One of the businesses purchased through Liverpool City Council's 'Shops for a pound' scheme has opened on Smithdown Road.
Taya Hughes has recently opened her ‘Seven Streets’ Fashion Designer Boutique.
Liverpool City Council’s Shop for £1 Business scheme saw ‘Seven Streets’ fashion boutique open for business on December 18 and the store will have an official opening in 2022.
Taya will offer her own unique brands Seven Streets, Tayamika and Tayameca as well as other brands from at least 15 local designers.
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Following her debut in Liverpool's Fashion Week (LFW) in 2015 Taya set up her own clothing brand.
In 2016 Taya applied for the Liverpool City Council scheme which offered premises to set up a business but required that you have the premises refurbished after purchasing it for £1.
This changed and a developer paid for the refurbishment under a revised scheme and following this business owners, such as Taya, pay £1 rent per week for the first three years in order to help her business get off the ground.
After years in the waiting Taya finally held a pre launch of Seven Streets on December 18 and is now open for business with an official 2022 launch set for February 4.
Sky Arts producers noted her designs on Taya’s website while looking for Liverpool based designers and chose her for the programme 'Statues Re-imagined’ which aired on Sky Arts earlier this year.
Taya told the ECHO : "I completely got what they wanted to achieve. The producers made sure I was comfortable, given there was some controversy around what we were doing to statues.
“I picked three explorers (outside Sefton Park Palm House) and re-imagined them in a fair exchange in going to Africa (given their links to slavery) Only this time appreciating things they saw and coming away with fabrics not people.
“Picturing the Ruff Collars traditionally worn by the very wealthy, like Kings and Queens, I wanted to put a positive image to the statues by reflecting culture using fabrics.
Anne, Princess Royal viewed Taya’s work outside the Palm House in Sefton Park.
“The association of West Africa and Ghana using traditional colours, Australia and the Caribbean in particular where I used the colour blue to represent the ocean crossings and the seas around the islands.
“I wanted to provoke the imagination of people”.
Following Taya’s 2015 debut in LFW she attended a fashion event in Bristol as the only person invited from outside that locality.
Exploring what was happening in Bristol Taya noted that collaboration between independent brand labels was taking place and this gave her the idea to start something similar in Liverpool, due to not seeing anything like this happening.
Taya said: “I know how hard it is to get designs stocked in city centre stores. They go with traditional and not independent labels.”
Taking her inspiration from Liverpool originally starting off with about seven streets gave rise to Taya’s brand name Seven Streets.
The name Tayamika is inspired from her African origins, as she was born in Zimbabwe and her father came from Malawi.
The Tayameca brand which is pronounced the same was inspired by a dream and gave rise to that label name.
Arriving in the UK, from Zimbabwe, in her teens Taya studied electrical engineering in London.
After getting her diploma she later studied and became a qualified accountant, which she said "serves her well as a business owner.”
Taya left London and added: “When I moved to Liverpool in 2010 I wanted a fresh start as art was in my life from school.
She attended Liverpool City College and did a diploma in Art and Fashion design from 2010 - 2012.
Taya liked upcycling clothes and would make a handbag from a pair of jeans, a dress using several scarves and has as her concept idea; redesigning wedding dresses.
Many designs caught the eyes of friends and family when attending social functions as Taya would make a whole outfit. This led to her making outfits for family friends.
Due to starting a family Taya did not go to London as planned to do internships at fashion houses, so she set up her own fashion brand.
She said: “My shop is a new chapter.”
In 2016 Taya won a design award at the Liberty Fashion competition held in London. Three years later in 2019 she won the Pacesetters fashion award in Liverpool.
The Pacesetters Business Expo is organised to bring entrepreneurs, start-up ventures and small businesses together from different walks of life to showcase their products and services in order to create awareness in the community. An event held each year since 2017.
Following this success in 2020 she won the GAB (Gathering of Africa’s Best) award for her contribution to promoting a positive image of Africa and African fashion.
In the future Taya will also design men's fashion items.
