THE
AFRICAN
FASHION
RESEARCH
INSTITUTE
.
The African Fashion Research Institute was founded in 2019, largely shaped by what we consider to be the urgent and overdue need to remember, rethink, and rewrite fashion histories that speak to afro-centric ways of wearing, knowing, making, and styling often absent in fashion books, exhibitions, and imaginations. The African Fashion Research Institute (AFRI) shares the work of local and global African fashion pioneers, academics, makers, thinkers, students, critics and leaders through fashion-driven decolonial research projects and digital platforms. We aim to create new networks of knowledge generation and exchange with online and shareable materials for outreach, curricula development and general public interest. Partnerships and collaborations are at the forefront of building our community, with African fashion studies leading the way to rethink and reframe fashion aesthetics and practices emerging on, and from the continent and its diaspora. Together, we showcase cultural and creative knowledges, archive unique, diverse, alternate identity narratives, and sustain new design narratives.
In a continent, where the sartorial is deeply vested in the political, cultural, creative and social crafting and presentation of identities, histories and futures, it is critical that African fashion is afforded new and sustained forms of attention. Fashion offers a powerful, material and conceptual lens across diverse spaces/expressions, such as gender, class, power, trade, intimacy, memory, technology, and more. We aim to become a nexus for and facilitator of these complex conversations, creating shared platforms with diverse partners who collectively will contribute to, curate, showcase, archive and distribute ideas around practices of contemporary and conceptual African fashion, whilst also critically rethinking, rewriting, reimagining, and reflecting on African fashion histories and their fashioned futures.
.
AFRI aims to bring together the work of African fashion academics and creatives for the wider benefit of diverse research communities and diverse audiences. We envisage both a digital and physical hub, platform or network that can host virtual and real exhibitions, podcasts, talks, workshops, papers, zines, performance interventions and more, while reaching new audiences and creating new archives for these projects.
AFRI engages local and global African fashion activists, pioneers, academics, makers, thinkers and students in order to support research, and articulate and archive diverse cultural narratives. We develop partnerships and projects in order to lead fashion-driven decolonial research across diverse platforms and networks of knowledge generation and exchange. We aim to (re)think and (re)frame fashion aesthetics, narratives and practices emerging on and from the continent and its diaspora, and create shareable materials for outreach, curricula and general public interest.
.
The Team
Erica de Greef (Co-Managing Director)
Dr Erica de Greef is a curator, author and co-founder of the African Fashion Research Institute (AFRI). She works collaboratively to promote redress and invite decolonial (re)imagination, with projects spanning museums, creative platforms, educational institutions and grassroot spaces. She holds a PhD in African Studies from the University of Cape Town with a thesis titled ‘Sartorial Disruptions’.
Lesiba Mabitsela (Co-Managing Director)
Lesiba Mabitsela is an interdisciplinary artist and fashion designer from Johannesburg, South Africa. Mabitsela’s artistic work incorporates site-specific performances, fashion design and digital archiving with critical fashion and performance studies in his explorations of African masculine identities. Mabitsela is also known for engineering garments created for the brand Lesiba Mabitsela Studio.
Ziyander Mute (Education Programme Coordinator)
Ziyander Mute is a sustainable fashion entrepreneur, creative freelancer, and fellow based in Johannesburg, South Africa, specializing in the circular fashion economy and resilient industry futures. With a background in fashion styling and policy, Ziyander actively contributes to shaping the future of African fashion as a 2026 Next Gen Assembly Member and Pan-African Fashion Policy Fellow.
Dumisani Jere (Graphic Designer & Website Developer)
Dumisani Jere, founder of DEVOLUTIONERY (PTY) LTD, is a contemporary interdisciplinary artist and former associate, Drawing & Narrative 1st year lecturer. He was born in Soweto, and studied at the Open Window Institute, an independent art and digital sciences school based in Pretoria, where he obtained a BA Degree in Visual Communication Design in 2017. Jere experiments and explores these themes in various audio and visual, illustration, motion design, painting, and digital mixed media.
heeten bhagat (Researcher)
heeten bhagat is a shit stirrer by nature. He works in the emerging terrain of pracademics – looking to expand collaborations and design experiments between academia and real-life systems. He approaches this work primarily as a methodologist – working to bring pragmatic and pertinent programming to support decolonial & diversity-related work in overlooked /underserved learning environments.
BonganSiviwe James (Researcher)
Siviwe James is a researcher, arts practitioner and archivist whose work speaks through visual and sonic archaeology, as reconstructions of place and meaning. James’ practice inserts fragments of time in the voids of history, creating (k)new imaginaries as landscapes of knowledge of the lives and worlds of Xhosa people, working with both personal and public audio-visual archival materials and everyday interviews.
Scott Williams (Researcher)
Scott Williams is a Cape Town-based visual arts practitioner, researcher, and Andrew Mellon award fellow contributing to the study of African fashion cultures with the African Fashion Research Institute. As a founding member of the Burning Museum collective and a master’s candidate at the University of Stellenbosch, his practice spans contemporary art, curation, and socially engaged youth arts education.
Abdul Dube (Researcher)
Abdul Dube is a multidisciplinary artist, designer and curator in Aarhus, Denmark and Berlin, Germany. His work concerns questions of multicultural belonging, racism, resistance, intersectional solidarity, heritage, sustainability, and Black imagination. Abdul’s recent heritage-related work includes facilitating an anti-Black racism in our public archives workshop with Black Archives Sweden, resulting in a zine called BLACK SPACE; facilitating European Colonial Heritage Modalities in Entangled Cities; and Creative Liaison to the Aros Museum Education Department.
Lethabo Xulu (Researcher)
Lethabo Xulu is a thinker, designer, and futurist leading elxulu studio, a research and design firm dedicated to transforming everyday African objects and experiences into urban living and design discourse. With over 16 years of experience in the design industry, her practice pioneers African design futures across food, fashion, and interior design typologies.
Bongani Tau (Researcher & Videographer)
Bongani Tau is a fashion researcher, writer, and creative consultant in the advertising industry. His work features in multiple international publications. His creative endeavours include Abengoni as a research and outreach project to empower South African township youth through critical fashion education and multimedia studies.
Liz Kobusinge (Visual Artist & Researcher)
Liz Kobusinge is a Ugandan researcher and multidisciplinary artist whose practice spans printmaking, installation, film, textiles, and ecology. Through the rich heritage of eco-printing and bark cloth traditions, her work demonstrates a deep commitment to selfhood, autonomy, and a future where both communities and the earth thrive.
Shiela Nakitende (Visual Artist & Researcher)
Sheila Nakitende is a multidisciplinary artist and researcher based in Kampala, Uganda, whose practice explores womanhood, material culture, and indigenous knowledge systems through techniques like weaving, stitching, and hand papermaking. As a Prince Claus Fund Cycle 4 CAREC Fellows Awardee and recipient of international residencies, her work has been extensively exhibited across galleries and institutions in Africa, Europe, and the United States.
Thabiso Ncanana (Designer)
Thabiso Ncanana is a fashion artist and creative director from Esikhawini, Richard’s Bay. His work merges heritage with contemporary sentiment in an exploration of celebrating African culture via the medium of fashion. Primarily informed by rural and indigenous etiquette such as conservation and sustainability (ukonga nokuhlonipha imvelo), his design direction accentuates the bond between human and nature, past and present, material and concept within the African cultural context.
Hajar Agrad (Mentee)
Hajar is a researcher and writer from Agadir, Morocco, whose work bridges fashion studies with inclusive, data-informed research practices and decolonial perspectives.
Ntokozo Shabalala (Mentee)
Ntokozo is a multidisciplinary visual artist, jewellery designer, who explores memory, identity, and spirituality through detailed craftsmanship
Nandi Mpofu (Mentee)
Nandi is a final-year Digital Arts student at the University of the Witwatersrand focusing on game design, animation, and the intersection of digital arts with South African fashion.
African Fashion Research Institute (PTY) LTD, registration number: 2019/291525/07 | AFRI is classified as an EME and Level 2 BBEEE compliant.