I Will Choose Local Fabrics Among Other Objectives- Nana Konadu Agyema-Rawlings

Ghana's former First Lady Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings revealed in an acceptance speech after receiving an honorary award at the 2019 Fashion Connect Africa event on December 30, 2019,  that it is her own personal decision to keep wearing our local fabrics than foreign fabrics because for her it's best to promote the local textile industry than the foreign industry.

Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings said after receiving the award, “Thank you very much for this award. I just like to say that sometimes when you want to start a project, you don’t know the end results until you get there. When I started wearing my local fabrics, GTP was almost a collapsed industry and I took a decision to keep wearing just local fabrics.”

She recalled how her decision to wear local fabrics went a long way to influence other African first ladies to patronize African fabrics. “So, we went to a conference in Egypt and all the first ladies were wearing their designer clothes and so on. And I came in my very nice (local) fabric and some were making negative passes at me, others were like I was looking nice, maybe they should also start wearing it. I said thank you and yes they should all start wearing it. And they said they will think about it. By the time my husband was leaving office in 2000, the whole of Africa was wearing local fabrics, I mean the first ladies,” she shared. 

Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings is one of the people who have sparked up the love for our local fabrics in recent fashion trends. She steps up to every occasion with a fashion that does not go unnoticed and leaves a mark in relation to our culture.

Her beautiful Kente outfits and fabrics with her usual headgear have no doubt become a symbol to many in Africa and beyond and it's for these reasons and many more that she was celebrated at the Fashion Connect Africa event.

Fashion Connect Africa was aimed at bridging the gap between the global fashion industry and the indigenous African fashion industry which brought a never-seen-before style and innovation to the African fashion runway.