Alba García Ávila
Alba García Ávila is the designer and founder of Toque, a social project based on African fashion design. Toque was born on the Swahili coast of Kenya, where Alba lived for several months. Everything began at the start of the lockdown in March 2020 when life as we knew it stopped. The silence and the location inspired Alba to create this beautiful project. During her stay in Kenya, she collaborated and worked together with an artisan tailor who helped her design and produce every one of the pieces in the collection. Toque is a community which involves many different professionals, providing them with opportunities and professional validation, expanding their network and promoting local fair trade. Being handcrafted, there is no piece the same which gives a singularity to each garment.
Toque works with different types of African Swahili fabrics, such as kikoy, dira or kitenge, each with its own specific properties.
Each Toque model has a Swahili name, which illustrates a concept about life there, its coasts, its island and its people. That little story that connects our world with theirs. Somehow, when you buy a Toque piece, you get a little closer to their culture.
