Marukuavi’S Gifts & Beads

The Kasupi Crafts exclusively retail ‘fashionable’ clothing, jewellery, accessories and selected apparel, like T-shirts, made or decorated by hand, almost entirely originating from the Namibian craft sector. Owner of the stall, Josephine Kasupi, formerly worked for 13 years for the owner of Tomcat, and later became the proud owner and renamed it aptly to Kasupi Crafts. She enjoys providing visitors with an experience of a ‘different’ kind of craft stall. Kasupi offers the adventurous fashionista leather bags made from flawless springbok and zebra hides which follow the design and pattern of mainstream handbags, clutches and shoulder-slings, yet conventional enough to take to the office. Kasupi Craft’s famous leather springbok fur sandals are often available in fashionable colours like bright greens and screaming pinks.

Glenda Meinert produces original wildlife and figurative art on high-quality, hand-selected leather. Every piece is different and due to the nature of leather, requires careful planning in composition, layout, design and selection. She draws inspiration from African, Namibian wildlife and landscapes. Glenda started her working career as a designer and pattern-maker at Nakara, Namibia’s largest tannery and producer of leather products, where she designed national costumes for Miss Namibia. In her spare time, she experimented with leather offcuts, produced greeting cards and small landscapes which were presented to friends. Encouraging positive responses induced Glenda to experiment with leather on larger landscapes and finally led to the creation of wildlife art. Her first exhibition in 1998 was a great success.

Self-taught designer and owner of Fimbi Leather, Elsie Imhof, has successfully harnessed her background as tour guide to express a deep-seated appreciation for the Namibian outdoors and her knowledge of a variety of animal hides to create a popular range of eye-catching and attractive leather products. Each item is unique and therefore a leather lover and collector’s dream. Imhof started Fimbi Leather Art four years ago after a successful art exhibition and to this day, still draws inspiration for product design from her immediate environment. There are no frills and fusses to the designs; these are merely good-quality hides converted into well-made, sturdy items, perfect for everyday use. Case in point, her range of leather book covers are statement pieces, carefully stitched to reveal the great quality and selection of flawless leather, perfectly complimenting any top-level executive’s stationery.

Claudia Hangara is a craft trader from rural Namibia, raised in a family loving all things leather. Fifteen years ago, when she started her own business, Josephine’s Leather Work, Arts and Crafts, Claudia’s range naturally focused exclusively on handbags, purses, wallets, jewellery and animals made of leather. The leather is sourced locally thereby lending to each item a 100% Namibian identity. As the years passed and her business grew, Claudia slowly incorporated other items into her range of products such as rawhide sandals of springbok hide, wire craft, dolls, key-rings and beaded products. Claudia Hangara has a unique set of skills in Windhoek and a visit to her stall in the Namibia Craft Centre is compulsory if you are looking for a beautiful animal hide to decorate and compliment your home or office.