23/09/2026
Kambarang 💛💙🩷 From artwork to runway.
Seven Noongar artists. Seven unique expressions of Country. One very special collection.
Noongar Arts Fashion is an artist-led collective operating from Wilger Mia – Bunbury Regional Art Gallery on Wardandi Country.
For the Kambarang collection, artists spent time on Country absorbing the colours, light and textures of the Noongar season of transformation and birth — golden wattle, vibrant kangaroo paws, delicate orchids and everlastings sweeping across the landscape.
Those experiences became original artworks, translated directly onto fabric through screen printing, block printing, eco-dyeing and hand painting.
This was our second time working with the Bunbury Noongar Arts Program and our second time creating looks destined for the Country to Couture runway.
Projects like this are some of our favourites because they don’t have to begin with a conventional fashion design.
They can begin with an artwork. A piece of hand-painted fabric. An idea. A story. Or simply, “Could we turn this into a dress?”
From there, we can work together on the technical side — developing the garment, patterns and samples, working out how best to use the artwork placement, and cutting and constructing the final pieces.
So if you’re an Indigenous artist, designer or arts centre looking towards Country to Couture next year, don’t be put off because garment development isn’t what you normally do.
Bring us what you can imagine, and we’ll help you work out how to make it. ✂️
Swipe through to see Kambarang go from fabric and the cutting table to the runway in Darwin →
Artists:
Shannon Clohessy Shannon Clohessy
Charlotte Ugle
Kathy Ugle
Violet Coyne
Dawn Alone
Rhona Wallum
Lera Bennell
Organised by the amazing Candice Nannup Candice Nannup 💛💙🩷
Follow Noongar Arts Fashion Bunbury Regional Art Gallery
Indigenous Fashion Projects Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair Bunbury Regional Art Gallery
📷 Runway photography: Benjamin Warlngundu Ellis
FirstNationsFashion IndigenousArt
