Oh Kumasi!

So I am on my way to purchase the fabric for the line at the kente village in Kumasi, assuming everything will go according to plan....which most likely doesn’t happen in Ghana! Of course the bus breaks down only a quarter of the way there! So we were stuck waiting for a new bus to arrive from Accra for 4 hours!! I made friends with two elderly men, one who was on the way to see his 107 year old mom! He takes the trip every month and cherishes each one as he knows she will not be with him for much longer. So I finally made it to Kumasi with a grand total of 8.5 hours on the bus and ended up sleeping there and buying the kente a day later than planned. I spent the whole day in the kente village going from vendor to vendor trying to purchase enough for the initial line. Since the road was so dusty on the way there and we were out in the sun all day the only thing I wanted to do when I got back home was take a shower! When I arrived back to Accra by 11:30pm I turned on the shower and nothing came out! No water..damn...guess there’s always tomorrow....

The Origins

The idea for hemma came about when we studied abroad in Ghana. We were there during the our junior year in the Spring of 07. This was a major turning point in both of our lives because we were able to become so detached from our lives in New York and fully immerse ourselves in the Ghanaian lifestyle. We were both worried when we first got there and weren't sure if we could last an entire semester. But by the time we left, we cried our eyes out because we didn't want to leave Ghana behind. Through hemma we've found a way to bring some of Ghana back with us and share it with New York. We fell into the idea of creating a clothing line, it started off unintentionally. While in Ghana we loved the wide array of West African fabrics and garment designs, so we started designing clothes for ourselves. Between Cindy and I we made dozens of pieces, including garments made out of Kente fabric. Everyone in Ghana and the NYU program loved it. When we came back to NY we got the same reception. A lightbulb clicked for us. We decided that we wanted to share the clothing that we loved so much by starting hemma.