Stephanie McCulley

J452, Advanced PR Writing

4/7/08

Feature Article

A One of a Kind Design

You brush your hand over the soft calico fabric as your eyes dart between the stamps on the batik cloth. You’ve begun to realize the individuality of the impressions as you notice a tag near the collar. “Comfort Koomson,” it says. It is the signature of your artist, the creator of the art you hold.

You look back at the unique design, the brightly colored dye, the cracked, handcrafted stamps and begin to imagine Comfort mix, dip and stamp hot wax onto the cloth as dense, mid-July air seeps through her windows. She dyes, dries and washes the cloth before giving it to the seamstress to be made into your dress. It is then sold to Global Mamas and offered to consumers.

Many African women earn a living through this ancient form of handmade fabric art, also known as batiking. Like recipes, family traditions or facial features, batik techniques are passed from mother to daughter in West Africa.

Global Mamas, a non-profit women’s organization in Ghana, helps women leverage this skill to create a product that may be sold outside of the Ghanaian marketplace. This enables them to climb out of poverty and gain economic independence.

“Economic equality for women is the stepping stone for social and political equality,” said Renae Adam, a cofounder of Global Mamas, “By using a skill that is already an inherit part of Ghanaian culture, we are able to help our ladies financially,

which in turn, aides in their social and political independence.”

As you turn back to the tag and Comfort’s name, you return to the Global Mamas Web site where you purchased your dress. Looking at her pictures and reading her story, you realize that by buying the dress, you’ve been a part of sending her children to school, helping her build a home and assisting in the expansion of her trade into a sustainable business that may be passed onto her daughters.

Gazing back at the distinctive pattern and the slight color variations, it’s evident that this dress is the only one of its kind.

Global Mamas, established in 2002, is a grassroots, fair trade co-op for women. It sells Ghanaian batik designs as clothing items, home décor and accessories internationally through its Web site, www.globalmamas.com.

Those who purchase Global Mamas products not only touch the lives of women worlds away but are given insight into the spirit of a Ghanaian women: their goals, their family, their accomplishments, their life.

Stephanie McCulley is a former intern of Global Mamas in Cape Coast, Ghana. She studies public relations at the University of Oregon.

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