Heal by Hair: How Communities, Culture, and Trust Are Redefining Mental Health Across Africa
In Siou, a village in Togo’s Kara region, a week before the Évala celebrations, the Heal by Hair Festival revealed a powerful truth: mental health is not only a medical conversation. It is a cultural, social, and collective responsibility. “We speak a great deal about healthcare infrastructure. We speak far less about infrastructures of trust. […]
How DJs Helped Take Afrobeats Global
Trill Xoe, a Lagos-raised DJ and producer who studied in Mauritius and has worked with Native Records, remembers hearing Afrobeats there, thousands of miles from home. Hearing the sound playing loudly from a DJ set felt like more than a surprise. “Just being in a foreign man’s land where they don’t speak English, and just […]
Bal d’Afrique, on African Ground
Byredo’s new campaign was shot in Accra with a West African cast, a Burkinabè choreographer and a creative team spanning the continent and its diaspora. It may be the most structurally ambitious fragrance campaign of the year. Photography by Philip-Daniel Ducasse for Byredo Byredo’s new Bal d’Afrique campaign was shot in Accra, Ghana, and built […]
The Cloth That Holds the Dead
An Egungun is not a costume. It’s a technology for making ancestors show up. Outside the communities that practice it, Egungun gets misread
Everyday Couture: Why Africa’s True Fashion Houses Sit on the Streets
Growing up in Africa, you feel the streets’ pulse long before you ever hear of Paris runways. On crowded roads where roasted plantain and petrol fumes mingle, a tailor’s shop hums with life. It’s a tiny space, bursting with wax prints, bogolan, kente, and lace — colors popping like a festival. A sewing machine […]
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 […]
Women’s Day Through Their Eyes: African Image Makers, 1950s–1980s
From the 1950s to the 1980s, as Africa waged its fight for independence and self-definition, a quiet revolution unfolded—one captured through the eyes of African women behind the lens. Defying colonial legacies and patriarchal gatekeeping, they reclaimed photography and film as instruments of power. Thérèse Sita-Bella, Felicia Ewurasi Abban, Safi Faye, Awa Tounkara, Ifeoma […]