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Wendell Sakiestewa: Design Star on the
Rise: From Street Wear to Celebrity Wear
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Wendell Sakiestewa |
Wendell Sakiestewa:
"My
experience in Designing Urban Street Wear for a
Celebrity Clientele has combined with my Native
Roots to help me produce the HopiWenSaks Line.
The success of the Line is driving the evolution
of my concept for opening my own Boutiques. I
am now scouting locations for the 1st.
Boutique and I am proud to say it will be in
Sedona, Arizona. The 2nd will be in
San Diego, California. Stay tuned for future
updates.
I would also like to pay my great respect to my
late father Michael Kabotie, he was a great
artist and has inspired me to keep creating and
moving forward in my field of Design. I will
miss him dearly but his “creative legacy”will
live on through me!"
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HopiWenSaks Clothing Line is Urban Contemporary, Hopi
Inspired by my Native Culture. Experience The Creative
Beauty of this Impressive Collection that Features
Beautifully Printed, Embellished, Embroidered Dress
Shirts, Pullovers, Tees, Tanks for both Men & Women.
Composed of a Wheel of Colors, A Variety Of Fabrics,
Rich Hand Tooled Details, Custom Fittings, these Designs
are Timeless and Irresistable. View the entire Line and
Purchase from the Online Catalog “HOPIWENSAKS.COM”.
Wendell Sakiestewa (pronounced “Sock-ee-ess-ta-wah”)
grew up in Arizona, surrounded by the creative arts of
his Hopi heritage. Wendell’s grandmother, a seamstress
and pattern-maker, taught him to sew, introduced him to
buying fabrics, showed him how to make and layout a
pattern. She nurtured his talents, and entered him in
every art contest she could and he won most of them! As
he got older, Wendell was encouraged to follow the
artistic family tradition and pursue crafts like
carving, jewelry, and painting. Creativity came
naturally to him, and he easily mastered any craft he
undertook, whether it was sewing, drawing, or beading.
While he loved the arts of his heritage, Wendell wanted
to try something new and different, so he decided on a
career in electrical engineering. He loved drawing
blueprints and schematics, and used these skills in a
job creating cockpit gears.
After five years in that profession, he was ready for a
change. Fascinated with interior design, though with no
formal interior design training, he had an insatiable
desire to learn and succeed! Sure enough, soon he was
busy with many interior design projects. He excelled,
working with fabrics, colors, and textures. He was on
the right track, but it would take one more leap to find
his true calling. He took his love of all that was
decorative about interiors and transferred it to fashion
design. Wendell enrolled in fashion courses at a local
community college and found a job designing swimwear.
With his newfound passion, Wendell decided to head for
LA and complete his fashion design education at FIDM. It
wasn’t easy, as Wendell financed everything on his own.
He was determined to follow his dream and had total
confidence in himself. While at FIDM, he interviewed for
a cashier’s position at Scott Hill, an upscale clothing
boutique in Beverly Hills. They were so impressed with
Wendell that they didn’t hire him as a cashier. Instead
they brought him on, as an assistant designer! Wendell
did it all, from managing, to taking inventory and
helping the store’s tailors. He was a
jack-of-all-trades! At Scott Hill, Wendell worked with
lots of celebrities arid it wasn’t out of the ordinary
for him to put together an entire outfit priced in the
$15,000 range! It’s there he met and befriended Keanu
Reeves. The boutique sold high-end clothing as well as
Scott Hill’s own line. After two months as assistant
designer, Wendell started controlling the manufacturing
of Scott Hill’s line from Italy, which meant lots of
Italian business trips! Wendell’s experience with Scott
Hill provided inspiration to succeed on his own.
After graduating from FIDM’s Fashion Design Program in
1996, Wendell worked for several companies designing
junior and missy wear. Confident that he could do
everything involved in producing a line, Wendell decided
to go freelance. Being able to do it all – design,
costing, production, and sales – is a major benefit of
his wide range of experience, now that he runs his own
business. He says, “Now, I wear many hats. It’s
stressful but rewarding!” Eventually he started
designing menswear and realized he particularly loves
the edginess of streetwear and is always miles ahead of
mainstream trends in his designs. His clothes do
particularly well on the East Coast and in China, which
Wendell appreciates: “I love knowing that people are
wearing my clothes all the way around the world!”
In one his first major engagements as a freelance
designer, he designed musician Smokey Robinson’s line of
children’s clothing, called BornStar. The BornStar was
line was featured in Earnshaw’s magazine, a journal
focused on children’s clothing, in February 2000. That
success led to a high-profile collaboration with Tyrone
Barry III, and Snoop Doggy Dog. Tyrone Barry III was
launching a line of urban apparel called Motavate,
inspired by the rap superstar. Wendell explains, “I
vibed with Snoop and we went from there!”
In January 2001, FIDM’s Career Center helped Wendell
make a stellar celebrity connection. Madonna’s
guitarist, Monty Pittman, called FIDM looking for a
designer to create costumes for a major media event, the
premier of the movie Snatch, starring Benicio Del Toro
and Brad Pitt. So where is the Madonna connection?
Snatch was written and directed by Madonna’s then
husband, Guy Ritchie, and some of her band members
performed in the film. The Career Center knew the
perfect designer for the job – Wendell! He met with
Monty that same week to discuss the style they were
going for. Within one day, Wendell completed a series of
sketches and fabrications. It was Madonna herself, who
had to approve his designs, and she loved them! Monty
wore Wendell’s striped cotton zoot suit to the premier
and was bombarded with one question: “Who’s your
designer?” Realizing his last name was somewhat
difficult to pronounce, Wendell had armed Monty with
business cards to hand out.
In 2004, Wendell took on a new celebrity client,
champion boxer, Fernando Vargas, El Feroz. Vargas
contacted Wendell through FIDM. They met, vibed and
immediately started to work on concepts for Vargas’
urban male clothing line, creating Nawshis Clothing
Company (“Nawshis” ~ “nauseous”). Finding inspiration in
everthing about the “straight out of Oxnard” Fernando –
his attitude, aggression and lifestyle – Wendell says,
“I stepped into his energy and created a marketable,
sharp clothing line.” The new company’s line was
unveiled at the MAGIC Marketplace in Las Vegas in late
August, 2004. Wendell has continued to create fight
clothing gear for Fernando Vargas, into 2008.
One creative area of the business, which has attracted
Wendell’s interest, is the styling and staging of
photoshoots promoting the clothing. Wendell received an
early credit in Earnshaw’s for a photoshoot at Smokey
Robinson’s home, featuring the BornStar line. More
recently, he has earned credits in the pre-Magic issue
of DNR (August 23, 2004), in the Lexani Lifestyles
magazine, and Downlow Magazine, relating to the Nawshis
clothing line.
Outside of the world of celebrity clients, Wendell has
had a major success in support of Special Ops Paintball,
a supplier of clothing, equipment and accessories to
those participating in the sport of woods paintball.
Beginning in 2003, Wendell designed their Marauder line,
featuring a jersey and pants in cotton ripstock, as well
as their Fusion line, featuring a jersey in polyester
and their Fusion pants, in cordura. The Fusion and
Marauder products were featured in the premiere issue of
RECON, a magazine focused on woods paintball, in June
2005. In addition to the designing the prototypes,
Wendell supervised their initial, small-scale U.S.
production, and supported the transfer of production to
China, as the line’s sales grew into the half-million
dollar range. The line has continued with great success
into 2008.
In 2007, Wendell began a collaboration with entrepreneur
Jason Keston, who was planning to launch 4Boys Gear,
marketing a new line of modern urban men’s underwear and
swimwear, made in America. 4boysgear.com is now a
dynamic and interactive full ecommerce website,
featuring Wendell’s high style, high performance
designs.
Doug Donehoo, a former private banker and environmental
activist, in 2008, sought Wendell's support for 4-rth
("for earth"), a unique venture that aims "to combine
the most comfortable and durable eco-friendly fabrics
with unique fashion design for superior fit and style."
The 4-rth.com website is marketing men's and women's
sportswear, manufactured in Los Angeles, and using
Wendell's designs.
In 2009, Wendell began a collaboration with Evade Armor,
(evadearmor.com) a company seeking to bring a
revolutionary sense of style to sports fishing and
hunting. Wendell’s designs combine sharp design with
highly functional features and fabric choices. His Evade
UV Protecting shirt is made from a breathable dimple
mesh that has been coated with the latest UV absorbing
protectant, and includes Micro mesh vent sides to
maximize breathability. His design for the Utility Short
is made of a high strength nylon material, which
provides a light weight feel and dries out fast,
includes two heavy duty velcro straps to adjust fit, two
large cargo style pockets on each leg, and a easy access
reinforced plier pocket, all features desired by sports
fishermen.
Late in 2009, Wendell began working with Baller Jeans,
creating jean and t-shirt lines for the startup,
incorporating a patented, functional pocket design in
the jeans. Wendell has been coordinating the creation of
the clothing and associated graphics, prior to the
launching of the line in 2010 at the MAGIC tradeshow in
Las Vegas in February 2010.
What’s in the future for this determined young designer?
One personal goal -- his own clothing line inspired by
his Hopi Native American roots – came to fruition in
2007 with a men’s line featuring Hopi symbols as design
elements. In late 2008, he launched his women’s line,
featuring creatively embellished tops and bottoms. His
work can be seen on the website, http://hopiwensaks.nativeart.net,
as well as on his Online Catalog website, http://hopiwensaks.com.
The authenticity of these nevertheless fully
contemporary designs is attested by the extensive
attention they’ve received. Some of the creations from
the men’s line were featured in Native Peoples Arts and
Lifeways magazine, May-June 2006 and, again, in the
Sept-Oct 2006 issue. Indian Country Today Tourism and
Gaming 2006 also featured his work, as did the National
Museum of the American Indian (Smithsonian) magazine’s
Sept-Oct issue. Channel 12 Phoenix reported on his work.
Four of his clothing pieces were featured in a 2006
Fashion Show at the Indian Craft Shop & Interior Museum
in Washington, D.C., part of a ten day celebration of
The American Indian Influence in Fashion. Subsequently,
in 2007, one men’s pants and one shirt from his line
were chosen for display alongside items from the
permanent collection of the Interior Department Museum,
in a nearly year-long museum exhibit titled, Reinventing
Tradition: American Indian Design in Contemporary
Clothing.
Wendell’s father, the great Hopi artist, Michael Kabotie,
passed in October 2009. Inspired by his father’s work
and memory, Wendell has been re-designing his own,
hopiwensaks clothing line, and plans to launched the new
designs at the Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair and Market
in Phoenix, March 2010. The Signature Artist for this
year’s Fair was Michael Kabotie.
Wendell’s work is on a new website,
http://wensaksdesigns.com, which provides a complete
overview of his designs and achievements in the fashion
industry.
Continue to see Wendell's designs
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www.hopiwensaks.com
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