NAMIBIA CRAFT CENTRE

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.

Angelika Eichas is the creative mind behind a range of wired, beaded and recycled light-fittings, lampshades, mobiles and decorative craft for the home. Using recycled material such as beer-bottle tops, caps, wire, bicycle tyres, makalani shells and old zinc sheets, Angelika creates a remarkable variety of popular lampshades and light-fittings. Combining rural Namibian colour palettes (earthy browns, rusty reds, sandy tans) with bright, shiny wire-mesh or dulled rusted wire, lends an almost otherworldly ‘look and feel’ to the mobiles and light-fittings. The handmade light-fittings in particular are versatile enough to stylishly compliment the interiors of both chic urban and elegant, rural farmsteads. The natural materials (acacia seeds, old zinc, pips, pods, and driftwood) combined in the making of the mobiles, a welcome addition to any home, betray an artistically-oriented patterned organisation.

Anin is a Nama word that translates to many birds. The Nama People is a member of the Khoikhoi people of Namibia and live in the Southern parts of the vast Namibia. Heidi von Hase established Anin Embroidery in 1987 by initially supplying materials and providing creative direction to the women. The motifs chosen mostly depicted the many birds of Anin itself and familiar scenes from village life in Hoachanas – set against a backdrop of makeshift houses and dusty yards. Strips of fabric and threads were given to the embroidering ladies to work onto. These strips formed both the functional and aesthetic appeal that is still the core feature of the ‘anin style’ today. Finding this practically creative way to create a functional craft by sewing up tablecloths, cushion covers and later bed linen, Heidi took the women’s skills to another level. Tourists came from far and wide to see the craftsmanship of incredibly gifted hands and purchase a souvenir for friends and family.

Emage Workshop has been crafting for over ten years and is highly equipped with the skills-development and discipline required to mesh the open-ended, unstructured artistic process on the one hand, with the goal-orientated, structured process of craft-making on the other. Emage Workshop takes conventional, acceptable forms of products such as books, dinner plates, cups, canvas clocks and beautifully blends these with hand-craft techniques using designs which shave the border with genuine fine art, solely, albeit subtle and understated. Recycled material, wood, sand, stones, shells and feather add the unique touches of truly wild and natural Namibia to the products. Tanya Schemmer, the founder of Emage Workshop draws her inspiration from nature and aims to present visitors to the Namibia Craft Centre stall with portable products encapsulating the haunting beauty of Namibian landscapes and the ephemeral essence of wildlife.

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.

Morris Baba found hope in handicraft. It started as a hobby first and grew into something more. When he came to Namibia, he started on the street and made wire and beaded animals and art pieces. After really battling, he was offered a spot at the Craft Centre. Now he has improved the quality of this products and is able to support his family in Namibian and Zimbabwe from sales at the Craft Centre. His skill is self-taught. ‘When I was young, I was inspired by a man who used to do carvings. I started to make some bicycles and then I went on to make elephants and geckos.’ Morris produces a variety of recycled animals, toys, decorations, large welded metal animals and many more. One of the most popular animals, the warthog, has been bought by many visitors and shipped to Europe and Americas. Morris makes sure that he has a great variety of products, and guarantees that there is something for everyone.

For the past twenty years, the Omba Trust has worked closely with the Ju/Hoansi community in Namibia to foster a sustainable development model to integrate the rare skills of the Ju/Hoansi into the mainstream economy. The Ju/Hoansi is a San tribal community in rural Namibia, confined in large part to but a small section of their previous hunter-food-gathering landscape. With the guidance and support of Omba Arts Trust, community members fashion beautifully intricate jewellery from ostrich egg shells and create very rare pieces of art, often used as inspiration for a unique range of fabric prints also available from the Trust. In addition, Omba has for the longest time engaged skilled and talented basket weavers from various parts of Namibia to produce a range of decorative and highly sought-after baskets; a standard feature in most Namibian homes representing an abstraction of symbols relating to wealth and fertility, in particular.

The name ‘Limbandungila’ means ‘walk slowly’ in Oshiwambo, an indigenous language of northern Namibia and owner, Ottilie Nghiitwikwa, is a connoisseur of hand-carved wooden crafts from north and north-eastern Namibia. Limbandungila was established in 1997 and stocks beautifully hand-carved wooden masks, paintings in relief, ceremonial masks and wildlife figurines, including traditional Namibian items such as bowls, cups and woven harvest baskets, predominantly from cultural groups in northern Namibia, selected with great care for her customers by Nghiitwikwa. Her enterprise and initiative supports several rural producers and craftsmen, necessitating Ottilie Nghiitwikwa travel regularly to northern Namibia, scouting for new hand-carved wooden items. Her winning selections and choices of wooden craft has made Limbandungila an enduring supplier of quality products, known for its traditional, authentic wooden artefacts of Namibian origin.