African fashion has flourished in terms of creativity and innovation in recent years, and is attracting global attention.
Designers and labels are churning out garments that reflect African cities and how they interact with global trends. Think Nigeria’s Ejiro Amos Tafiri and Mai Atafo, Ghana’s Christie Brown and Larry Jay, Kenya’s Ikojn or South Africa’s Boyde.
Cities like Lagos, Accra, Marrakesh, Nairobi and Johannesburg have become global fashion capitals. They’re fashion production hubs that are creating styles that mirror their cosmopolitanism; their vibrant mix of nationalities.
In a recent study I focus on how fashion in Lagos mirrors the bustling Nigerian city’s cosmopolitanism. It reflects a meeting point between global and local influences.
Drawing on interviews with designers, I discuss how cosmopolitanism is produced through clothing – and the gender dynamics that underpin it. African fashion production is drawing from local roots but also responding to global social and cultural developments.
Cosmopolitan Africa
Cosmopolitanism is a global community that transcends national borders. Many cultures inform a big city’s fashions, like they do its cuisines.
But while the conversation on cosmopolitanism has centred mostly on western countries, Africa also has a long history of connection to other parts of the world through trade, migration and the exchange of ideas.
African American philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah argues that the western idea of cosmopolitanism often assumes a complete embrace of foreign cultures and ideals. But among Africans, cosmopolitanism integrates the local with the global. He calls this rooted cosmopolitanism. It’s seen in various forms in African societies, such as urbanisation or fashion in this case.
Lagos
Lagos is Africa’s most populous city and is home to many migrants. It’s a mix of foreigners and indigenous people with different cultural backgrounds who find meaning in living as Lagosians.
I chose Lagos for my study because of its vibrant creative industries. Even a decade ago, Lagos was judged by one magazine as the world’s fourth-largest fashion city. I interviewed 18 fashion designers living and working there.
Local fabric, western designs for women
I found that fashion in Lagos can be separated into two major trends: fabric and design – the materials clothes are made with and the styles in vogue.
Local fabrics and appropriated fabrics (foreign-produced cloths that have been assimilated into Nigerian cultures) are in vogue today for female fashion.
Local fabrics are hand-woven or dyed cloths and stem from various ethnic groups, like Aso oke or Akwete.
Popular appropriated fabrics are Ankara (wax prints, originally from Indonesia), lace (a delicate, openwork fabric popular on traditional Nigerian attire) and George (a type of Madras cloth popular among Nigeria’s Igbos).
Before the 2000s, the use of these fabrics was at two ends of a spectrum. Indigenous cloth, lace and George were for social and cultural events. Ankara was for everyday functional clothes, iro (a wrap skirt) and buba (a three-piece traditional design for women, mostly the married or elderly), especially among low-income people.
The popularity of local fabrics in today’s fashion didn’t emerge from a vacuum. It was a choice by designers, a social process of acceptance, and government initiative.
Today’s designers are consciously using local fabrics as a way of endorsing their roots and normalising their use. Many faced rejection at first. Zena, a participant in my study, sold only two pieces of her clothing during her first year of business. She spent time convincing people “this is good”:
And, funny enough, they are easy to wear and not expensive. But it took a while for them to appreciate it.
Since the early 1990s the Nigerian government has been committed to promoting local fabrics and locally produced clothes. In 2017, it approved a Monday and Wednesday “Made-in-Nigeria Dress Days” policy.
While local fabrics are today the fabric trend in women’s clothing, the design trend is western. Designers use local fabrics in styles that have global appeal.
Still, they are conscious of maintaining authenticity through either the fabric, a silhouette or a design concept that resonates with their culture.
According to Eji, her western designs still have the African woman in mind:
The African woman is not only situated in Africa, but they are also all over the world. I believe the world is more cosmopolitan now, we have interracial marriages, we can borrow culture from everywhere, we can inter-weave stuff.
Women’s fashion mirrors Lagos society’s complexity and its openness to global trends, as it seeks to globalise its local elements.
It’s the opposite for men
Cosmopolitan men’s fashion in Lagos is the opposite of women’s. The fabric trend is western; the design trend is local.
In Lagos, most men wear the two or three-piece “native”. The buba and sokoto, for example, is for regular wear. (A traditional two-piece top and trouser, normally from the same fabric.) The agbada is for special events. (Trousers, a top and a loose-fitting, wide-sleeved robe over.)
Credit: theconversation