LONDON — Nensi Dojaka’s namesake label is only two years old, but her second solo outing during London Fashion Week may be one of the week’s most anticipated runway shows in a season devoid of usual anchors like Burberry and Victoria Beckham.

On Saturday, the designer best known for her flesh-baring mini-dresses and sensual, lingerie-inspired designs will reveal her new collection at the disused Selfridges Hotel behind the famed luxury department store. Pops of pink and pastel green are peppered in and among her preferred palette of blacks and mauves, while the usual array of cutout mini-dresses and intricate bustiers are joined by more wearable items like jackets, swimsuits and jersey dresses.

“This moment is important because there’s a lot of eyes on the brand,” Dojaka told BoF at a preview in her North London studio. “So it’s important to keep going, show something new, show a bit more of what the brand can be.”

It’s been a whirlwind of a pandemic for Dojaka, whose breakout moment came amid one of the toughest business environments the industry has ever faced. After amassing a celebrity fanbase and securing top stockists like Matchesfashion and MyTheresa, she scooped up the Fashion Award for emerging designer talent, as well as the prestigious LVMH Prize. The latter landed her a €300,000 grant and a year-long mentorship from LVMH executive Sophie Brocart.

Now Dojaka is eyeing the next stage of her label’s development, ramping up production capabilities and gradually expanding her distribution, while simultaneously building out her collections to include a wider range of categories. She’s hoping to balance two goals, reinforcing her precise brand identity while commercialising her aesthetic for a broader audience.

“I would hate to describe it as sexualised,” she said of her signature look. “It’s about using the sexiness almost like a power play; it’s more about the woman taking control of the gaze. The clothes are sexy, but they’re for the women, about the women.”

Dojaka, who originally hails from Albania, moved to London in her late teens and went on to study lingerie design at the London College of Fashion. After an internship at dressmaker Peter Pilotto inspired her to pursue a career in womenswear, she completed the prestigious Fashion MA course at London’s Central Saint Martins, where her background in lingerie was instantly recognisable in her creations.

In 2019, Dojaka’s graduate collection, a mix of sensual mini-dresses and underwear pieces, featured a firm nod to 1990s and early 2000s culture just as fashion’s Millennium nostalgia trend was gaining steam. Ssense snapped up pieces from the collection, and by the time London Fashion Week rolled around in February 2020, Dojaka had secured a spot on the official schedule as part of Lulu Kennedy’s Fashion East programme for nurturing promising new design talent.

Dojaka’s work stood out “for its super elevated aesthetic and technique,” Kennedy said. “It wasn’t like students’ work; it already looked on its way to being a brand.”

While her Spring Summer 2021 show with Fashion East had to be moved online due to coronavirus restrictions, the collection was nonetheless a “turning point” for the young brand, Dojaka said. On the creative side, she went beyond minidresses and lingerie pieces to create a more rounded-out offering.

And, as luck would have it, the collection coincided with “the Bella Hadid moment,” when the model wore a full look by the designer to the MTV Video Music Awards and an internet frenzy ensued. “It brought attention, I think that’s how a lot of buyers found out about the brand,” Dojaka said.

Soon, a string of A-List “It” girls — including Dua Lipa, Rihanna, Hailey Bieber and Zendaya — had championed Dojaka’s designs on their Instagram pages and on the red carpet. As the world emerged out of lockdowns, demand for partywear skyrocketed and Dojaka’s star continued to rise. Last year, her products cracked Lyst’s quarterly ranking of fashion’s top 10 hottest products twice, alongside big luxury brands like Gucci and Balenciaga.

<b>“It’s about using the sexiness almost like a power play, it’s more about the woman taking control of the gaze.”</b>

Retailers have taken notice, too. Over the last 12 months, Dojaka has grown her list of stockists from 25 to 60, with orders for her Spring Summer 2022 collection — the first to benefit from a solo runway show — up more than five-fold year on year.

At Browns, the brand found “instant success,” according to the retailer’s womenswear buying director Ida Petersson, who first bought into the brand for Autumn Winter 2021. “Most pieces only stay[ed] in-store or online for a couple of hours before selling out,” she said.

“It’s never vulgar,” said Marco Vianello, vice president of sales and business development at Tomorrow, the showroom turned brand accelerator that now handles Dojaka’s sales and distribution. “Her clothes in fact are extremely soulful and feminine, but there is also very accurate attention to detail, which delivered that perfect balance between something that is a little bit more vulnerable and sensitive to something that is a little bit more severe.”

To be sure, Dojaka is coming up in an industry that tends to break more young indie designers than it makes. Turning industry buzz into a viable business isn’t easy. The wholesale system, which Dojaka relies on for 100 percent of revenue, is under immense pressure.

While Dojaka’s bootstrapped brand is still in its infancy, with an in-house team that consists of just her and two colleagues, the LVMH Prize last fall has given her the possibility to think bigger. Dojaka moved her production from the UK to Italy, where factories are more specialised in producing high-quality garments and can handle larger production runs, she said. Working with Tomorrow, she hopes to ramp up distribution gradually, adding one “star” retailer per season.

She’s also investing in branching out beyond the flirty dresses and lingerie pieces she’s best known for to create a more holistic Nensi Dojaka brand universe. This season sees her segue into outerwear and knitwear for the first time, which sits alongside other pieces like tailored jumpsuits and a beige sequin maxi dress.

Swimsuits also return (“I’m passing them off as tops for the show,” she laughed, “It’s a secret!”). The category performed strongly with buyers last season thanks to its wearability and lower price point, according to the designer.

Dojaka’s category development could help the brand to cater to a broader spectrum of women, and not just those with model-esque physiques. Her upcoming collection incorporates new materials that provide more stretch, like velvet and ribbed jersey, allowing her to translate her aesthetic into pieces that women with a range of body types can wear with confidence, while adjustable straps are worked into designs to cater to a variety of breast sizes. Outerwear could open the brand to clients that prefer a less revealing look.

“If I was wearing a dress, I would never wear it like that,” she said, referring to one of her more skin-baring designs. “I will be wearing it styled with something, or a bit more covered. So I’m trying to think more in that way, to show people how they could wear it. That’s where the rest of the clothes come [in].”

Shoes, which Dojaka first introduced last season, are also a focus. Meanwhile, she’s dipping a toe into the jewellery space via a capsule created in collaboration with jewellery brand Andrew Bunney.

Buyers are betting the brand will continue to resonate with their customers.

“There is obviously a strong sexy younger customer who really resonates with the styling and look of the product, but the collection is so sophisticated we are seeing a wide range of customers really engaging with [it],” said Liane Wiggins, head of womenswear at Matchesfashion. “Nensi has an amazing talent for offering sexy, modern, relevant dressing, to make women feel empowered.”