Continuing Afa Ah Loo’s legacy, fellow fashion designers finish last design for upcoming wedding

SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — A fellow fashion designer is working to finish a wedding dress for an upcoming wedding that Afa Ah Loo designed and began fitting before his tragic death during the ‘No Kings’ protest in Salt Lake City.

ABC4.com spoke with Natalie Workman, a fashion designer who shared a design studio with Afa Ah Loo, and who is continuing his work by finishing his design for this wedding dress.

“Afa was the best, most community-oriented person that I know,” she said. “It was always very inspiring, just considering that we’re in the same business–fashion designers–it was always very community-over-competition relationship, and he had that with so many people. His community was huge. I would say the whole world is Afa’s community.”

She continued that everyone would agree that Ah Loo was incredibly generous and talented. “I think probably just the amount of lives he touched with his just massive heart, is probably the most important thing about him,” she said.

Workman said that following his death, she knew Ah Loo had a wedding dress coming up that was due, and that he had fitted a first draft of the dress, but it was not complete. The problem was that she didn’t know who it belonged to, so she posted it on Instagram.

“And this is just a testament to his community orientation too, so many people shared it, and then I even had multiple designers reach out to help,” Workman explained. “So, there are just so many people that wanted to help because that is his legacy, that’s who he was. It was just honestly healing in this time where we’re very sad.”

Workman said that she thinks that many of Ah Loo’s clients were people he was connected to personally, and this client in particular was someone he knew.

The bride who will wear this dress is Tiana Otu. “He just made me fall in love with a dress that I hadn’t even seen,” she said. “And it truly breaks me that, you know, I won’t be able to see that through with him, but I’m grateful.”

“If he was making a dress for you, it’s all custom, so it’s like a very special, personal experience, and I mean, you can’t get another dress like this. It’s a one-of-a-kind piece,” Workman described. “So, we’re so happy to be able to finish bringing it to life.”

Otu said she was celebrating her father and brother-in-law for Father’s Day when she received the news of what happened at the protest. She also said she was supposed to meet with Ah Loo on Saturday to talk about the dress, and they had just talked the Thursday before his death.

She said she wanted his family to have time to grieve, so she didn’t reach out about the dress, but she saw that Ah Loo’s wife had reposted Workman’s post about the wedding dress.

“I just appreciate so much,” Otu said. “I don’t think these designers and people understand how much it meant to me as a bride for them to be willing to do something like that, you know, because I again, I didn’t want to stress or mention, I was like, you know what? At this point, I’ll take anything, and just kind of move on and just let the family be able to do what they need to do.”

“You sit there and explain yourself, and it’s almost like he gets it,” Otu described her experience working with Ah Loo. “You know, as a bride, I’m a very confusing bride, and I’m very detailed. And every time I explained things, like, oh, I get it, I get what you mean.”

Workman also shared some memories she has of Ah Loo. “When I had a fashion show and I was stressed out about finishing my dresses, he would step in and help.” She said that there’s a whole group of designers that are going to try to emulate that energy of always showing up for people.

Those designers are coming together, and each are going to bring one of his designs to life for a fashion show coming up on August 1.

The fashion show will be part of the Creative Pacific event, which will begin on July 31 at the Natural History Museum. It will run until August 2. Tickets can be purchased on their website here. Ah Loo founded Creative Pacific with Benjamin Powell.