For Adetutu Adedeji, Founder and CEO of Morah Kulture, fashion is life and Adire fabrics is the spice that brings out the best of its aroma.
Very sassy, quite outspoken and a colourful fashionista to the core. In an Exclusive Interview with TheConscience editorial team, she bares it all.
With great enthusiasm and passion, she tells everyone that Adire fabrics is the coolest African fashion that represents the continent’s uniqueness and colourful beauty anyday. Little wonders some global icons like Lady Michelle Obama and Lupita Nyongo now rock the Adire style. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo also rocked Adire fabrics throughout his 8 years administration.
Going personal, she opened up: I am Adetutu, a graduate of Business Administration and Management. A customer relationship expert,a fashion enthusiast and an entrepreneur. My brand is Morah Kulture and it’s all about bringing out the best of our customers look and style with the proudly African Adire fabrics. We provide all-round support including sales, fashion advice, colour selection assistance and speedy delivery. I have been in this since the 90s.
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Delving into brief history, Adetutu explained that Adire is popularly known with the Abeokuta, South Western people of Nigeria. From there, it is sold across West African countries. In history it has also been practised in Mali. Adire fabrics, practised in Yorubaland as a form of tie and dye, is the indigo-dyed cloth made in southwestern Nigeria by Yoruba women, using a variety of resist-dyeing techniques.
She continues: Adire has always been a part of me before becoming trendy. Adire fabrics are special because there’s a whole lot you can make with it and i would say, it’s the only fabric that brings the true African and Yoruba fashion to focus. I started the business because of my love for African prints. As a creative strategist, I do the designs myself though I have a team. Adire fabrics is so special because it’s the soul of African fabrics. It’s the coolest.
On what Inspired her, she said, “My mum inspired my fashion sense. She was an high fashion lover. I keep abreast of the fashion world through the help of media. My passion does play a significant role too coupled with hard work and consistency. Actually, I grew up in a home where we have excellent taste in fashion, from my grandparents to my parents, and my siblings. I started as a child fashionista. There’s always a certain cloth for specific occasion and I do the selection. So it’s a childhood passion.”
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On technology, she said it has brought phenomenal changes to the world and Nigeria. Things can be easily done from the comfort of homes, businesses are run globally over the media, transactions both locally and internationally are done on media devices. All thanks to tech!
She said there are so many career opportunities in the fabrics entrepreneurship if only the youngsters will put their passion into it. The extended goal of my Adire fabrics business is to bring recognition and acceptance of the locally made fabrics into modern day fashion and style.There’s so much the youths can gain from the fabric business if they can really see the huge opportunities it brings. It’s an added skill acquisition to their academic degrees.
About government, she said it has put so many skills acquisitions in place to help youths to be self reliant. There are opportunities everywhere to add more to their knowledge by providing free trainings in the IT world, Agricultural sector, fashion and many other skills to make the Nigerian youths self independent and relevant. It can do more in providing soft loans to SME’s, more training and acquisition centers, and supporting and promoting made in Nigeria products.
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On what helped her stay focused, Adetutu said, “To a large extent, my formal education did play an incredible role in preparing me for entrepreneurship aside from the passion for it. Personal self development helped too. Intellectual capacities in coming up with new business ideas also helped.”
She added, “I’m not discouraging those in the corporate world. But always have a plan B. It is always good to have a trade that you call your own when the chips are down. Entrepreneurs are now the VOICE of the world now.There’s a switch from been an employee to self employment.”
Finally, on Corona Virus the Morah Kulture boss shared her experience: “Yes. Covid-19 affected my business during the lockdown, because my delivery service couldn’t function. But in order to sustain my business, i had to re-strategise. During the lockdown, I deviced a means of meeting my clients’ fabric needs.
I added more compelling values by coming up with new designs and improve expansion. I always make sure my inventory was on point. What makes you a good entrepreneur is to be able to give your clients or customers satisfaction for what they’re paying or paid you for consistently. That’s what the Morah Kulture Adire brand is known for.
