The Kente Beach Bag!
Over the past six months, we have been raving about Ghana, that’s why we have been looking forward to completing our Spring/Summer 20 collection with this last capsule, celebrating Ghanian craftsmanship and beach life.
Kente is a traditional Ghanaian textile that is woven into strips and then sewn together to the desired size. While in the past it was reserved for Ashanti royalty and special occasions, it is now a widely-used textile for all kind of different products. It is seen as an important part of Ghana’s cultural identity, while the patterns and symbols have different meanings in local communities and tribes.
The project started during our trip to Ghana in 2019 when we had the chance to visit Bob, who is known for his knowledge and experience in Kente weaving. At his workshop, we were able to see how his team carefully hand-weaved on the wooden horizontal stripe looms. The precision, the pace and the concentration is just unseen and underlines how much skill and work is behind one Kente cloth.
In collaboration with Bob, we then decided on the fabrics for our project. Bob and his team worked on it intensively for a couple of months and when the pieces arrived in our studio in Germany, we were just blown away from the quality, colours and knowing how much effort is behind each piece.
As the final step of the project, the beautiful fabrics were made into bags in Germany and got an inner lining and a pocket.
The result is the Kente Beach bag in three different designs, limited to 20 pieces each:
Fatih Fa Black: Named Fatiah Fa in dedication to the marriage of the first president of independent Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah, and his wife Fathia. It symbolises mutual affection and elegance.
Heyemeletor Blue: Heyemeletor refers to the three stages of life: being born, grow and being responsible and die. It symbolises life and the inability to control nature.
Suklikpe Red: Suklikpe literally means ‘cube of sugar’ and symbolises sincerity and appreciation.
All profits go to Dream Big Ghana Foundation whose inspiring work we were able to see and experience during our trip to Ghana!
The Kente Beach Bag is dropping on Sunday, 9th of August at 6PM CEST.
