilities, Patrick Galang is most definitely back
This Designer Profile is an excerpt from MEGA’s July 2023 Issue
Multi-hyphenates really do exist. Stylist, editor, and fashion designer Patrick Galang is proof of this. With his return to his creative nature after his long and quiet hiatus, how was he able to ease himself in with the idea of reinvention?
When Galang went to Slim’s Fashion and Arts School to study fashion design in 2003, he didn’t expect it’s where he’d meet his best friends: Anna Leah Salvador, Niño Asejo, and Martin Bautista. Eventually, they formed their own design collective called Eccentricity and Subversion. As young design students, he shares that the collective served as their playground for reinventing garments.
“I can still recall how obsessed I was with deconstruction and upcycling clothes,” says Galang. “It introduced me to what freedom in design meant and became an integral part of my fashion identity.”
At his own rebranded label Rafglang—a shorter version of his full name Patrick Rafael Galang—clothing has three tenets: reassemble, reengineer, and repurpose. Each one formulates a specific design in terms of structure, form, and function. His envisioned creative output? To regenerate what has been done before.
“My creative process is deliberately slow and organic,” Galang shares. “I would usually start with a silhouette or a pattern, and develop it as ideas grow. I would then infuse music and think about the kind of woman who would wear it.”
Read more about Patrick Galang’s comeback in MEGA’s June 2023 issue, now available on Readly, Magzter, Press Reader and Zinio
Creative Direction JONES PALTENG. Fashion Direction KAT CRUZ-VILLANUEVA and RYUJI SHIOMITSU. Beauty Direction MIA CASTRO. Photography JOSEPH BERMUDEZ. Styling CHRISTINE SION and CARLOS TOMAWIS of NEW COLLECTIVE STYLE. Makeup THAZZIA FALEK. Hair ARCHIE GILBERO. Model TAKI SHIMADA. Sittings Editor BAM ABELLON. Fashion Writer MARIAN SAN PEDRO. Fashion Associate and Shoot Coordination BITHIA REYES.
