INTERVIEW with Mestiza Filipina || Designer for Ravishing Fashionistas 2025

SD: Hi Mestiza Filipina, can you please introduce yourself again?

LP: Hey everyone! My name is Louisa Parkinson and I'm the fashion designer and co-founder behind the online Filipino cultural fashion brand, Mestiza Filipina. Some fun facts about me, I'm an award winning scientist with a PhD in Plant Pathology and Molecular Biology; I was the commercial face of the University of Queensland in the 2010's; and I had a 10-year science career before I made the leap into full-time business in 2024. It turns out I've always been pretty entrepreneurial though, and I think that's been my real passion all along, as I had a successful face mask fashion business in 2020-2022 called The Mask Boutique, which provided jobs to people in Brisbane who lost their income during the COVID-19 pandemic and supplied over 10,000 face masks to people in Australia.

At Mestiza Filipina, we create modern Filipiniana — cultural fashion rooted in Philippine heritage and reimagined for today. Filipiniana has long been a symbol of cultural pride in the Philippines, yet today it’s often reserved for politicians, weddings, and formal milestones. At Mestiza Filipina, we believe it deserves more. 

Our mission is to reimagine traditional Filipiniana for the everyday woman — designing elegant eveningwear, statement pieces, and modern silhouettes that honour our heritage while embracing contemporary style. We often ask ourselves: If Western fashion hadn’t dominated Filipino fashion, what might Filipiniana have evolved to look like today?

Mestiza Filipina was co-founded with my brother Anthony in late 2021 and started out as a side-hustle, born from our shared lived experiences as second generation Filipino-Australians, and our love of Filipino culture and fashion. For three years I’d spend my days in the lab, then work late into the night running the business, packing orders, and building our fashion brand. Mestiza Filipina is our way of staying connected to Filipino culture through fashion — and in doing so, we’ve helped thousands of people around the world do the same. 

SD: Without giving too much details away, what should we expect from your collection for Ravishing Fashionistas 2025?

LP: Anthony and I grew up performing Filipino cultural dance in Brisbane, and we also spent parts of our childhood in rural Mindanao, Philippines, where our family is from. Our mother, Merly Parkinson, one of the pioneering cultural performers in Brisbane in the ’90s, raised us with a strong connection to our roots — teaching us Filipino language, dance, and cultural practices. As a teenager, I participated in mum’s town festival, performing traditional dances with local groups in Mindanao, wearing cultural garments steeped in symbolism and story.

The Mestiza Filipina 2025 runway collection is a personal love letter to those experiences — a celebration of Filipino identity that blends tradition with reinvention. You’ll see iconic Filipiniana ‘butterfly’ sleeves and silhouettes, shimmering golden crowns inspired by the sun rays of the Philippine flag, and my signature heart motif on garment backs as a symbol of identity and connection. 

Some garments are even styled with vintage accessories that I wore as a child dancer — like the salakot (farmer's hat) from the folk dance of the same name. You’ll also see real malongs sourced from Maranao artisans in Mindanao, a nod to our family’s ancestral roots.

 Every piece in this collection tells a story — of memory, belonging, and modern cultural identity.

SD: What is your favourite part of being a designer? 

LP: I love sharing stories about my life and weaving parts of myself into my designs and runway collections. We’ve styled very aspect of our runway collection with pieces and accessories made in the Philippines, by people dear to us, and vintage pieces from my Filipino cultural dance performance days.

For instance, many outfits in this collection use real malong and malong landap textiles sourced directly from communities in Mindanao. The malong is a versatile tube garment used by the Maranao people. I often wear my malong in cultural dances, as a skirt, a dress, a blanket, and even as a changing room on the go — I still use the same one from 30 years ago!

Another outfit blends modern Filipiniana (our emerald green Mestiza Bolero) with an opulent green malong worn as a skirt and it’s paired with my 2011 Binibining Pilipinas-Australia (Miss Philippines-Australia) national costume veil — a sequined tangerine piece inspired by Maranao royalty. We finished the look with golden janggay claws, referencing the Dayang-Dayang dance I once performed across Brisbane. This is where fashion becomes something more — a way for people to connect with their ancestry, explore identity, and celebrate where they come from. And that’s what I love most about being a designer!

There’s a personal story behind each outfit in our 2025 runway collection, so please feel free to come and have a chat with me at Ravishing Fashionistas to learn more about it!

SD: How do you approach sustainability and ethical practices in your designs and production processes?

LP: Sustainability is an important theme in fashion - not just for the environment, but also for the people who make the clothes that we wear. As a cultural fashion brand, it's important for us to honour the cultural significance of the pieces that we produce and support the makers of those garments. Our business is actively working with artisan makers across various regions in the Philippines, providing jobs to preserve & sustain Filipino culture and train new generations of makers in the trade. We're also an environmentally conscious brand with all our packaging being recyclable or compostable; and as part of our brand strategy, we encourage customers to make many different outfits from our pieces, to help reduce only wearing a garment once (just for the event we bought it for).  

SD: What challenges have you faced as an emerging fashion designer, and how have you overcome them? 

LP: Mestiza Filipina is an established fashion brand since late 2021, with a cult global following and thousands of customers around the world. However as a commercial fashion designer, I’m pretty new to the field with only one year of experience. My first collection as a designer was released this year so I guess you could call me an emerging designer!

One of the challenges I’ve faced in my fashion design journey so far is sometimes feeling impostor syndrome. My intrusive thoughts tell me I must not be a real fashion designer because I’m not yet skilled in everything related to fashion design. I don’t have a degree in fashion or the arts, and I’m still learning about the various technical aspects behind the clothes that we wear. But there are things which do make me a fashion designer and that’s having a creative vision and story, being skilled enough to develop my designs, and then executing it. I recognise I don’t have to be able to do it all to be a fashion designer, and that’s okay.

There are bursaries and scholarship opportunities which we can apply for to upskill and have mentorship for those starting out. I was the recipient of the 2024 Brisbane Lord Mayor’s Multicultural Business Scholarship to launch my own fashion line. That led me to my mentor Kerry Xynias — a Brisbane-based designer with decades of experience — who helped me develop my skills and knowledge as a designer.

 Being a designer for your own online fashion brand also involves business management, e-commerce knowledge, marketing and strategic decision making. It’s incredibly challenging and there’s a lot more to my work than meets the eye!  

SD: What advice do you have for aspiring fashion designers who are just starting their journey?

LP: Whether you’re an aspiring fashion designer or have a business idea that you’d like to explore, make a start on it, now! Don’t wait until you’re “ready.” Perfection is a myth — close enough really is good enough. Opportunities don’t often come when you feel fully prepared, but when you say yes anyway. When you’re scared — say yes. When you feel imposter syndrome — say yes. 

Take the leap! You’ll thank yourself later.

See Mestiza Filipina on the runway. Buy your tickets here.

Ravishing Fashionistas Website: https://ravishingfashionistas.com/
Ravishing Fashionistas Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ravishing_fashionistas/
Ravishing Fashionistas Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ravishingfashionistas
Ravishing Fashionistas Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnWLvRrzzdNLg2naY5rdJJg

Mestiza Filipina’s Social Media Presence:

Website: https://mestizafilipina.co/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mestizafilipina.co
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mestizafilipina.co/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@mestizafilipina.co

Photo Credits:

First and Second Photo: Louisa Parkinson in Mestiza Filipina and taken by Matt Grehan