Beauty in Hard Times: Africa’s Lipstick Effect
What do women hold onto when everything else feels uncertain? Across Africa, one answer rises again and again: beauty rituals. In times of economic pressure, when inflation climbs and currencies wobble, many women continue to invest in small but powerful acts of adornment—braids, gele, fragrance oils, or a few yards of fabric. Economists call it […]
WORN OUT — Part III: Return to Sender
How African Designers Are Reclaiming Waste and Rewriting Fashion’s Future The bales arrive as they always have — compressed, labeled, shipped across oceans like cargo without conscience. They still overwhelm ports and markets, a visible symptom of a system that hasn’t stopped. But something has shifted in how they’re received. Across Accra, Cairo, Dakar, workshops […]
WORN OUT — Part II: How African Governments Are Responding to the Textile Waste Crisis
Western wardrobes don’t end in Europe or North America. They spill quietly, devastatingly onto African soil, packed into shipping containers and sold in open-air markets under the guise of “donations.” But from Accra to Kigali, Dakar to Lusaka, something is shifting. The bales keep arriving. The markets keep choking. But across the continent, a patchwork […]
Lafalaise Dion on Styling Guzangs’ ‘Helmet of Heritage’ Cover with Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah
Lafalaise Dion is a force—an artist whose work transcends fashion. Her hands don’t just style; they conjure altars of memory and defiance, weaving stories through fabric and cowrie shells. When Guzangs, the bold voice of African fashion, set out to create its debut cover, “Helmet of Heritage,” featuring NFL star Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah in Tamale, Ghana, […]
WORN OUT: The True Cost of Your Donated Clothes
Part I — The History of a Heap Kantamanto doesn’t sleep. It breathes, wheezes, and heaves under the weight of foreign fabrics. Bales arrive daily—tightly bound, often soaked in chemical stench or rainwater from cargo ships—marked “donation” in faded marker. They are not gifts. They are transactions. They are waste. And they are profitable for […]
WORN OUT: A Series on Africa and Secondhand Clothing
A three-part Guzangs series on the secondhand clothing trade and the African economies absorbing it. An estimated 15 million used garments enter Ghana every week, most of them shipped from the UK, the US, and China, and a global secondhand trade now worth more than five billion dollars a year treats the continent as its […]
Style Breakdown: Inside Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah’s Custom Looks and the Designers Behind Them
In our debut digital issue, we spotlight Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah, NFL linebacker and Ghanaian as the face of our inaugural Guzangs cover. Each look he wore was custom-made in collaboration with African designers and stylists, curated specifically for this moment. While these exact pieces were made for Jeremiah, many are available to order or shop in […]
Helmet of Heritage: Behind the Scenes of Guzangs’ Debut Digital Cover
In this landmark debut digital issue of Guzangs, we ignite a fresh chapter in cultural storytelling. Leading our cover story is American football standout Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah, whose on-field prowess is matched by his devotion to his Ghanaian heritage and can be seen evidently seen through his style cycle on instagram– boldly worn kente looks, embroidered […]
Helmet of Heritage: Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah on Identity, Legacy, and Purpose
NFL star Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah leads Guzangs’ debut digital cover in a story that threads fashion, ancestry, and purpose—shot in Tamale, Ghana.
OUR TOWN: The Film Capturing a West African Movement on Wheels and Waves
Some stories don’t arrive through words. They show up in motion—on boards, in waves, and in the spaces young people carve out for themselves. OUR TOWN is one of them. Directed by Lounseny Soumah, the 35-minute documentary premiered yesterday at MK2 Bibliothèque in Paris. It follows Skate Tour GH, a 2022 road trip that brought […]