African handcrafted fabrics between art and tradition
- Lucia Pavan/ likeUafrica
- Dec 12, 2025
- 3 min read
When I think of African fabrics , a world of memories, colors, stories, and traditions opens up to me that have fascinated and inspired me since I spent my first year in Cotonou, Benin.
These fabrics are not just textiles, but true stories of distant cultures, handed down from generation to generation.
Today we're embarking on a journey to discover the African fabrics I know best and, in many cases, offer in my Made in Africa concept store in Milan and online at likeUafrica . In this first installment of the blog, we'll stay in West Africa to explore artisanal loom-woven fabrics using ancient weaving techniques, an art that combines creativity, identity, and craftsmanship.
Not just wax. 🌍 'PAGNE', traditional African fabrics woven on a loom and/or hand-painted: a heritage waiting to be discovered.
African weaving techniques are multiple and vary from region to region, reflecting the continent's cultural diversity, where fabrics become living archives of identity, spirituality, and collective memory.
In this first blog post, we're talking about West African woven fabrics, known as Pagne Tissé (literally, "woven cloth"). Each country has its own history, its own meaning, and its own unique way of expressing beauty through cotton weaving.
Here are the most iconic fabrics:
🇲🇱 Mali – Bogolan, mud cloth (Bogolanfini or Mud Cloth) : typical of Mali, it is a natural cotton woven on a loom, dyed with fermented mud and then painted. Mali, like Benin, produces a lot of cotton, which was historically spun into these ancient textiles, still made with the local raw material. The motifs are often linked to tribal stories and spiritual beliefs.
Origin: From the word bogo (“mud” in the Bambara language).
Technique: The fabric (made from local raw cotton) is first woven white on a loom, then dyed with plant extracts and decorated with fermented mud which reacts chemically, fixing the designs.
Symbols: Geometric patterns and ancestral signs that speak of protection, life cycles, and clan identity.
Contemporary Rebirth: The Bogolan is today an icon of modern African art, reinterpreted in fashion and ethical design.
🇹🇬 Togo – The Tradition of the Ewe Weavers
Origin: Weaving inherited from the Ewe culture, also widespread in Ghana and Benin.
Technique: Narrow strips of cotton are hand-woven and then sewn together to form large panels.
Motifs: Abstract geometric patterns and bright colors; motifs are often named after proverbs or historical events.
EWE del Togo Influences: Ewe and Kente fabrics have influenced each other, becoming a cultural bridge between Togo and Ghana.
🇬🇭 Ghana – Kente, the cloth of kings
Origin: Originated among the Ashanti and Ewe peoples; originally reserved for royalty and sacred ceremonies.
Technique: Made on horizontal looms; silk or cotton threads woven into complex, multicolored patterns.
Symbolism: Every color and design has a meaning:
Gold → wealth and power
Green → growth and renewal
Black → maturity and spirituality
Today: A pan-African symbol of pride, identity, and diaspora.
🇨🇮 Ivory Coast – Baoulé Fabric
Origin: Created by the Baoulé people, descendants of the Ashanti.
Technique: Weaving on small strip looms, using colored threads and often irregular textures to create visual rhythm.
Aesthetics: Elegant and understated, often with motifs inspired by nature or everyday life.
Cultural value: Used in rituals, weddings and ceremonies of passage.
Borsa in tessuto Baulé
🇸🇳 Casamance (Senegal) – The revelation of the pagne tissé
Origin: An area rich in Diola and Mandingue cultures, where weaving is a women's tradition. I know it as Pagne Manjak, typical of southern Senegal and Guinea, which I find in various cooperatives in the city of Dakar.
Technique: Cotton spun and dyed with natural colors, woven on vertical or horizontal looms.
Use: Ceremonial cloths, dresses, bed sheets or decorative panels.
Style: More minimalist than other countries, with earthy tones and repetitive patterns that evoke balance and harmony
Pagne Tissè Manjak 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso – The Faso Dan Fani
Origin: Created by Mossi women, Faso Dan Fani means “the fabric woven by the homeland”.
Technique: Hand-woven on traditional narrow-strip looms; the cotton threads are dyed with natural pigments.
Symbolism: Each motif tells of values such as unity, strength or fertility.
Today: Become a national symbol of pride and cultural independence; promoted by figures such as Thomas Sankara in the 1980s.
The selection of these traditional fabrics in my "boutique des pagne" likeUafrica varies depending on the time of year. About every three months, new small series of fabrics and products made with these fabrics arrive in the shop. The quantities are small and the pieces are almost always unique. I recommend stopping by the showroom and following the publications so you don't miss out on new arrivals, which often aren't repeated.
At the moment they are found on likeUafrica:
The BOGOLAN section
A series of EWE/KENTE from TOGO
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