A gallery in Nairobi was the site of a recent exhibition titled Tradition(al). It was anything but traditional. The works of 18 African fashion designers were showcased in the Kenyan capital from 4 – 12 April, forming part of a larger Dutch initiative called the State of Fashion Biennale. Between 17 May – 30 June 2024 parts of Tradition(al) will travel to the main site in Arnhem in The Netherlands.

This was the first time most visitors to the Nairobi exhibition would have seen designs by some of these world-renowned fashion designers. While the Maxhosa Africa brand from South Africa has long been circulating in the media, for example, few would have had the opportunity to see Laduma Ngxokolo’s Xhosa-inspired knitwear.

All of those on exhibit are applying and interpreting indigenous and traditional knowledges, and material practices

When fashion curator and cultural producer Sunny Dolat was approached to curate an exhibition in Nairobi for the Dutch biennale, he was asked to respond to what is most important and urgent. For Sunny, this means giving Africans opportunities to see African work as often as possible. His selection of designers draws attention to another important and urgent issue –  fashion designers are custodians of African knowledge. All of those on exhibit are applying and interpreting indigenous and traditional knowledges, and material practices.

The result is not only an important cultural moment, but a huge success in engaging an audience – testament to an urgent need for “seeing”. Attendance at the opening was more than twice the expected number. The following day’s programme of talks was also oversubscribed.

Curator Sunny Dolat speaks to the audience during the walkabout on the first day of the exhibition, Tradition(al)

While the group exhibition speaks to traditional and indigenous knowledges, it simultaneously avoids (and critiques) any single lens, expanding perceived ideas of African design and African aesthetics. Sunny says, “There’s a tendency to only locate and validate African design when it speaks to issues of traditional heritage. This invalidates the work of designers who are exploring things that don’t fit very neatly within those elements.” This plurality of identity and expression is strongly evident in the exhibition.

From Patricia Mbela’s beadwork and Emmy Kasbit’s deconstructed suit, to Doreen Mashika’s East African resort wear and Bubu Ogisi’s bark cloth outfit, each piece reflects a cultural point of view in showcasing material practices. The designs have deep roots in local culture and practices. But their applications have global appeal, such as the work of Hawi Midekssa, founder and creative director at HAWII who writes on her website that her “designs are a poetic fusion of Ethiopian roots and emotions”.

Then Hisi Studio offers an example that looks at a cultural tradition that does not benefit all its people. In her installation, Kenyan designer Angela Wanjikiu invites the audience to touch the braille on a textile artefact, part of her ongoing exploration into enhancing inclusivity in the fashion industry.  Angela says that her work is moving away from a tradition which in the past has ostricised and prejudiced people with disabilities.

Kenyan creative director of POISA Patricia Mbela is a Taita woman who studied contemporary fashion design in Britain when she was younger. Once back home, she says, “I had to become a Keynan and an African again.” After making clothes for a while, she realised one day that she was meant to do beadwork.

On a visit to the Nairobi National Museum, Patrica came upon a piece of beading from the Taita tradition. Patricia spent the next decade applying her expertise in contemporary design to relearn the traditions of her ancestral inheritance. In the show notes, Sunny writes: “With images and beads, she painstakingly forced her hands to remember through hours of trial and error. Patricia and her cousin, Ruthiana, whom she taught along the way, are the only two Taita women in Kenya who use the art of their forebears in this way, creating garments whose existence is urgent.”

Patricia Mbela was in conversation with Sunny Dolat about her beadwork during a talks programme at the exhibition

Patricia explained at the opening that during British colonialism, Taita beadwork was buried and hidden. “People were scared of being told that they were involved with witchcraft. The fear of persecution, even death, meant we dropped our culture.” Now she is making a traditional style of beadwork that is inspired by modern fashion and she is “happiest when I’m with a bag of beads.”

The exhibition also touches on modes of production, and, for instance, shows how a decentred approach is empowering pastoral women. Ushanga, a Kenyan government beading initiative, works across the country training women how to create quality projects, how to understand trends and links the women to markets.

The diversity of textiles and knowledges used to create fashion and pieces of adornment indicate that there is no one-way to be African nor one fixed way to be a designer or maker. Founder of Lagos Fashion Week Omoyemi Akerele says, “What you learn from this exhibition is so much more than design, it’s about practice, stories and communities.”

All of this, Sunny says, points to the need for further acknowledgement of African design on Africa, for it to be protected, to be resourced and to be platformed.

Below are descriptions of each garment on exhibit, as written by the designers.

MONO

Designer: Enam Geli from Togo

CHACHA ROBE: This robe seamlessly blends the rich cultural heritage of three African nations: Ghana, Togo, and Mali. At its core lies the vibrant textile lokpo, sourced from the Volta region of Ghana, renowned for its intricate patterns and bold colours. Crafted with skill and precision, the garment is sewn by a talented Togolese tailor, whose expertise and attention to detail ensures a flawless fit. Drawing on generations of tradition and technique, the garment is infused with a sense of authenticity and craftsmanship that speaks to the heart of African fashion.

But the journey of this garment doesn’t end there. It finds its final flourish in the hands of a Malian tailor, who employs a unique fringing technique reminiscent of his country’s rich embroidery heritage. Each stitch adds elegance and sophistication, evolving the garment further as a work of art.

Together, these elements come together to create a celebration of Pan-African unity and creativity.

• Materials: lokpo – cotton, silk, lurex
• Techniques: handweaving, embroidery

JOHANNA BRAMBLE CRÉATIONS

Designer Johanna Bramble from Côte d’Ivoire

RE-SOURCES: Re-Sources is a series of textiles in natural fibers – cotton, raphia and abaca. (The image is of Re-Sources 003.) The master weaver’s gesture creates a link with the elements. Both source and resource, the artisan witnesses the evolution of civilisations, and carries within him the heritage and vision of multiple identities. He is, like any living element on earth, in perpetual movement.

Re-Sources spotlights the infinite potential of a fine technique, in alignment with tradition. These weavings, traditionally called “pagne tissés’ or ‘serru rabal” in Wolof, are well cared for in Senegalese homes. Often considered women’s treasures, many perfumed with incense and loaded with symbols and specificities depending on intention and use, they are present during key moments in life, ranging from birth until the last breath, even as shields against the evil eye. Their centrality in culture showcases the ability of each weaver to see themselves in their weaving, as they would see themselves in a mirror. Weaving thus reveals the weaver, in both personal identity and within the universality of their communities. Johanna Bramble thus places humans at the vulnerable heart of life, esteeming this precious tangible and intangible heritage.

• Technique: Handweaving
• Material: Senegalese industrial cotton, Senegalese hand spun cotton, French elastane

 

POISA AFRICA

Designer: Patricia Mbela from Kenya

PHOENIX: Taita beadwork was all but extinct before Patricia Mbela came across a surprising piece in the stores of the Nairobi National Museum, which led her down a path of unbelievable discovery. She, a Taita woman, had never seen the traditional beaded garments of her people, and this moment filled her with an overwhelming sense of both loss and longing, grieving what she had never known she did not know, and dreaming of things she had never imagined before.

Patricia spent the next decade harnessing her expertise in contemporary design in the tireless work of being re-introduced to her ancestral inheritance. With images and beads, she painstakingly forced her hands to remember through hours of trial and error. Patricia and her cousin Ruthiana, whom she taught along the way, are the only two Taita women who use the art of their forebears in this way, creating garments whose existence is urgent.

Patricia’s piece, “Phoenix”, evokes the extraordinary image of the mythical bird it is named for, both in its warm colors shifting from a rich yellow to a fiery red, and in its graceful silhouette, featuring a gorgeous flamboyance of beads on one shoulder that is reminiscent of magnificent plumage.

• Materials: plastic beads, glass beads, metal beads, wire
• Technique: hand beading

 

KIKOROMEO

Desiger: Iona McCreath from Kenya

EWALA: Cultures are evolutionary, their constant is change. Thus, our preservation of them should not be to try and freeze them in time, but to allow them the ability to continue this evolutionary process. With the current state of the world, and the extent to which we have eradicated, we must sometimes go back in order to go forward; go back to the rituals and processes we can remember and identify clearly, and from there, begin the process of evolution.

However, through this evolution, we cannot define a universal concept of what is important, we must consequently acknowledge our own individuality and realise that what is important to one is different to that which is important to the other. Thus, what we will each take with us on our journeys will serve to bring forth different aspects from that which we all come.

The preservation will consequently come from the acceptance of evolution and change bound with the acknowledgment of the importance of our individual cultures.

Through this acceptance and acknowledgment, we will serve to not drop one culture to cling to another that we deem to be more dominant or more “developed” but will come to understand our space and existence as a hybridisation of a series of different centres, each as integral to our humanity as the other.

The pieces I create speak to the above, serving as individual time capsules of the present moment that are influenced by what has been and indicate what is to come. Consequently, collaborations are an important part of this process as they facilitate a confluence of perspectives giving an even more valuable depiction of the hybridization that makes up everyday life.

EWALA HAND-PAINTED COAT: Hand-painted by fine artist Eltayeb Dawelbait, each piece created is one of a kind and revered as a collector’s item. Ideated in the early 2000’s, the coat was reborn in 2019 during Iona McCreath’s foray into the KikoRomeo archives as the brand’s new creative director, reinterpreting pieces from her early childhood memories of KikoRomeo photoshoots and fashion shows. The motifs on the garment are all different as each one is individually hand painted; however, the placement of each motif is indicated by the designer, with a focus on positions that flatter the body.

EWALA TEXTILE: This iteration of the Ewala textile was developed by Iona McCreath and Eltayeb Dawelbait for KikoRomeo’s SS24 collection. Informed by the heritage of the brand and its long-standing relationship with artist Eltayeb, these hand painted textiles pay homage to tradition whilst forging a direction of their own. This textile is inspired by Turkana heritage, foregrounding a pattern developed from different cultural elements including artefacts, beadwork, and everyday objects.

• Materials: cotton
• Techniques: hand painting

HAWII

Designer: Hawi Midekssa from Ethiopia

YE BALGER LIJ COAT: Ye balager lij is an Ethiopian term that translates to “the child of a countryman(woman).” It is derogatory slang, describing rural and countryside people as illiterate or not modern enough. This coat is part of a collection named to reclaim and reimagine this word in their favour, paying homage to the experiences and influences of each generation. It further explores the interplay between rural and urban experiences, highlighting them as part of wider Ethiopian family traditions and cultural values.

• Material: cotton, gabardine
• Techniques: customized block print of Ethiopian alphabet

 

MOSHIONS

Designer: Moses Turahirwa from Rwanda

SHANA: If our ancestors showed up today, what would they say about our way of life? In the capsule collection Imandwa, Moses reinterprets the traditional Rwandan dress, known as mushanana, by exploring the influence of pre-colonial generations on emotions, fashion, and nature, in dramatic pieces that represent freedom and fluidity.

Imandwa invites ancestral aesthetics from across Africa—such as Rwanda’s drapes and wooden shields, along with Tanzania and Kenya’s Maasai dress—into a modern sartorial expression. Moses also uses the collection to challenge the limits of gendered clothing and toxic masculinity, via a daring interplay of traditional and contemporary silhouettes.

• Materials: wool, silk, cow horn

LOZA MALÉOMBHO

Designer: Loza Maléombho from Côte d’Ivoire

POLAR DRESS and KPELE BELT: Loza Maléombho’s fashion career is a testament to her ability to bridge the gap between tradition and modernity, creating a space where the rich expressions of Africanness are celebrated and embraced by a global audience. Her work is consistent in finding new sites for traditional motifs, such as her recurring and iconic use of the Baoulé mask as seen on pieces such as the kpele belt and koh plus sandals. Her deep study of precolonial history, spirituality, and customs shines through her work, enabling her to build bridges between space and time, revisiting elements of heritage in futuristic ways.

The Polar dress is one example of this trademark, featuring bold and eye-catching cutouts set in a deconstructed silhouette, expressed in a unique tie-dye cotton print.

• Material: cotton, leather, brass
• Techniques: hand dyed – tie and dye

IAMISIGO

Designer: Bubu Ogisi from Nigeria

PATCHWORK BARK CLOTH SUIT: For their SS 20 collection “supreme higher entity” IAMISIGO collaborated with bark cloth artist and historian, Fred Mutebi, who has dedicated his life on earth to promoting bark cloth. Originally discovered by a hunter to trap animals, this ancient heritage fabric is created from the Mutuba tree, whose bark is peeled off and manipulated to generate the strips that make traps; a process that entailed beating, stretching, and soaking of the fibers.

Serving various social and cultural functions in the Baganda culture of Uganda, bark cloth has continued to be a connecting thread between past, present and future generations of Africans. Through political, social, cultural, and economic transformations, bark cloth is now associated with the poor, and as such, become a symbol of economic deprivation. This has negatively affected the present bark cloth industry, when, ironically, it is one of the most sustainable fibres in the world.

• Materials: bark cloth
• Techniques: hand hammered

 

HISI STUDIO

Designer: Wanjiku Angela from Kenya

ARE SOME DOTS? ARE SOME CIRCLES? The famed African embrace of “ubuntu”, a collective and communal understanding of all, often belies an exclusion of different vulnerable and marginalised peoples in both traditional and modern times. People living with disability have suffered ostracisation and prejudice, setting the stage for violent discrimination and lack of care from ignorant societies.

Hisi Studios begin from the dots and circles of the braille tactile script used by the visually impaired, inviting the wider fashion industry to join the language’s traditional users in a multi-sensory engagement with fabric that embraces the diversity of human experience. Angela presents words of hope and affirmation spelled out in a puffed print, creating a unique expression of texture and form. Her translation of tenderness and inclusion in fabric allows everyone to feel and touch it for themselves, and carry home a deeper understanding of communication and accessibility.

• Materials: cotton
• Techniques: screen print – puff print

PAPA OPPONG

Designer: Papa Oppong from Ghana/USA

Stage IV – WITCHCRAFT: Papa Oppong, in bearing close and intimate witness to the lives of his mother and grandmother who raised him, along with thousands of other Ghanaian women, explores their relationship with power and their society’s reactions to it by spelling out a five-stage life cycle, consisting of birth, puberty, marriage, witchcraft and death. The witchcraft stage is defined by violent pushback on the women’s increased social status and power, wherein women of several communities have found themselves physically relegated to witch camps if they do not use this power in socially acceptable ways, based on varied misogynistic and oppressive beliefs.

Papa is known for his distinctive ability to easily embed diverse pop sensibilities within traditional forms, aesthetics, and methods. Yopoo is therefore Papa’s render of this game of thrones via silhouette, colour, scale and symbols that transcend time and culture. The Witchcraft piece defiantly embraces women’s strength that is traditionally shunned and feared, affirming it through the use of raffia in the apron fringes as used in the mud huts of the witch camps. The garment further incorporates a nipple-freeing silicone breastplate, and an extravagant array of different sizes of sequins and paillettes marching all over its deconstructed form, as an ode to glamour and fearlessness.

• Materials: kente cloth, wool, raffia, paillettes, tulle, chiffon, silicone
• Techniques: hand woven, hand embellished

KATUSH

Designer: Katungulu Mwendwa from Kenya

UJANA SHIRT AND PAMBA SKIRT: Black Bird, a Kanga, embodies a literal journey into the world of the guinea fowl, inspired by a traditional folktale from the 1930s. The story from Kamba folklore, unfurls the tale of the chicken and the guinea fowl, exploring why the former got domesticated and the latter did not. It recounts how the once-close friendship between the two birds soured when the chicken deceived the guinea fowl by concealing the advantages of domestication and life with human beings.

Katungulu found herself curious about the possibility of weaving traditional folklore into her creations, beginning with an exploration focused on the guinea fowl in this case. ‘Black Bird, a Kanga’ emerges as a testament to this exploration, characterised by soft structures crafted from locally sourced handwoven cotton and wool. Each piece encapsulates layers of texture and collaborative creativity, reflecting a fable woven into fabric.

UJANA SHIRT: The Ujana Shirt is where style and soft structures strike up a stylish conversation. Its relaxed fit also offers playful pockets and a metal zip fastening with handmade detailing at its end.

Engaging in Katungulu’s investigation of volumes derived from discourse on the guinea fowl, the intersection of curves and straight lines gives rise to delicate structural shapes encircling the hips of the wearer.

PAMBA SKIRT: The Pamba Skirt is meticulously crafted from locally sourced, handwoven wool and cotton. This exquisite piece is rendered in a timeless pencil fit, designed to accentuate the beauty of the female form, while functional pockets at the waist offer convenience. A centre slit lends a playful touch of charm to the ensemble.

• Materials: cotton,wool, bone
• Technique: hand woven

USHANGA KENYA INITIATIVE

The many women’s groups under the umbrella of the Ushanga Kenya Initiative are artisans without borders, sharing their craft beyond their villages and communities. The beads are one way of carrying and wearing their traditions, as part of their pastoralist heritage, used to mark and celebrate movement of individuals between age sets, age groups and phases of life, depending on pre-determined colours and patterns, and sharing their dynamic identities with each other. These long beloved beaded ornaments and garments have become an iconic part of shared East African identity over the decades.

Beyond the techniques of beadwork being handed down from generation to generation, the women’s work within the initiative are a symbol of many changes as regards the ways work and outputs are viewed in the fashion industry. While their high quality pieces are in demand locally and internationally, with the possibilities for value addition further expanding via partnerships and commissions, the women are leading the way in striking a flexible balance between free expression of their traditions for themselves, and enabling the sharing of their cultures on the bodies of others. The women are at once both artisans and archivists, while remaining fully themselves as mothers, daughters and community members, thus holistically safeguarding their cultural legacies.

MAXHOSA AFRICA

Designer: Laduma Ngxokolo from South Africa

GOLF SHIRT and CARDIGAN: Xhosa coming of age rituals are the cultural initiation for thousands of boys in South Africa’s Eastern Cape. Alongside the circumcision that shows their elevation to manhood, each initiate is called upon to leave the trappings of their boyhood behind, up to and including all their old clothes. This enables their parents and relatives to buy them new clothes that are a stronger reflection of their new status.

Driven by a strong desire to explore knitwear design solutions that would be culturally suitable for modern amakrwala (Xhosa initiates), Laduma Ngxokolo founded MAXHOSA AFRICA, a South African brand in 2012. As a former initiate himself, Laduma’s premium pieces began as an effervescent celebration of traditional Xhosa aesthetics. He began with an exploration of their beadwork patterns, complete with inherent symbolism and bright colours.

The golf shirt and cardigan on display are from the SS ‘17 collection ‘Apropriyeyshin’, constructed in flat classic silhouettes. The pieces aim to express the beauty in cultural exchange between Western and Xhosa dress-codes, in a modern take that makes a bold and sophisticated statement.

• Materials: linen, viscose
• Technique: knit

LAGOS SPACE PROGRAMME

Designer: Adeju Thompson from Nigeria

POST-ADIRE HOODIE and YORUBA WIDE TROUSERS: Guided by the cultural and spiritual philosophies of the Yoruba people viewed through a queer lens, Lagos Space Programme places the heritage craft and sartorial expressions of the Yoruba in dialogue with resonant cultural heritages from around the world. In doing so, the label creates a future culture that can be shared by a global audience.

From its founding to its (re)naming by Portuguese explorers, to its emergence as the epicenter of a new global youth culture, the Lagos metropolis has always been the physical manifestation of Yoruba culture in dialogue with the rest of the world. Lagos Space Programme invokes both an experimental design exploration and a metaphorical portal into a future with no blueprints or limitations, only endless possibilities. One of LSP’s explorations is traditional Yoruba dress codes, leading to their replicas of and homages to different pieces, including the wide legged workwear trousers featured here.

Central to the LSP vision is Thompson’s commitment to West African artisanship and harnessing these crafts as tools for activism. His interrogation of adire eleko, the indigo resist-dyed textile, becomes post-adire, as his team in Lagos meticulously hand-draw his motifs onto cloth using the traditional feather brush method, and then send it to a family of dyers in Abeokuta, Ogun State. “Adire is very much a fine art, a way to tell your story through fabric. It’s also a dying craft,” he says. “I’m working with the best of the best, people who have been trained by master dyers, because it deserves that respect. And then, I move the storytelling forward by incorporating queer semiotics to speak for myself and to my community.” The post-adire hoodie carries this beautiful and layered making process into the casualness of streetwear, turning even everyday informal pieces into rich documents and narratives.

• Materials: adire – indigo dyed cotton, tropical wool, lace
• Techniques: hand woven, hand dyed

 

EMMY KASBIT

Designer: Emmanuel Okoro from Nigeria

AKWETE SUIT: Emmanuel Okoro’s brand, Emmy Kasbit, was started in Nigeria in 2014, and is known for bringing aesthetically clean, architectural design principles into his dealings with traditional staples. His work is also revered for its use of different kinds of Nigerian indigenous textiles. Chief among them is the famous akwete, which was first woven in the town of the same name by the Igbo people in Abia State. Akwete is traditionally woven by women on uniquely wide looms, and it can take several days to finish one piece, which can serve as a wrapper covering the whole body.

The suit presented here, from the SS18 collection “An Ode To My Father”, features the brand’s inaugural akwete, worked into an asymmetrical slim cut suit characterised by a rippling fringe.

• Materials: akwete – cotton, silk
• Technique: hand woven

 

DICKENS OTIENO

Designer: Dickens Otieno from Kenya

STILL LIFE: SCHOOL UNIFORM: Dickens Otieno is known for being the “Mabati Tailor” for his enchanting alchemical transformation of used aluminium cans into the warp and weft threads of new, sculptural textiles, allowing an intimate glimpse into the architecture of weaving. His process, informed by indigenous weaving practices, also looks at forms made from papyrus, raffia and palm, the fabric colours and patterns in his mother’s tailoring workshop, objects piled high in markets and other magical moments and memories in his immediate surroundings.

The still life is an intimate portrait of a quintessential item of clothing which is supposed to be the great class ‘equaliser’—the school uniform— and the dizzying memories and emotions that are attached to it throughout years of learning. The piece captures a quiet, everyday moment, in a grounding and dignifying way that invites reflection.

• Materials: aluminium
• Techniques: hand weaving

LUKHANYO MDINGI

Designer: Lukhanyo Mdingi from South Africa

WOMAN’S BURKINA TWO PIECE SUIT: The synergistic partnership between Cape Town based designer Lukhanyo Mdingi and the Burkinabé weaving cooperative CABES-GIE, resulted in the invention of two new weaving methods, as well as the generation of over two hundred thousand meters of Faso Dan Fani, the Burkinabé national fabric which enjoys culturally protected status, in processes that embraced the highest social and ecological ethical standards that were contextually possible.

In a post introducing the collaboration, Lukhayo had this to say: “Craft has always been at the heart of the LM label; but being in the presence of those behind the making allowed me to understand the honesty and integrity within the provenance of it all.” Lukhayo described working with the weavers to blend cotton and metal threads, as well as painstaking colour matching to get exact Pantone shades. He added, “It really is a collaboration, and I rely on their ingenuity. This is how it should be: really understanding how they can add their expertise, to see how they can tighten the design and really make it a lot stronger.”

A Faso Dan Fani textile features in the Lukhanyo Mdingi two piece women’s suit from the Burkina collection.

• Materials: faso dan fani – cotton, lurex
• Technique: handwoven

DOREEN MASHIKA

Designer: Doreen Mashika from Tanzania

NIA DRESS: Doreen Mashika believes that the bedrock of traditional cultures in Africa should be celebrated, and holds the East African kanga at the heart of her resort-wear brand. Native to the Swahili coastline, kangas feature heavily throughout her work in a variety of eclectic manipulations and colors. Based in Zanzibar, Doreen creates breezy, relaxed silhouettes inspired by the colours and textiles of her Tanzanian heritage. Doreen is a master of the unexpected, harnessing an ability to marry starkly contrasting kangas, and even reorient their panels and expected layouts, with transfixing results.

• Materials: cotton

 

Between 17 May – 30 June 2024 parts of Tradition(al) will travel to the main State of Fashion Biennale site in Arnhem. The biennale is curated by Rachel Dedman and Lou Bennett, with Sunny, Kallol Datta and Hanayrá Negreiros. This decentralised edition unfolds across Arnhem, Nairobi, Bengalūru and São Paulo, exploring the complexities of tradition, the power of indigenous knowledge, and the political potential of clothing.

More information about the programme of State of Fashion 2024 can be found on our website: stateoffashion.org 

• Photos: Ian Gichohi is a photographer living and working in Nairobi, Kenya
• Installation artist: Vinette Khakai 
• Venue: Circle Art Gallery in Nairobi