COLLEEN EITZEN

1996 was a year of beginnings for Colleen Eitzen. She and Neil Roake opened the Durban Designer Emporium. They married. Their daughter was born.

In 2000, The Space was born.

Thirty years later, Eitzen remains one of South African fashion’s most enduring voices, with a career shaped not only by instinct and experience, but by the women who have worn her work. Over decades, they have become part of her creative education, informing her understanding of fit, movement, pattern and what clothing needs to do in real life.

A longstanding presence on the SA Fashion Week landscape, Eitzen continues to evolve without surrendering the individuality that has always distinguished her work.

For 2026, that evolution moves into fresh territory: bolder, less expected, and still unmistakably Colleen Eitzen. Pattern, form and ease remain part of the language, but this next chapter carries a new energy.

Thirty years on, she is not looking back. She is still moving forward.