‘Why I’m promoting my bags on kickstarter’

Alexandria Wunmi Alli is the designer/owner of F&W Style Handbags a Luxury Leather handbag company. The goal at F&W Style is to create well-crafted, colourful, luxury handbags for women without the $1000 price tag. For seven years now F&W Style handbags has become the go to brand for women worldwide. In this interview with GuardianWoman, she explains the inspiration for her handbags and why she’s doing her sales promoter on KickStarter a global crowd funding/pre-ordering platform

Tell us about your handbag collection
Less than three weeks ago, we officially launched a new handbag collection called the Sade Mini Bag on KickStarter, a global crowdfunding/per-ordering platform for emerging entrepreneurial businesses. The Sade Mini Bag is made out the Nigerian hand-woven Aso Oke fabric. We have married the use of this traditional fabric with the style and structure of a modern designer handbag. In just three weeks of running the campaign, we have gotten an amazing response and have reached 98 per cent of our goal already and also got a feature in major U.S publication Essence Magazine.

What’s the story behind the Sade Mini bags?
During my traditional Nigerian wedding I wore a Nigerian fabric called Aso-Oke for the very first time. The Aso-Oke fabric is a hand woven cloth made by the Yoruba people in western Nigeria. This beautiful fabric is worn by royalty or during very special occasions.

After wearing that fabric at my traditional wedding I knew that I didn’t want that to be the only time. I wanted to find a way to bring that feeling of royalty to women everywhere, everyday not just on special occasions. So, I created the Sade mini bag! This bag is uniquely crafted with the Aso Oke fabric and genuine pebble grain leather.

What is KickStarter?
KickStarter is a global crowd funding/pre-ordering platform for creators to show their innovations to the world. Once approved by KickStarter and your campaign goal is set, you must reach that goal by the end of your funding period in other to get any of the funds to manufacture and bring your product to life.

Is there a reason you’re promoting them on Kickstarter?
My goal is to raise exposure for this unique Sade Mini bag to a larger audience. Our mission is to promote our African culture to the world by using this innovative handbag that merges our core traditional fabric with a modern design.

How do people find out more and support this project?
They can visit our website www.fwstyle.com for a direct link to the KickStarter Campaign. They can also find us on instagram @fwstyle.