Emerging designers often say they admire fashion provocateurs like Iris van Herpen and the late Lee Alexander McQueen — creatives whose boundary-pushing feats of craft have left indelible marks on the collective psyche. Yet most of these young visionaries singing their praises have a long way to go in honing the technical skills — and singular design “voice” — that sets such fashion figures apart from the rest of the industry.

And this is why Saskatchewan-born Plains Cree fashion designer Jontay Kahm is so remarkable. At 28, the New York–based talent has evolved from sketching music video inspirations in his bedroom to winning the Emerging Designer of the Year at the 2024 Canadian Arts and Fashion Awards (CAFA) and staging a fashion show at the Getty Center in Los Angeles last September.
Kahm’s oeuvre includes statement pieces like the ‘Heaven on Earth’ dress (a cocktail dress sewn with midnight blue feathers and an exoskeletal beaded embellishment) and ‘Sunsets’ (a full-length gown comprised of dyed pink-to-orange fringe). Both from Kahm’s Ethereal Realms collection, which he showed at the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts (SWAIA) fashion show in September 2024, these designs evoke fantastical avant-garde fashion.

Kahm’s interest in fashion design began nearly two decades ago when he saw Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” video in his early teens. Growing up with no internet on the Mosquito Grizzly Bear’s Head Lean Man First Nation reserve, he was inspired by Gaga’s use of Alexander McQueen’s clothing and overall alien aesthetic.

“Everything about it was just so otherworldly to me and I wanted to be a part of it,” recalls Kahm. “Growing up in Saskatchewan, I didn’t see anything glamorous at all. It was all farmland, a very rural vibe, and I felt like a fish out of water.”

Kahm spent over $60 a month of his teenage allowance on magazines like Vogue to keep up with design trends, all the while drawing each look he saw Lady Gaga wear. “I observed her Fame Monster era, learning more about the designers that she wore and about her stylist, Nicola Formichetti,” Kahm says. “And then lo and behold, I was drawing. At first, I was copying Gaga’s looks, and then, later, I started to make my own designs out of boredom.”

That inclination grew into an attempt at making dresses on a children’s sewing machine (though Kahm was still very young — his first fashion show turn was during a student talent show). “It didn’t even have a foot pedal,” he recalls. As a self-taught designer, he initially kept his creations private, only sharing them with close friends and his father, the late visual modern artist, Jeff Kahm. “He always wanted me to be an artist and he got his wish even though it wasn’t through painting,” Kahm says. “When I first told him about fashion designing, he was very supportive and we started looking at schools together.”

Kahm had set his sights on renowned institutions like Parsons School of Design and Central St Martins but faced financial constraints, at least in the beginning. Kahm eventually enrolled in the studio arts program at the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Sante Fe, New Mexico, where his father taught art. It was there that the younger Kahm crossed paths with a colleague and friend of his father’s, professor Amber-Dawn Bear Robe. One of Kahm’s instructors, she would become instrumental in igniting his career.

Originally from Alberta and now based in Santa Fe, Bear Robe remembers being “completely blown away” after first seeing Kahm’s designs. She has since staged several runway shows featuring Kahm’s collections, including at the Getty Center’s Indigenous Futurism fashion event and all of SWAIA’s catwalk presentations.

Included were Kahm’s Ethereal Realms collection with its Christian motifs (crosses and three roses representing the Holy Trinity) and his debut collection, Regalian Bodies, which explored eternal life and absence — themes that were heavy on Kahm’s mind when his father suddenly passed away while Kahm was still studying at IAIA.

A maestro of materiality, Kahm liberally uses embellishments — beading, feathers and ribbons — to augment the drama of each garment while honouring his Indigenous ancestry. The extravagant Transcendence dress from the Regalian Bodies collection, for example, is crafted from feathers and fringe and features a double bustle detail inspired by male traditional fancy dress.

Kham notes that it was while completing his BFA in studio arts at IAIA that he began to “really hone in” on bringing his culture, and the materiality of it, into his work. Inspiration came from being surrounded by Native people and Native culture — “the food, the imagery, the music.” IAIA lacked a formal fashion program, so Kahm requested to fill that niche with a collection inspired by Cree regalia — vibrant colours, protruding feathers and swaths of fringe. “I researched how to use feathers, beads and ribbons that way,” says Kahm.

“He has a unique design language unlike any other that I’ve seen thus far,” says Bear Robe. “It’s amazing that he’s able to grow and to see his vision come together, particularly in his explorations of powwow culture for the Cree people. And the way his vision is becoming a wonderful manifestation of contemporary couture fashion is rare. I’m very lucky to be witnessing his growth.” Kahm’s opulent collections ultimately impressed Parsons faculty member Sariah Park, who offered him a full scholarship for a master’s program after seeing his runway debut at SWAIA. This is the reason Kahm says he would do whatever Bear Robe wants him to do. “I trust her judgment of what she wants for me.”

Kahm, who will be presenting his thesis collection at Parsons this fall, reflects on his trajectory. “It took me almost 10 years to find a recognizable aesthetic that showed what I was going to be known for. My work from 10 years ago does not look like the work I’m doing right now.” Kahm’s fans and community — many of them are based in the U.S. Southwest, as Kahm had moved to Albuquerque to join his father — are waiting with bated breath, same as last fall, when Kahm was honoured by CAFA.

“I didn’t think I would win and I didn’t have a speech ready,” Kahm says. “All the other candidates were so good, and I’d overheard them speaking about business and manufacturing at a nominee lunch. I just thought there’s no way I would win — I make all my stuff in my bedroom.”

This private space is where Kahm also continues to dream. He says he would love to become the creative director at Alexander McQueen, and perhaps be a guest designer for the Jean Paul Gaultier collaborative couture collections. The amplified budgets for these brand positions, Kahm notes, would allow his voluminous designs to reach even loftier heights.

He also notes that Killers of the Flower Moon star Lily Gladstone wearing one of his designs to a premiere was another recent career high. She donned the ‘Migration’ dress from his Regalian Bodies collection, a design whose name was drawn from the experience he and his father had in moving to the United States from Canada to follow their American dream.

“I always envision [my work] in galleries and museums, on the red carpet, in magazines and music videos,” Kahm says. “That’s the kind of design I really liked looking at growing up, and that’s why I create the pieces the way they are.”

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By Odessa Paloma Parker — *This article originally appeared in Insight: The Art Of Living Magazine – The Connection Issue.