Welly does hit bit for a worthy cause

By Bruce Emond

JAKARTA (JP): Far from his Toronto home, Indonesian designer Welly Kurniawan's creations are getting a showing on catwalks from Russia to South Africa.

He has been involved for the past 15 years with Fashion Cares, which raises funds for AIDS research by holding fashion shows around the world. Two of his designs have been part of the collections chosen and shown by the main sponsor, MAC Cosmetics, in cities worldwide in 2000 and 2001, and one of them is featured in the October issue of Hong Kong ELLE.

On a recent week-long visit to Jakarta, Welly, 44, said he was proud to be the only Indonesian designer involved in the cause.

"I've been part of it from the beginning, when we were only working out of clubs. But for the last three years, they keep the clothes and take them all around the world, and do them with local designers, doing the same show."

He said he became involved because he saw many of his friends dying of the disease after it was first diagnosed among gay men in the U.S. in the early 1980s. With the fashion and arts community hit particularly hard by the disease (American designers Halston and Willi Smith, as well as makeup artist Way Bandy, are among those who have died from AIDS), Fashion Cares was one of its first fund-raising efforts.

The "gay" association made Fashion Cares a hard sell during its first years, but some high-profile people with AIDS and HIV, famous AIDS advocates like Elizabeth Taylor and public education campaigns that the syndrome does not discriminate based on sexual orientation have done a lot to change all that.

Ten years ago, Welly said wryly, it was hard to get corporate sponsors to give Fashion Cares the time of day. Today, they are the ones calling to be part of the show.

"I think, now, people realize this is not one group's problem, but everybody's problem. And I find it very rewarding, because, you know, you're helping somebody. Now every fashion show I do involves charity, I don't do it just for the fashion ... "

Working with a group provided a more concerted effort, he said, because "personally you can never do enough. But one more person in a group makes a difference".

Fashion start

Welly said he loved fashion from the time he was small, growing up surrounded by his mother and three sisters (he also has a brother who is nine years younger).

"I grew up in a family with a lot of females, and somehow I was always involved in helping them on how to dress. I would design, and give them suggestions, 'How about if we do it this way'."

He was originally set for a career in architecture, but then changed to his real love of fashion design, studying at George Brown College in Toronto in the mid-1970s.

After graduating he stayed on in Canada, opening his couture business and later moving on to wardrobe, designing a total season of clothes, from business suits to evening gowns, for clients. His elegant, extravagant designs -- "I get my inspiration from my clients" -- each cost about C$2,000 (about US$1,350).

"Every season they come in, and say, 'this season I have this and this coming up, and I need this many suits per season', and I have to design for them, so it's like wardrobe coordinating for them at the same time," said Welly.

"I find that more challenging (compared to mass designing), because you cannot do the same thing, but you have to do something to fit the person, and you have to make sure you don't repeat yourself ... it's a very personal basis."

Welly said his clientele, which includes a Canadian legislator, were not brand-minded.

"They don't need to show people how much they spend, whether they spend more or less than their label, they want to be themselves. They want to walk in a room, and they don't want to see someone sitting there wearing the same thing."

For now, although he does not have any plans to return to live in Indonesia, Welly would like to explore the possibility of having Fashion Cares in his homeland.

"I'm going to start slowly making connections with designers here, and maybe I could get a couple of Canadian designers who would be interested in coming to Indonesia for it ... AIDS is everybody's problem -- mothers, wives, husbands, children -- but it might take a while for Indonesia to wake up to it."