Textiles and Clothes

Textiles and Clothes

Mariarose Ngosi, Lilongwe, Malawi, on sourcing African clothes for weddings in Glasgow:

“Normally, it’s white dress. A normal white wedding dress and a normal suit. Ah, yes. But for the family sometimes, during the wedding time, they can pick a colour. An African colour. So, for the families they can wear that African colour. So, everyone will be in the same colour with that different design… It can be yellow, blue, green, whatever, but the African material cloth (wax cloth) you can also get here in Scotland as well. We have lots of them, as well, nowadays. So, you can wear that. They can say, ok, this is the colour for the wedding, so whoever can afford to buy that can buy and make a dress towards it…yes, the wax print cloth… Occasionally I do [wear African dress], yes. If I go to the…mainly it’s if you are going to the function. If it’s a Malawian function or a wedding or whatever, people tend to wear African outfits, yeah… Yeah, you can buy them in Scotland. We have girls who…some of them they travel to Malawi and they bring some. Or, you can even ask, like, my cousin’s wife went to Malawi last month and she brought some materials from home. And I know a girl from Blantyre [in Scotland] and she sells things from Uganda. But it is the same type of material, so, yes, you can get them.”

Ghanaian smocks

One of our male respondents, who is originally from the Sisaala people in northern Ghana, told us about the traditional smocks of that region. He said that they are light and airy and therefore pleasant for wearing when dancing. He also said they were good to wear to facilitate flirting. The smocks have been used as a symbol of Ghanaian unity by several presidents of Ghana. Their traditional manufacture is under threat (as a great deal of traditional cloth and textile production has been for a long time in Africa) from foreign imports of cheap cloth.

Female attire in Namibia

Namibia’s Herero women wear dresses that are based on the Victorian dresses of their German colonisers and oppressors and has come to symbolise their suffering and resilience. It is an important moment in a young Herero woman's life when she gets her first dress. However, the accompanying head dress represents the meaning of cattle to the Herero people. Modern versions of the dress and headwear are now available.

Kente cloth

The Kente cloth originates in what is now Ghana and is made by a number of different groups of people. One story goes that its patterns were invented by a wise spider called ‘Anansi,’ who passed the knowledge on to humans. In the past it was often woven out of the silk from European trade cloth. The Kente cloth has become known, very much, as an exclusive good, which is used for celebrations and also regarded as a symbol of both luxury and wealth. The patterns and colours all have specific meanings.

Chief Suliman Chebe, Sissala People, Ghana on Kente cloth:

“Every tribe, more or less, have some matching colours that depicts the spirit of the tribe. So, Ghana is a very traditional country. We’re very open minded, yes…the culture is very vibrant. If you go to the Ashantis, for example, they have the Kente cloth. And Kente is like a kilt, but more colourful. More sweet. It actually cheers you up. When somebody is wearing Kente, you feel happy.”

Chief Josephine Obo Macleod, Esan People, Nigeria, on African clothing and textiles:

“Clothing…and fabrics and style. It’s all very important to the Africans. I find when I get to, I travel overseas and I get to Africa, the first thing that I see is the sights, the sound and the smell. But, it’s elaborately dressed women and men. And you know, for me, I think they look very well. I wish I could dress as much as they can. But, some of them can just coordinate their clothes. Bright yellow, bright this…and it suits them and it’s so beautiful. So, that’s our culture they’ve brought in…during the time they have naming ceremonies here. Or they have African day [in Scotland], here a lot of Africans will wear their traditional clothes. And I think that’s also very good. And I think that we have to explore ways that we can incorporate that to our western clothes, and western clothes into the traditional clothes. Textiles and fabric means a lot to us, you know… And also, one thing also I find is, western people are now using more of our traditional fabrics for furnitures. Like throw pillows, beddings, tablecloths…but, most of Africans, although they dress well, with all these things they are looking down on it. And not exploring other uses of the fabric… Another sadness I had, was in my village. When my husband wanted to attend my chieftancy, I wanted him to wear my own traditionally handwoven…they call it igbu in Eshan land, and unfortunately, there was nobody else weaving it in my own particular village. My aunty used to weave it. And then the loom was thrown away by her children when she had arthritis. Because they thought that it was now beneath them to weave this stuff. And by the time I finished my research, I had to go to, actually, the Catholic church again…to go and order the traditional cloth that my husband wore. So, most of it is now being done by the Catholic church. The Catholic church, buying looms and trying to save the tradition for us. I feel that it is actually very sad that our people are not taking it seriously. They only remember the traditional wares when they are having a wedding or when there is a death. But, it’s very sad I think that we should, yes…it’s beautiful to dress all those colourful way that we do, but we should also try to help those people who have the skills, and let the skills be passed down to the children.”

Kaddi Jatu Jobe, Mandinka, Gambia, on sourcing African clothes in the UK:

“In London, you can get them, and in Reading, where I came from. We have like a Wednesday market. We have like, uhm, people from London, who will come to the market and sell. So, we buy it from there and we’ve got a few tailors here as well, who do sewing. But if it’s the embroidered ones, those ones are mostly from Gambia.”

Ndop cloth

Ndop cloths are high-quality, blue-coloured resist-dyed cloths (a process in which the dye is forcibly resisted with stitching or wax, amongst other things), which were first imported to the Cameroon Grassfields from eastern Nigeria. Local production of the cloths by the women of the area began at the turn of the last century. The red wool along the fringe is made from material that is imported from abroad. Ndop display cloths are still amongst the most favoured gifts to be given amongst leaders in the area. Both the geometric symbols (circles, lozenges, and meandering lines) and the depictions of animal (crocodiles, etc.) have royal symbolism. The blue colour of the cloth also denotes the Bamiléké elite.

Jean Albert Nietcho, Bamiléké, Cameroon, on Ndop cloth:

“People from the Ndé have their special colour. Sky blue and dark blue. We…it’s some kind of design. We have a museum back home. When you go to that museum you will see something that we do… So, it’s the blue…it’s the blue sky. It’s blue. It’s a little bit of…trace of white. It’s blue or blue sky. It’s some shape on it… I can’t really say that. Sometimes, it’s just a line which come like this. Sometime it just…just like a triangle… or a pyramid shape. They got that with the symbol and also animals. Each village have kind of animals.”

Jean Albert Nietcho, Bamiléké, Cameroon, on African clothes at events:

“Even when I go to civil marriage, me and my wife, we wear African clothes. The smart ones. Not the traditional…(laughs). Mostly in the summer. Well you’ve seen the weather in Africa…”

Lydie Bere Flere Dossa, Akan, Ivory Coast, on cinnamon on wedding clothes:

“It smell a little bit like cinnamon when I make it there. So, there is this one and they put it in a burner. And when they burn it, they’ll put it in a house and all the dress who are around smell it. You know, it smell it as well. So, this one, especially when there is a wedding. We like to burn it in a corner, so all the dress gonna have that smell.”

Bark cloth

One of our respondents from the Baganda group of people of Uganda talked of his great pride in the traditional dress of his home area and how he wears it when he can in Glasgow. ‘Bark cloth’ is made from the inner bark of the mutuba tree, which is a kind of ficus (a plant you may have in your living room). According to UNESCO, the process for making it is older than weaving. The United Nations body named Ugandan bark cloth manufacturing part of the world's ‘intangible cultural heritage’, in 2005. Examples of the cloth can be seen in the National Museum of Scotland.

Lule Nassar, Baganda, Uganda, on wearing bark cloth in Glasgow:

“It’s the skin of the tree. They take the skin of the tree, then they hammer it, maybe a thousand time, and they stretch it, stretch it and it become real clothes… Yes, yes, I have some here. It can’t go away with me…everywhere I go (laughs). If today I was not working to come to see you, that’s the dress I’d dress, every time if I go to any occasion. I feel so special to wear that. And, eh, everywhere I go here in Scotland, the people they love it…people they love it here.”

Sean Thomas, Lagos, Nigeria, on wedding clothes:

“So, if we say, doing the marriages, the families will have different colours. The bride’s family might choose blue, the groom’s family might choose grey… Ceremonies are often very big by the way, you might have five or six hundred people coming, so out of all those people you would be easily able to identify who belongs to what family.”

Grace Maneka, Malawi, on Africans wearing traditional clothing in the UK:

“The way people use African dress here in Scotland is different from the way they’ll use it in England. In England we wear it more than it’s worn out here. Not sure whether it’s lack of events or just, uhm... but, it’s not worn as much as I would think…or, I would like to see it being worn. Maybe there is no supply. That’s why I’m coming up with, uhm, something to try and supply these things. Fabrics, fashion and something traditional. It’s alright to wear now and again, just like you [Chief Amu] are wearing. So, it just gives that nice authenticity, just like the Asians do. They go around wearing their own cultural clothing. And I think, Africans, we ought to be comfortable doing the same.”

Kanga Cloth

Ali Abubakur, one of our respondents who is originally from the Zanzibar archipelago, showed us a Kanga cloth when we visited his home to interview him. These cloths are ubiquitous in East Africa and come in an array of different patterns and colours. They are worn day to day and play a part in all the main life-event ceremonies. Their key feature is that they contain a saying or proverb in Kiswahili. These can be used to pass on wisdom and to express thoughts that the wearer feels cannot be expressed verbally.