‘I CAN’T TELL WORKERS TO WORK OVERNIGHT AND GO HOME TO SLEEP WITH MY WIFE’ – Yomi Casual
By OKI SAMSON
Olorunyomi Makun, CEO, Yomi Casual
Yomi Casuals is a hugely successful and acclaimed brand in Nigeria’s bustling fashion industry. But intense creativity, dexterity, effort, attention to detail and much more is involved in the fast rising fashion outfit. The brand may choose to be known as ‘casual’ but it’s activities in no way casual but serious business.
The brain behind the concept Mr. Olorunyomi Makun spent time with OKI SAMSON of Trek Africa Newspapers and discussed varying issues ranging from his trade, marriage, politics, and relationship with his brother Ayo Makun of AY Live, and so on.
It is a beautiful read!
Trek Africa: Can we meet you?
Yomi Casual: My name is Makun Omoniyi Olorunyomi. I am a fashion designer. The MD/CEO of Yomi Casuals, Lekki, Lagos.
Trek Africa: Why did you come about the name ‘casual’, what are you aiming at?
Yomi Casual: ‘Casual’ that is the way I see my kind of designs but people call and say ‘Yomi this is not casual, this is serious’, but then ‘casual’ is not meant to be boring even though it is serious. That is my definition of ‘casual’.
Yomi Casual on a Runway
Trek Africa: What influences your arts?
Yomi Casual: It is inborn for me, sometimes I sketch and I am amazed ‘how did you come up with this?’ I just get inspired, I just give it all to God because He is the One that gives talent. I get inspired about my environment as well in the sense that if I see an object I can think how I can infuse that style on fabrics.
Trek Africa: Since the inception of your corporate office in Lekki, how has it been?
Yomi Casual: It is been good. I got an advice from a client when I was still on the mainland who told me if you want money, you have to come to money money will not come to you. We can’t keep looking for you on the mainland, we are your money we can’t keep chasing you, you have to find a store on the island. But then, the Surulere store at some point was also cashing out because Surulere is the fashion hub and is the centre for Lagos mainland.
Trek Africa: As a married man, how is business in relation to living up to the standard?
Yomi Casual: Everything is working, I thank God, because it was a fear for me. How do I cope getting married because sometimes I have to sleep in the office to get jobs done. I am not a kind of boss that will ask workers to work overnight while I go home to sleep with my wife. But thank God everything is falling into place and that is where the part of getting a good woman comes in, a woman who understand your business, she knows my kind of job before she made up her mind to marry me. If I tell her I am passing the night in the office, she is quite sure that’s where I will be and that’s where trust comes in.
Trek Africa: Your customers are yearning for more creative works, how do you go about this?
Yomi Casual: I have been giving them and I will still do it. But many people that you will see online asking for new designs are only looking for who to copy not because they want to patronise you. If you check many of them, they are tailors. Well, I dropped some designs four months ago and I will do another one soon.
Trek Africa: There is this argument that your clients are sourced by your brother Ayo ‘AY’ Makun, what do you have to say?
Yomi Casual: That’s a big lie. Most of my customers have not even met AY one on one. Some are even shocked when they know that he is my brother because I don’t go around telling them about it, so they will say ‘you are so humble’. I am trying to build a brand myself, I don’t want a situation where they will keep saying ‘AY’s brother’ everywhere you go. Forget the argument, however, people will always talk.
Trek Africa: There are also insinuations that you are in public glare because you have political affiliations, can you clear the air?
Yomi Casual: I am not thinking in that direction at all. I can’t even go for the smallest post. I love the entertainment industry, I am comfortable with my tailoring job. This is what have brought me this far, I married, I drive the best of cars.
Trek Africa: Will you venture into other areas soon?
Yomi Casual: I might if it is what I like. I love cars, my friends know I love cars, I will go into car upgrade ‘pimp my ride’ soon, importation of tyres, anything that has to do with cars.
Trek Africa: Could we say cars are like your best kept secret?
Yomi Casual: Of course not. You will know that soon and that’s why it is called a secret.
Trek Africa: Which personality would you like to style?
Yomi Casual: Not one in particular. I think Akinwumi Ambode, he is stylish, energetic and fun to be with. Generally, I like stylish men, I like men who love to look good, if you love to look good, you are my man.
Trek Africa: What will be your advice to the incoming governments, perhaps in terms of style and fashion?
Yomi Casual: Everybody has their style. So I can’t say Mr. A this is how you should dress when you appear in public. Everybody would wear whatever they are comfortable with and that is what style is all about. You can’t wear me if you are not okay with me. And I always tell my clients, ‘some will say I have my wedding and I say this on Ebuka I would like to dress like him’ and I will tell them you are not like Ebuka. You don’t have the same frame. Ebuka is tall, slim, has flat-tummy while you are brief and chubby, so you can’t wear this. I will always offer my advice. Sometimes I may not even do the outfit because my name will be on that outfit and people will see it and say Yomi you call yourself a stylist and you can’t even advice your client. So my advice to our incoming top executives is to wear you, just look good.
Trek Africa: What do you think will be the economic benefits if all creative artists, entertainers decide to come together for the country’s good?
Yomi Casual: Definitely, we will have a better Nigeria, we will have a better industry. The fashion industry is big business all around the world. When you travel to Paris, London, what your folks will say is buy me shirt when you are coming. Why don’t they say that about Nigeria? It is because there is nothing to buy or it is not affordable. The industry there is large where they can do mass production and it is government-enabled. The mass production factories we have in Nigeria are not standard. If we had standard ones, it would have made life easy for me because all I have to do is sketch my designs, take my designs to the factory, do fabric selection, tell them to give me 50 of this, 200 of that, get my trademark so that no one can copy it. And that’s another area we need to focus on in Nigeria, the aspect of copyrights. This can make designers billionaires because everybody wear clothes and still want to look good, no matter how broke.
Trek Africa: How do you rate journalists in terms of fashion and style?
Yomi Casual: It is just a general thing. Just as we have stylish lawyers, we have stylist journalists while we have some that don’t pay attention to fashion, anything goes. They will say I am a pressman I don’t have to look good as long as I have my ID card. But it should not be so! Dress the way you want to be addressed, it works like magic.
Trek Africa: How do you rate fashion designers?
Yomi Casual: I will give kudos to Mudi, he is no. 1 in Africa. But I also think everybody is trying, I am highly impressed. The industry is growing, the earlier we understand that the market is big enough then we can live as one.
