Textile Ascendancies: Aesthetics, Production, and Trade in Northern Nigeria

Map 5.1. Map of Kano metropolis, indicating Syrian Quarters, City Market (Kasuwa Kurmi), and Bompai Industrial Area. Drawn and reproduced by Federal Drawing Department, Lagos, Nigeria, 1958. (Courtesy of the University of Michigan Library, Stephen S. Clark Map Library.)

Map 4.1. Map of Niger showing smuggling route through Benin, Niger, and Nigeria. (Gaya-Birnin Konni-Maradi-Kano; produced by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, 2000.)

Map 3.1. Map indicating Kano State towns of Gwarzo, Kura, and Wudil as well as the road linking Kano-Zaria-Kaduna. Road Map of Nigeria, drawn, printed, and published by Federal Survey Department, Lagos, Nigeria, 1955. (Courtesy of the University of Michigan Library, Stephen S. Clark Map Library.)

Map 2.1. Map of Kano-Zaria-Sokoto-Jega, indicating earlier trade routes, which led north to Agades and onto Tripoli and south to Ilorin and Badagri, 1800–1850. (Bovill 1922, opposite page 50.)

Map 1.2. Map of Bunu District indicating market routes used by Bunu weavers. (Renne 1995, 140.)

Map 1.1. Map of the Sokoto Caliphate ca. 1880 (Kriger 1990, 40; map by the Cartographic Office, York University). (Courtesy of Colleen Kriger.)

Smart phone with image of the Kano-based trader, Alhaji Shafi’u Abdulkadir, showing the type of acrylic blanket to be ordered from a Chinese blanket manufacturer in Baoding by his Chinese broker, Guangzhou, December 2014 (photograph by E.P. Renne).

Blanket being woven at the Northern Textiles Manufacturers—NTM (Gidan Bargo), Bompai Industrial Area, Kano, 29 October 1966 (photograph by Francis Uher, courtesy of the Ministry of Information, Kaduna).

Detail of luru zubwa handwoven blanket, made with handspun natural and indigo-dyed cotton thread, consisting of nine 6” handwoven strips which have been handsewn together; the width of these strips suggest that the cloth was woven in a village near Kano (Lamb and Holmes 1980: 109). The triangular shapes are called aska, (knives). Purchased in Kurmi Market, Kano, December 1994 (photograph by E. Renne).

Imitation Vlisco cloth for sale in shop in Zaria, selling for N5,000 for six yards. Despite the label’s claim, this cloth was manufactured in China. The intentional mis-spelling, Vlisco, suggests the company’s attempt to avoid a copyright suit, Tudun Wada, Zaria, November 2017 (photograph by E. Renne).

An example of cloth known as yar da atamfa (“throw-away” print cloth) in Kano and roba-roba (rubber-rubber) in Zaria. The cloth made in China that sold for N1,300 in Zaria City market in January 2017. It has a heavy rubbery hand and is very shiny. This cloth is also an example of manufactured cloths which are made to imitate the appearance of handwoven strip textiles (photograph by E. Renne).

Mohammadu Yahaya Waziri lining up the screen (registering) for screen-printing textiles at the Northern Nigerian Textiles Mill in Kaduna, 1983 (photograph courtesy of Mohammadu Yahaya Waziri).

Hand block-printed textile, 2018 (Courtesy of the Dept. of Industrial Design ABU, Zaria).

Large warehouses used for storing textiles near Kantin Kwari market, November 2012, Kano (photograph by Elisha Renne).

Textile trader-broker, Alhaji Shafi’u Abdulkadir, 2017, Kano (photograph by Hannatu Hassan).

Kantin Kwari market scene, with lorry off-loading wax print textile bundles, Unity Road, July 2013, Kano (photograph by Hannatu Hassan).

Textile manufactured by the African Textile Mill Ltd., Kano, for the political campaign of Senator Ireanyi Okowa (r), who was elected governor of Delta State in 2015. The photograph of the former governor of Delta State, Chief James Ibori (May 1999-May 2007) is on the left. The umbrella is the political logo of the People’s Democratic Party (photograph by A. DanAsabe, Kano).

Weavers working with mechanized looms at the Kano Citizens Trading Company Ltd. (later known as Kano Textile Mills-Gwammaja) in the 1950s, Kano.

Kaduna textile sample swatches, from and May 2001 (left) and October 1997 (right), printed at the Northern Nigerian Textiles Mill (photograph by E. P. Renne, courtesy of Kaduna Textiles Ltd, Kaduna).