Santa Fe, New Mexico has become the center of Indigenous fashion, with more than 50 designers, all from the U.S. and Canada, presenting runway collections at the second annual Native Fashion Week that ended Sunday.

The week kicked off with a sunset cocktail party and designer preview aboard the scenic Sky Railway train owned by “Game of Thrones” creator George RR Martin, and included shows, designer panels, and shopping events across multiple venues.

“My goal of Native Fashion Week was to have New York come here, and you are New York fashion,’ said Amber Dawn Bear Robe, the curator and art historian who produced Native Fashion Week at the Santa Fe Railyard, welcoming CFDA CEO Steven Kolb to a panel discussion with designer Jamie Okuma, the first Indigenous CFDA member.

A Luiseno, Shoshone-Bannock, Wailaki, and Okinawan who is also an enrolled member of the La Jolla band of Indians in Southern California where she lives, Okuma was included in the 2022 “In America: An Anthology of Fashion” Costume Institute exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art when head curator Andrew Bolton recommended her to the CFDA.

“It’s been so amazing, and I am so thankful…I just wanted to know it was based on my creativity, my artwork, my body of work, and not just because I’m an Indigenous person,” said Okuma, who started out as a fine artist with her exquisite beaded creations, including designer shoes, landing in museum collections before she segued into ready-to-wear and runway.

“Jamie didn’t become a member because she’s an Indigenous designer; she became a member because she’s a really good designer,” Kolb said during the discussion about diversity in fashion. “It’s been hard for some communities to break into the system, and many people see the CFDA as representing the system because we’ve been around for so many years. We know that to give designers an opportunity – whether they’re Indigenous, Black, Asian or queer – we need to create programs that give them an upper hand. And now, given the current climate and the politics in Washington, that’s more important than ever.”

Kolb mentioned several existing programs that could potentially provide templates for supporting the Indigenous community, including the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund; the CFDA | Genesis House AAPI Design + Innovation Grant, now in its third year of awarding resources and funding to designers, and the Tiffany & Co. x CFDA Jewelry Designer Award, which recognizes outstanding American jewelry designers committed to driving inclusivity within the design industry with a one-year paid fellowship within Tiffany & Co.’s design department.

He praised the power of community in Santa Fe, where regional press joined customers this week. “For growth, it’s about identifying the talent to best represent Indigenous design in fashion capitals like New York and perhaps creating a showcase during New York Fashion Week,” Kolb said.

There were plenty of designers who could be in the running for that, including Okuma, who has seen success with a slow and steady approach, presenting collections on her own timetable, producing her clothing in L.A., and selling direct-to-consumer as well as on-demand through the Earth to Wear platform.

“I don’t want to take on partners. I’m not looking for that kind of capital where I’m beholden to somebody right now,” said the designer, who has a museum retrospective slated for 2027. “I have grown pretty drastically and yes it’s slow and corporate business doesn’t like it because they are always like ‘we need it now.’ But the way I’m doing it is working.”

“Most successful designers focus on the work, the product, the creativity, and what comes from that is their success,” said Kolb.

Throughout the weekend, seasoned and up-and-coming designers demonstrated different styles and approaches from red carpet to street, one-of-one art pieces to full ready-to-wear collections. They showed at events organized by Bear Robe and other local fashion players, as well as the Southwestern Association of Indian Arts, which also produces runway shows during Santa Fe’s annual Indian Market in August, often incorporating singing, hoop dancing, even skateboarding on the runway.

Stars of hit TV show “Dark Winds” came out to support—and walk the runway–along with “The Walking Dead” actor Norman Reedus, and former Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland, the first Native American to serve as a U.S. cabinet secretary, who hit the front row.

On Friday night, Amy Denet Deal, a design executive for brands including Puma and Reebok before discovering her Diné roots and starting Santa Fe’s 4Kinship retail store and sustainable fashion brand, hosted “What Sets Us Apart.” The celebration of Indigenous creativity and futurism at the Container Turner Caroll Contemporary Art Space featured the work of queer Diné artists Evan Benally Atwood, Nate Lemeul, and Raven Bright, and a dance performance by queer Burqueno Latinx artist Gabriel Carrion-Gonzales, as well as Indo-Hispano/ Mestizo LVMH Prize semi-finalist Josh Tafoya’s punk rock handwoven wearable art suspended from the ceiling in a dramatic display.

“The idea was that each of us come to our indigeneity in our own way. I’ve been bullied because of mine and other people have, too. We wanted to create conversation about that,” said Deal, who also debuted her first clothing collection made from upcycled Pendleton wool remnants, parachute fabric and crochet doilies at the shipping container-turned-gallery. She built the collection around Tlingit jewelry designer Jennifer Younger’s new pieces.

At the Santa Fe Community Convention Center, SWAIA partnered with Vancouver Fashion Week on a “north meets south” showcase, said the organization’s executive director Jamie Schulze. Highlights included beaded dresses and slogan T-shirts (“It was on the rez before it was on the runway”) from Vividus sportswear’s Kasha Pomo;  Miwok, Cree Filipino Ilocano designer Tierra Alysia; one-of-a-kind trade cloth jackets and a pink embroidered princess coat by Dene and Blackfoot designer Livia Many Wounds’ Dancing Storm Designs; and woven tie-shirts and dresses by textile artist Rhiannon Grieco, a weaver with Spanish and Tohono O’odham ancestry.

Arikara, Hidatsa, Blackfeet and Plains Cree designer Lauren Good Day showed two collections, one color and print-focused referencing her ledger drawings for her contemporary fashion fans, and another more experimental, using natural fabrications and a neutral color palette.

At Bear Robe’s Native Fashion Week Railyard shows, Jeremy Donavan Arviso’s Original Landlords brand presented a vision of Native prep, including T-shirts, ponchos and khaki pants with his creative interpretation of the Polo Pony as a chief with a tomahawk.

Artist and designer Korina Emmerich, co-founder of the Relative Arts showcase for Indigenous fashion in New York, showed bold tailoring and fringed dresses under her Emme Studio line, celebrating her heritage from the Puyallup tribe, while Creator’s Kidz Co. designer Dr. B. Day Day, who is African American and Coast Salish, Tlingit, Kwakwaka/wakw, debuted his creative menswear with interesting tailoring and craft details.

Canada’s Pamela Baker (Squamish/Kwakiutl/Tlingit/Haida) made a powerful statement about Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women with her blood red gown picturing the faces of many of the women lost. The “Threaded Lineage” debut runway collection from Nonamey also stirred emotion. Lukas Arthur, an Ojibwe Anishinaabe artist/designer who recently created the windows for the Hermès store in New York, used his hand-painted upcycled ladylike pieces as a canvas to tell stories of stolen land, his family members who have been the victims of violence, and more.

Participating in a panel discussion earlier in the week, he spoke poignantly about the common thread of loss among many Native designers, while also sounding a hopeful note about the power of creative resilience and innovation. “The future of Indigenous fashion is you may recognize ceremonial regalia or not.”

The possibilities are endless.