Eat, travel and play with Havaianas

There was a true, rustic exuberance and spontaneous joy at the launch party for the newest edition of Havaianas Filipinas 2015  with the theme Lasap, Lakbay, and Laro, as interpreted by Abbey Sy, Alessandra Lanot, and Patrick Cabral.

Everyone wants to feel like a kid again, right? There is so much fun with simplicity,” declares Anne Gonzalez, managing director of Havaianas Philippines. “The big idea for Filipinas 2015 was to collaborate with young Filipino artists true to the brand’s direction to constantly evolve and renew the customer experience while still evoking some feeling of nostalgia. We are a heritage brand, so we have a strong DNA, but we also have to be current. It may sound funny, but we’re taking things forward by going back.” She then shares a very personal insight. “This is a true story. Recently, I heard my youngest, she’s now seven years old, just squealing with laughter. Then she came in with some chalk, and told me that her yaya just taught her how to play patintero, and she was loving it.” This pure, lovely and unadulterated fun mark the look and feel of this new collection.

There was a true, rustic exuberance and spontaneous joy at the launch party for the newest edition of Havaianas Filipinas 2015, in line with their theme of Lasap, Lakbay, and Laro, as interpreted by young artists Abbey Sy, Alessandra Lanot, and Patrick Cabral. The look was of a summer picnic with lawn furniture strewn about, street food carts and even a sky-blue VW Combi, an evocative throwback fun ride.

“The kids today grew up in the digital age, and they are now discovering the handmade and the direct connection with material.” Jon Syjuco, a partner in Havaianas Filipinas, concurs. “Everyone now loves calligraphy, my wife just loves it, so taking that theme and reinterpreting Filipino themes in line with that makes this our most relatable Filipinas collection. Our principals in Brazil are very careful and particular with these collaborations, but they also recognize how strong this market is, and they love this line.”

On zoning on the three main themes of food, travel and play, Anne says simply, “Again, it all goes back to relevance. If you look at what people post on social media, it’s mostly food and travel. And then we really wanted to have that feeling of play, to keep things light and youthful.”

When I cheekily put Anne on the spot and ask her to name a favorite of the three designs, she just smiles and confesses, “I can’t name a favorite! Every time we do the Filipinas series, I always get all the designs, because it’s ours. It’s a way of showing off the best of us.”

Lasap: in good taste

Alessandra Lanot, who is both a watercolor artist and a restaurateur, chose to focus on everyone’s favorite childhood treat, sorbetes. “But I wanted to elevate the idea by using black and gold. We think of sorbetes as a street food, but with the color scheme, I wanted to come up with something unexpected; the color scheme just says it all. I love to doodle with the calligraphy pen, and in the final design that is my real handwriting. So its really very personal.” She gushes that denim shorts and Havaianas was her daily college uniform. “This project is a way of coming home.”

Asked to sum up her final design in just three words, she says, “Sleek. Feminine. Filipino.”

At the launch, everyone was seen holding a cone (or a mini-pandesal) of sorbetes, counting calories temporarily forgotten for the day. Is there anyone who doesn’t love ice cream? The dichotomy of an everyday pleasure of dirty ice cream with the easy chic of a metallic and black classic combo is a limited edition with limitless possibilities.

Lakbay: travel time

Abbey Sy admits, “Everything that I included in my design is something that I believe in. ‘Explore the unknown.’ ‘Adventure awaits.’ And then combining these (mantras) with words associated with travel around the Philippines was new and fun for me. Ever since I was a child, I have been really attracted to traveling.”

And to reinforce the local quality of her design, she tweaked the colors of the Filipino flag. “What I did was I used all the colors in the flag, but I changed the tones and treatment, so it’s not that literal. The base color is blue, since we are really known for our beaches so the sea had to be represented.”

One look at Abbey’s design will put one in a good mood. It’s a visual equivalent of a happy song or loved one’s voice. To represent her design, a VW Combi was tricked out with surfboards, and this emblematic and evocative van was certainly an IG sensation. It captured the anticipation and giddiness that comes with living life adventurously. And just to sum up the theme of traveling, Abbey came up with three words to sum up her work. “Fun. Playful. Adventurous.”

Laro: let the games begin

Digital artist Patrick Cabral is the quintessential example of how looking back can bring one forward. As a child in Camarines Sur in the Bicol region, he spent his days outdoors, and now that he develops web games, he asserts, “Play is the foundation of what I do. I like to say that I don’t have clients, just people around me who spark my curiosity.” Curiously enough, Patrick admits that he designed the first website for Havaianas Philippines when they first launched and that those first designs inspired the look of his graphic design.

“One of the artists who worked with Havaianas, Adhemas Batista, was an artist I really admired. So this is really a big thing for me.” When asked to describe his creative process for his design, he says, “The games that I included in my design were really my favorite games when I was a kid. And then I just added images of scissors and rocks because of bato-bato pick.” He sees the final result as “Playful. Nostalgic. Fun.” The Pinoy games booth was one of the most popular attractions of the launch, as most guests tried to outdo each other in knocking out the cans in the Tumbang Preso set-up.

When we slip on our slippers, we seldom stop to think of it. It is just an act among many acts in the day. But when we don our slippers, it is a kind of ritual. We have stepped out of formality and rigidity and are revealing our unvarnished selves. We might as well slip into not just something that’s more comfortable but more essential, more real, more us. And what could be more real, more true, than the inner child?

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The Havaianas Filipinas 2015 collection is now available at select Havaianas retailers nationwide for P1,195. To know more about the Havaianas Filipinas 2015 collection and the creative young talents who made them, follow HavaianasPhilippines on facebook and @havaianasphils on Twitter and Instagram.