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"  After years of collecting African kangas (sarongs), designer Max Osterweis decided to do something with all that colorful cotton fabric: launch Suno, a line that includes one-of-a-kind tanks ($160), high-waisted skirts ($345), and light summer dresses ($495) to be sold exclusively at Opening Ceremony in NYC and L.A. &amp;quot;I love how the prints make you instantly happy,&amp;quot; says the 34-year-old New Yorker, who grew up vacationing at his family&amp;#039;s house on Lamu Island, off Kenya. &amp;quot;Each kanga has a story, whether it&amp;#039;s &amp;#039;70s geometrics or traditional East African motifs, such as white dots symbolizing guinea fowl&amp;quot; [a Swahili colloquialism for &amp;quot;woman&amp;quot;].  To give back to the country that inspires him, Osterweis uses more than 15 full-time tailors in local Kenyan workshops (the Kenyan government requires employers to provide benefits to workers after two months on the job ). &amp;quot;The garment industry in Kenya was destroyed in the &amp;#039;80s, when the U.S. and Europe started sending secondhand clothing to Africa\u2014all of a sudden you could buy year-old Calvin Klein jeans for $1,&amp;quot; Osterweis explains. As for what the designer misses most about Africa when he&amp;#039;s back in Brooklyn, he says: &amp;quot;Sailing through mangroves at sunset and seeing warthogs on my way to work.&amp;quot; "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elle.com/fashion/a10125/fashion-news-sunos-sarongs-320920/?click=smart&kw=ist&src=smart&mag=ELM&link=-SMT-ELM>