While the duo behind the Latin American Fashion Summit have been busy bringing the region’s talent to the global fashion industry, their latest effort looks to welcome the global fashion industry to the region.
Starting with the first iteration in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, from March 13 to 15, Raíces of LAFS aims to be a marriage between a networking event and a trade show – but without the stuffy corporate element and convention center atmosphere cavernous.
“We’ve noticed after four years of doing summits that there’s so much impact that’s created when you connect people who are in the same industry,” said Estefania Lacayo, co-founder of LAFS, digital networking platform Tribu and now Raíces by LAFS. “People invite them to their place to come to a trunk show. You can generate as much as you can to help them grow their businesses.”
LAFS, the original summit that Lacayo started with partner Samantha Tams in 2018 — which in its pandemic-delayed iteration in March counted Johanna Ortiz, Alexandre Birman, Lauren Santo Domingo and Pharrell Williams among its guest speakers — will remain a staple in Miami, taking place in November each year as a sort of think tank, bringing C-level executives to discover not only the latest news from Latin America, but also the latest in best practices. good business. Raíces, in turn, hopes to facilitate more casual interactions between those doing business in Latin America and those seeking to do so.
“Latin America will be a very different product. we will [bring together] emerging designers, entrepreneurs who probably don’t really want to hear a senior executive talking about the meta world because they might not be there yet. They are more interested in [things like] what’s the perfect way to create a pitch for an editor, or what buyers want and hear from the fashion director of two, three different retailers,” Lacayo said. “The product in Latin America will be very heavy on the network. Heavy on meeting buyers, meeting lots and lots of brands and lots and lots of entrepreneurs in the fashion ecosystem. That’s really what they want.”
The conference will take place over two days, with limited panel discussions in the morning and most of the afternoon designed for speed dating—meetings between designers and bag buyers, meetings between jewelry artisans and shops that want the special of theirs. merchandise, meetings between those interested in fashion media and those in it sharing their knowledge.
“Too many speed dating activations [will] to happen [simultaneously] and the idea behind that is that people really want to know not only older people who are doing this, but they also want to meet other people who they can do business with, people who are doing something like this in Argentina or Brazil in London. who are Latinos in this world,” Lacayo said.
And contrary to everything that is unpleasant about the typical trade show, Raíces is about to develop into a colonial house, bringing together the exhibition of brands and designs from the region, the beauty of the Dominican Republic. As Tams said, the goal is to make it feel more like an “out-of-office-out-of-office thing rather than business as usual.”
“Even though Miami is the capital of Latin America, the reason we created LAFS is because we also wanted to show you all what Latin America has to offer, with its culture, with its heritage, with its artisans , with gastronomy,” said Lacayo.
As such, this is what will happen in Raíces on the margins of new business meetings.
“In this edition, we are planning to understand you with gastronomy, with visual things, like the streets are beautiful, but obviously we have historical elements – all we are going to plan is for you as guests to say. “Wow, that was the best taste of Latin America,” Tams said.
Because of the versatile features, the host country is fully on board. The first edition of the event will be presented by the Ministry of Tourism of the Dominican Republic. With the aim of making this a traveling event across the region, LAFS is already in talks with other nations to develop similar things.
Tourism aside, Latin America’s design selection is what visiting buyers should expect most from a business perspective. And that very sharp curation is what landed LAFS on Amazon’s Luxury Stores earlier this summer, with an edit that showcases the best fashion coming out of Latin America. And Raíces aims to bring back more of where he came from.
“Latin America has become a major focus for retailers. There is so much interest and there are so many opportunities, from small boutiques to large department stores,” Lacayo said. “For [buyers] to come to Latin America and see a beautiful curation, a beautiful showroom that appears right after Paris [Fashion Week]…it’s a great opportunity for them to see all the brands in a one-stop shop.”
It’s prime for brands and retailers who have promised to stock more products from Black and Latino brands, but aren’t yet sure where to find them—or aren’t committed enough to really wanted.
