The sample from our garage that ended up on Burna Boy

It started with a wristband

Lukanda was out in Melbourne wearing his Kenyan wristband when he got talking to Valentine Isra, a Kenyan-Australian stylist who's worked with Vogue. Two Kenyans in the same room, so of course they got chatting. He mentioned the brand and she said she reckoned she'd seen us on TikTok.

A week later we sent her some pieces for a magazine shoot. Then nothing for a while, which is pretty normal.

"I'm styling Burna Boy"

In November 2025, Burna Boy brought his tour to Melbourne. Valentine was styling him, and she messaged Lukanda to ask if we wanted to give him anything.

Timing was rough. We were nearly sold out and only had black tanks left. The one other thing we had was a sample of a long sleeve we'd been working on, a raglan, hanging on a rack in Lukanda's garage.

"I was like, well, this is my only opportunity. So I gave him a sample off the rack in my garage."

He drove it to the Sidney Myer Music Bowl and handed it to a security guard with directions on where to take it. The guard came back and said it was done. Lukanda honestly wasn't sure it would ever get to him, but it was worth a crack.

Watch on Instagram ↗

"You should probably check your Instagram"

For a while it was silence. Then one night Lukanda was scrolling and a message came through from Valentine telling him to check his Instagram.

It was Burna Boy on Apple Music, in our long sleeve, on their story and their reels. And because we don't put a logo on the front, there was nothing to point at. Lukanda had to ID it by the red stitching on the back.

What it meant to us

We don't gift people to chase clout. It still hit different. Lukanda is Kenyan and Jerome has Mauritian heritage, and here was one of the biggest artists in the world, one of the biggest to ever come out of Africa, wearing a Melbourne blanks brand.

"This guy has so much money and could wear anything, and he's wearing our blanks."

What changed after

People kept asking where they could get the long sleeve, so that garage sample turned into a real product. It's now the Raglan Long Sleeve, in Coal, Crete and Porcelain.

We also changed our labels. The inside tag used to just say BR. As minimal as we like to be, if something like this happens again people should be able to find us, so now it says Basic Respect.