Choosing is a daunting act. First, because it has become particularly difficult: more tools, more information, more possibilities, a horizon so vast that our attention can never fully encompass it. But beyond that, choosing means deciding what deserves to remain, knowing that other paths will inevitably be left unexplored.

For us, what deserves to remain is the ability to transform thought into a singular language, to build identity through culture and to create value that extends beyond function or novelty. What matters to us is this profoundly human intelligence, bringing together the discipline of research and method with creative freedom and artistic expression.

Against the contemporary fascination with efficiency, our priority may not be the coolest or the most widely shared. To speak of experimentation or sustainability can feel like drawing on a vocabulary the present has been quick to replace, yet the reasons they remain necessary are unchanged. We continue to believe that Fashion should approach with purpose the resources and processes it mobilises, the people and knowledge it brings together, and the economic realities of creators, teams and organisations that need viable conditions to continue researching, working and creating. The longevity we seek extends across the object, the ways in which it is made and the entire ecosystem around it, including the conditions that allow that ecosystem to endure. It is also a question of time, and of giving it its proper measure, because talent does not mature under the constant pressure of urgency.

From 7 to 11 October, MODALISBOA PRIORITY presented by OMODA & JAECOO, co-organised with the Municipality of Lisbon and supported by Turismo de Portugal’s Portugal Events programme, unfolds across the city. OMODA & JAECOO returns as main sponsor of the capital’s Fashion Week, reinforcing a shared vision in which innovation cannot exist without purpose, and in which fertile ground for creativity and responsible design is itself the result of conscious choice.

With Pátio da Galé as its main venue, the programme extends to spaces including MUDE – Design Museum, Museu do Tesouro Real, Moldo Studios and Sociedade Nacional de Belas Artes. Across these venues, the 67th Lisboa Fashion Week brings together Fashion presentations, platforms dedicated to emerging creators and new free-entry initiatives, from conversations and workshops to exhibitions and installations, connecting authorship, production, culture and public experience through opportunities for learning and exchange.

In keeping with the priorities we set out here, this edition opens with the first MODAPORTUGAL International Conference. Promoted by CENIT, the free-entry conference brings together thought leaders from across the world at MAAT Central on 7 October to discuss authorship, European policy, technological challenges and a commitment to future generations.

Over 35 years, the choices made by Lisboa Fashion Week have produced effects that extend far beyond the circumstances in which they were first made. Investment in the renewal of the creative landscape, proximity to industry, the integration of multiple artistic disciplines, critical reflection and the creation of contexts for innovation have built an infrastructure of relationships and knowledge whose reach extends beyond any single programming decision. It is through this gradual accumulation that programming acquires cultural significance, that experience becomes heritage, and that what we do in the present begins, without our fully knowing it, to shape a future memory.

MODALISBOA PRIORITY presented by OMODA & JAECOO is born, then, from the inevitability of choosing. We do not know which of the decisions we make will reveal their true importance only with time and distance. We know what we refuse to treat as transient. And that is where we place our priority.

CAMPAIGN
The campaign for the 67th Lisbon Fashion Week is created by Havas Portugal, with production by Casper Films, photography by Luís Miguel Fonseca, and styling by Tita Mendes. Model: Niva Lopes, Elite Lisbon.