Ibadan’s Tailors, Traders, and Textiles: A Narrative Photodocumentary

April 28, 2017 12:45 PM

Ibadan’s Tailors, Traders, and Textiles: A Narrative Photodocumentary. Join MeFites infini and glasseyes in a journey through fabric shops and fashion magazines of Ibadan, the state capital of Oyo State, Nigeria, to see how brands are built through word of mouth and hard work in the informal economy. Meet Mama Segun, fashion designer and seamstress, Ayoola Adedokun, the face of modern Nigeria, Lanre Ogunleye, stylist, trader, broker, and maker, and others. [via mefi projects]

Related news coverage of the Nigerian textile industry:
- Crunch time for Nigeria's textile sector (Al Jazeera, June 21, 2015) -- Manufacturers want government protection while traders want a strong currency in the face of rising Asian competition.

- Nigeria's struggling textile industry | The Wider Image (Reuters, Feb 15, 2017)

President Muhammadu Buhari hopes to revive the once flourishing textile and leather industries in northern Nigeria to end the country's dependence on oil exports and diversify Africa's biggest economy.

But a collapse in vital oil revenues has pushed the West African nation into its first recession in 25 years, making it difficult to provide state loans or improve the erratic power supply that has led to closure of most plants.

The textile industries may rebound, as World Economics, a well known organisation based in London, has declared that Nigeria’s economy is out of recession. (Vanguard NGR, April 18, 2017 -- though comments indicate this statement might not match realities in the country.)

posted by filthy light thief (2 comments total)

This is an amazing post. I'm setting this aside to read in depth, because, hello, textile historian.
posted by strixus at 12:58 PM on April 28, 2017 [3 favorites]

The textile industries may rebound, as World Economics, a well known organisation based in London, has declared that Nigeria’s economy is out of recession. (Vanguard NGR, April 18, 2017 -- though comments indicate this statement might not match realities in the country.)

I've had my eye on the Vanguard for some time now. I'm not convinced of their agenda and the messaging they push as compared to other publications.

The Central Bank of Nigeria has restated that the Nigerian economy would come out of the recession in the second quarter of 2017.

Textile industries have been devastated by cheaper Chinese facsimiles of African prints -ankara, and outright fakes and cheap imitations of Dutch wax giants like Vlisco. I don't think they're going to rebound overnight since the problems are deeper and more structural (electricity supply for one, cost of inputs, etc) and unrelated to the current recession.

Ghana's been impacted as well. This is not a good thing.
posted by infini at 1:24 PM on April 28, 2017 [6 favorites]