Scarf designer - Who is Fabiola De Ford?
Born in a small and happy country in Central America, Costa Rica. During her teenage years lived in England where she studied High School and then Fashion Design, winner of the first place Smirnoff Fashion Awards, Ethnic category. Also studied visual arts in the US and Costa Rica and became a visual arts IB teacher.
After coming back to Costa Rica from England at 19 years old, she encountered herself far away from her successful designer imagination. She got married, raised four children and after a breakout of her marriage she took back her creative lifestyle.
A woman of faith and determination she discovered her visual language, through meaningful connections with numismatics, the turism industry in Costa Rica, the IB Art experience and founded her brand influenced by gold, precious, shiny, durable metal and symbol of beauty and wealth of Costa Rica from its pre-Columbian history, nature and culture.
Then suddenly all made sense, the painting True Brits takes to the hills, in acrylic on canvas, painted in 2020, which is a replica of the photograph taken the day she won the first place in the ethnic category in London many years ago, transported her mind and soul back to her roots, her design career, the essence of her life and connection with God and and her art, which is what she loves to do... paint and design, the ethnicities, culture and the beauty of her country, and the love and empathy for others.
With a passion for culture and multi-ethnic influences, as a fashion designer, visual artist, and International Baccalaureate® (IB) Visual Arts teacher, she passionately embarked on her dream inspired by the Bicentennial coin La India Parada, which she first encountered in a newspaper clipping and then in person at the Numismatic Museum of the Central Bank. It was engraved in England with a Neo-classical influence in the Greco-Roman style. Being an indigenous princess with European influence, it was said, "this is a mestiza, this is us, many of the Ticos". Her material is gold, her denomination is 2 escudos and she is simply inspiring, and here started the adventure of the designer brand Fabiola De Ford.
"The engraved woman became my influence and motivation to draw and paint and bring the anonymous coin to light and embellish it with cultural and ethnic designs from Costa Rica and other cultures with interesting connections to our identity. The golden indigenous woman inspires the "Golden Nuances Collection. It is wonderful the strength she projects, her dignity, her determination and her confidence in her freedom and sovereignty that I decided to paint about it."
The first artwork was a large self-portrait and subsequently painted a collection of art "Gold Nuances" in which she replicated her several times among other more well-known cultural elements of Costa Rica.
She loves ethnicities and cultural identity, she loves the beautiful things of coins and banknotes, its colour palettes and brushes, and from this historic coin she designed the first collection of scarves "Gold Nuances", then "Coffee Nuances" and then "Eco-banknotes" for women who wear art and culture in their clothing in a contemporary way.
"I paint cultural stories on textiles" Fabiola De Ford