R'Bonney Gabriel launches first PH collection, expresses gratitude to Filipino community

R'Bonney Gabriel debuted her first Philippine collection, "How to Survive on Land and Sea," at the recently concluded Bench Fashion Week.

On Instagram, the Miss Universe 2022 shared snippets of her creations taken from the fashion runway held last Friday at the Bench Tower in Bonifacio Global City.

When Bench founder and chairman Ben Chan presented R'Bonney the opportunity to launch her collection at BFW, the fashion designer said she "had to say yes."

"Even though I've only been in the Philippines for a few months and didn't know where to begin, I knew I needed to take this challenge on," she said.

"Navigating these past 2.5 months has [been] tough, inspiring, and rewarding to make this vision come to life," she added.

Among the models who walked for R'Bonney include Miss Universe Philippines 2024 Chelsea Manalo, Gazini Ganados, and Lou Yanong. R'Bonney's parents, Dana Walker and Remigio Gabriel, were also present at the fashion show.

The Filipino-American beauty queen then thanked the Filipino community for being part of her milestone.

"Thank you to family, friends, tailors, models, Bench team, Empire Mercator team, Jacob Casem, Ate Carla, Kuya Elmer, and the Philippines fashion community for supporting me in all of this," she said.

R'Bonney arrived in the Philippines in April and has been busy modeling, hosting, doing guestings, and other work engagements.

The first Filipino-American Miss Universe has been exploring her heritage in the Philippines, from eating Pinoy street food, practicing her "tawad" game in Divisoria, riding a jeepney, traveling to beaches, visiting her dad's childhood home in Manila, learning to cook sinigang, and skipping traffic onboard a motorcycle service.

 

 

 

 

View this post on Instagram

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A post shared by R’Bonney Nola (@rbonneynola)