Africans are creative, but we like to ask for permission, and do I blame us? No. We were raised in a system where asking questions means you’re rude or you’re challenging authority. So even though we keep creating anyway, our creativity grows, but our businesses don’t scale. In a way, it’s stifling the creativity.
I remember my mom’s tailor shop. I grew up seeing those small corners with wooden tables, fabric scraps everywhere, chalk lines on the floor, and that familiar sound of scissors cutting through cloth. Sometimes, in the middle of the night, the noise of her sewing machine wouldn’t even let me sleep. One day, I decided to take an interest in her cutting techniques.
But as my mum chalked and cut the fabrics, she wasn’t saying anything. I didn’t understand what she was doing, so I asked, “Why did you cut it that way? Why did you do that?” She’d just say, “Just watch.” I’d ask again, and when my questions started distracting her, she’d say, “See, you’re disturbing me jare. Go and sit down somewhere.”
And honestly, I believe she had her reasons. I was probably interrupting her thought process, or she didn’t want to make a mistake. Or maybe she was even figuring out the style herself.
But you know what? This isn’t just true for my mom as a tailor in Africa; it’s true for almost every local tailor out there. Apprentices learn simply by being present. You watch how they measure. You observe how they hold fabric. You notice how they adjust, correct, and turn nothing into something beautiful.
The tailoring industry is largely informal and decentralized. Training happens through apprenticeship and informal mentoring, rarely documented or standardized.
Most existing datasets on fashion artisans focus on business numbers and contact info, not on skill transfer or teaching methods.
And as lovely and nostalgic as this setup is, it has also become a serious problem for the continent.
Too much of our fashion knowledge sits in people’s heads, not in books, not in videos, not in patterns, not in structured systems. And once the older tailors retire or pass on, that knowledge quietly disappears. No documentation or digital footprint. No way for the next generation to learn unless they physically spend years in another tailor’s shop.
Meanwhile, the world has moved on. Other cultures are turning their fashion methods into online courses, documented systems, searchable libraries, AI tools, and global learning platforms. And because we are not documenting ours, other people will eventually study us, digitize our methods, package them, and sell them back to us, the same way we already lost ownership of so many cultural stories.
Imagine what it could have been like if I had a manual to read before joining my mum at the cutting table. Or maybe a digital demo of what she was trying to do. I would have stood beside her quietly, taking in the real-life experience while connecting it with the theoretical knowledge I already had.
A tailor in Ghana could upload a 40-year-old method for cutting kaftans. A Nigerian tailor could document the old ways of shaping iro and buba. A Kenyan designer could digitize beadwork patterns passed down for generations.
African fashion isn’t lacking creativity. It’s lacking structure. It’s lacking digital continuity. And in a world where AI is already learning patterns, colours, textiles, and cultural designs, the worst thing we can do is leave our fashion wisdom on the table.
There’s only one way around this: developing our own independent system where we decide how we want to be perceived and priced.
And we’re already doing that by building the Owambe Fashion Game. It’s not just a fun dress-up experience; it’s a way to make people interact with African culture and fabrics in a way that sticks. A simple game, yes, but one that shows how our fabrics, styles, and creativity can live beyond tailor shops and handwritten notes.
If a digital platform can let anyone explore adire, ankara, lace, or aso-oke in a playful and interactive way, just imagine what a full fashion-knowledge platform could do for the entire industry. I will leave you to your imagination.
Until next time, my neighbours, remember, as we say over here, the A in Africa stands for Attitude, Atarodo, and All Things Extra!