Kidnapped, beaten, tied to a chair with an electric cable and a steak knife plunged into his thigh.
This wasn’t how 2018 was meant to be shaping up for Kharl WiRepa, who less than a year before had achieved a stunning fashion-first, becoming the first ever Māori designer to see their work in the pages of the influential fashion bible British Vogue.
Ahead of the airing of the Gowns and Geysers television show that goes behind the scene of the tantrums, tears and tiaras of the Miss Rotorua pageant he revived in 2018, and his return to the New Zealand Fashion Week catwalk, WiRepa sat down with Stuff to discuss a roller-coaster few years.
It’s a conversation that spans fashion, faith, Princess Diana, $1000 methamphetamine binges, catwalks and courtrooms – once as victim, once as defendant.
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In a curious twist of timing ahead of his NZ Fashion Week show on February 8, it’s that show, back in 2017, that WiRepa believes put him on the Vogue radar – not that he believed it at the time.
When the phone call came from Vogue publisher Condé Nast, “I actually didn’t believe it”.
“I thought OK, this is a telemarketing scheme, or it’s going to result in a ‘Nigerian Prince’ asking me for a credit card number.”
He “played along” anyway, and emailed in some photographs of his designs, then promptly forgot about it.
Four months later they were back in touch, and wanted more photographs.
WiRepa laughs when he admits he still thought the ‘Nigerian Prince’ was the more likely person at the other end, but that changed when a magazine package arrived a few months later.
“I scrolled through the pages and saw the dress. That’s when, for me, it became very real.”
Supplied
The Kharl WiRepa design that featured in the September 2017 edition of UK Vogue, making him the first Māori designer to have his work in the fashion bible.
He admits though that the win was clouded by other events going on in his life at that time, including a slew of fraud charges.
“We were fighting for name suppression and that was the only thing rolling through my mind at the time, when all these great things were happening.”
In the end WiRepa lost that battle, and was convicted of 14 charges of benefit fraud totalling $11,844.16, and ordered to repay that cash back to the Ministry of Social Development.
The charges stemmed from his time studying fashion at the Waiariki Institute, now Toi Ohomai, and related to a period of two years and eight months beginning in 2014.
They included making false documents omitting to disclose living arrangements, which allowed WiRepa to claim much more in student living allowances than he was entitled to.
Speaking to Stuff at the time, he said he accepted he had made a mistake, and was sanguine about the publicity he knew would inevitably follow after Judge Marie McKenzie declined name suppression.
Tom Lee/Stuff
Kharl WiRepa promised an ‘open book’ talk and was true to his word, with topics including his history-making Vogue appearance, catwalks, courtrooms, and getting back on track.
“It’s not my role to hide this fraud from national and international fashion communities,” she said at the time.
WiRepa is candid about the stress of those times.He describes how a fashion world awash with drugs and alcohol set the wheels in motion for his next brush with the courts – this time as a victim.
“Back then, for me to go to the races and snort a line of cocaine in the bathroom, to go out on a Saturday night and smoke $1000 worth of methamphetamine, it wasn’t unusual.
“There was definitely a relapse on the drugs and alcohol.”
He says the media exposure caused a loss of credibility, sponsors and dress sales.
“I did get back into alcohol and hanging around with the darker side of my associates.”
TOM LEE/STUFF/Waikato Times
Kharl WiRepa admits that a few years ago, there was ‘nothing unusual’ about smoking $1000 worth of methamphetamine on a Saturday night. He’s cleaned up since then and when he spoke to the Sunday Star-Times, nothing stronger than green tea was on the menu.
In 2018 a woman has chosen not to name, pleaded guilty to unlawfully detaining WiRepa, and wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.
She emerged from beneath the covers of a bed at a house WiRepa had been invited into. She was holding a 15cm-long steak knife, and demanded both drugs and cash, telling WiRepa: “I will cut your eyes out, and I can have you killed”.
WiRepa was then tied to a chair, assaulted and stabbed.
The woman and her associates took the methamphetamine he had on him, and his cash and jewellery, leaving only after he agreed to draw a map guiding them to a ‘drug house.’
WiRepa agrees it was rock bottom.
“At this point, there’s no more money, I’d been kidnapped. On the day of the kidnapping, that was the last of the money. The drugs, jewellery – they’d taken everything.”
The experience left WiRepa with post-traumatic stress disorder, and he’s since undergone counselling, but it also gave him the spark to turn things around.
“One thing I always had is my talent, so I always knew I could bounce back,” he says.
“Sobriety was one thing I needed, but I needed to surround myself with better people. There’s a lot of toxic people in the fashion and entertainment industry; it’s very superficial, lots of false relationships, a lot of pretension.”
He says his Mormon faith also played a role.
“I want back to the church and all those things my family is built on, that area of my life, to rebuild myself spiritually, mentally and physically.
“Leaving the church was the biggest mistake I made.
“Lifted up with pride, you become disconnected. Sometimes the Lord gives us a lesson in life where he takes things away so you can learn again. The whole thing has been a spiritual experience, even the kidnapping.
“I wouldn’t change it. I am in a better position now.”
Tom Lee/Stuff
Designer Kharl WiRepa is gearing up for a busy 2022, with a return to the New Zealand Fashion Week catwalk and the airing of the behind-the-scenes television show of his Miss Rotorua pageant.
Now, sipping on a green tea, WiRepa is healthier and fitter than ever.
He’s excited for the release of Gowns and Geysers on TVNZ On Demand on January 22, and is eyeing up Mt Maunganui and Taupō versions of the show.
“Into every town and iwi, until I rule the nation,” he jokes.
He’s proud of the fact the pageants have raised more than $150,000 for 30 charities, and of the diversity and inclusiveness they promote – these aren’t your old-school, bikini-parade events.
“Former prostitutes, P addicts, spina bifida sufferers, Chinese contestants, Indian contestants.”
He tells the pageant contenders about one of his icons too, Princess Diana.
“I grew up in a world where Princess Diana was the ultimate fashion icon and the ultimate way to be as a person,” he says, citing her charity work.
“The pageants are a way for us to create a world of Princess Dianas.”
Then there’s the return to New Zealand Fashion Week.
WiRepa’s spent the last three months working on his collection of 65 different looks, and he’s promising an antidote to the dark, grungy and sexualised shows that sometimes grace the catwalks.
“I want the audience to feel like they’re in heaven,” he says.
“This is the collection for what goddesses wear.”
