bringing it HOME

For Len Cabili of FILIPINNA, instilling an everyday appreciation for culture and craftsmanship is her life's purpose.

- TICIA ALMAZAN

LEN CABILI WAS ONLY FOUR WHEN SHE PUT ON HER FIRST BARO’T SAYA. The blouse and skirt is traditionally made with pineapple fiber, but Len’s was cut from another material completely: fabric in the print of their living room couch. Her mother had the clothes made for Len, her sisters, and their grandmother, and Len recalls how it was obvious that the cloth was only left over. One of them would have the top and skirt in the material, while the other would only have the skirt or the bandana.

The Cabili household, at least the one Len grew up in, was almost never empty. Because her father was formerly city mayor, there was a constant flow of guests from the Maranao and Higaonon, indigenous communities, who, at the time, often wore their traditional weaves like the landap, a malong distinguished by its large stripes. The Cabili home in Iligan in northern Mindanao was graced by many guests invited by their Basilan-born mother, too. A particularly memorable one for Len was the Bulgarian folk dance company that inspired her and her sisters to join the multi-awarded Bayanihan Dance Company, which their mother was a part of.

“I think our parents were very active in really integrating our culture into everyday life,” Len tells Vogue. “It wasn’t like I fell in love with it. It was just something that I was aware of and lived with.”

These retentive images, as she describes them, are what guide her today as the creative director of Filip + Inna, the fashion brand she established in 2009.