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This is an excerpt from Designer Dialogue in MEGA’s July 2025 issue
Fashion’s relationship with art always offers rich explorations of creation and expression. So when fashion designers Daryl Maat and Joe San Antonio collaborated with artists SAIS and Arce for Art Underground’s 10th anniversary, it resulted in two collections that seamlessly merged artists’ and designers’ visions on both canvas and garments.
Daryl Maat and SAIS’ collection Guhit ng Gunita awakens the inner child in us, letting us relive the spontaneity of youth sparked by depictions of drawings from childhood on pad paper. While Joe San Antonio and Arce’s Tambour is a convergence of visual art and fashion, as told through embroidery and form.
HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR DESIGN IDEOLOGY OR FASHION IDENTITY?
Joe San Antonio: I think my fashion identity is more about fabric manipulation. It’s alive, most of my pieces have movement. But as more people know me as a wedding designer, they go to me for the feminine side of my style. It’s more romantic and feminine at the same time. But for this collection of mine with Arce, I think it brought back the other side of me, the fabric manipulation.
Daryl Maat: My design ideology is the common denominator of very graphic and also very experimental, when it comes to prints. We’re kind of doing a rebranding now of the Daryl Maat brand. We’re focusing on Filipiniana. Before, we did gowns, short dresses… more on the feminine side. This is my first time doing Menswear. When I did women’s wear before, it’s more colorful, graphic, and very flashy. Now, the flashy evolved into something quirky. It’s the same concept, the same idea. The impact is still there.
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HOW DID THESE COLLABORATIONS AND COLLECTIONS COME TO BE?
JSA: We are actually art collectors. So, Nico Teotico (Art Undergound owner), Daryl, and I were talking over dinner and I said, “What do you think if we collab with an artist? And he said, “That’s a nice idea, and then maybe Daryl can do menswear with another artist.” And then he called up again and he said “Game, let’s do this. I was thinking, Arce with you and Daryl with Sais.” I thought it’s a good combination, when you see Arce’s works, it complements my style and Daryl’s pieces are very childlike, with the pad paper so it goes with Sais’s styles.
WHAT WERE THE THINGS YOU LEARNED ABOUT YOURSELF IN THIS COLLABORATION?
JSA: I think I found my old self—before I went into the wedding industry, where I did custom design. For this one, I got to create without boundaries. So this was purely me. When I created all the waves of the dresses, it was free flowing, there was no sketch ahead of time. I was just in my room, creating.
DM: It’s just the same with me. This was kind of also a rebranding of the brand. We focused more on the Filipiniana. I also found my authentic self. This is me. This is something that you would see me wearing every day. I was very inspired by this. Like Joe, I started this collection without sketches. That’s how inspired I am. Everything was free flowing. Collections sometimes tend to suppress us, and it also limits us in a way because we think of who’s going to buy and wear the clothes. But this collection, it’s something that’s free for us, we’re not thinking of an audience and it makes it limitless. So this is the real us, showing you our art.
WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO IN THE FUTURE?
JSA: JSA: This collection is actually a transition to my next plan, which is Studio Joe San Antonio. I’m gonna release an RTW. It’s a mix of semi-formal-ish, dressy clothing. I’m known for custom designs, so this brand will show who I am because it doesn’t have a clientele in mind. So it’s just free designing. I think I could show more of myself here.
DM: This is actually our first collection as a rebranding of Daryl Maat. The pad paper was technically designed back in 2023, so it’s still relatively new. It’s kind of reintroducing the brand to the people as Daryl Maat, the Barong Designer, a Filipiniana Designer. We also plan to continue this collection into different forms, because we also want to use local fabrics. We want to explore more local textiles, and also the different ideas of how we’re going to make Filipiniana more modern.
Read more of this conversation with Daryl Maat and Joe San Antonio in MEGA’s July 2025 issue now available on Readly, Magzter, Press Reader and Zinio.
Photography by RXANDY CAPINPIN. Art Direction by CLARE MAGNO. Styled by ERICA TEROL. Makeup MIKI LIUSON. Hair MAT T LEDESMA. Model CATH IBAY and ROYD LOYOLA.
