This document discusses the rise of artisanal luxury brands in South Africa. It begins by providing context about how millennials value sustainability, locality, and fair trade practices in their purchasing. This has led to terms like "artisanal", "craft", and "handmade" becoming synonymous with luxury brands. The document then profiles several successful South African leather brands like Research Unit, Freedom of Movement, and Matblac that produce high quality, handmade leather goods in small batches. It discusses how these brands are gaining popularity nationally and internationally by communicating their brand essence through social media. In conclusion, while these local brands are still small compared to international competitors, they are establishing their design identities and finding customers who appreciate their narratives

1. man
Alive
I
n 2010, the article ‘Signalling Status
with Luxury goods: The Role of Brand
Prominence’ was published and
overnight it became a marketing
blueprint for many in the luxury
industry. The theory divided the rich into tribes:
‘parvenus’, who associate themselves only with
other rich people; ‘patricians’, who signal to
each other but not the masses; and ‘poseurs’,
who generally cannot afford luxury but want
to look as though they can.
The authors theorise that more expensive
luxury goods, aimed at patricians, will have less
obvious branding. Sure enough, they found that
Gucci and Louis Vuitton charge more for quieter
handbags. Even venerable Mercedes slaps bigger
emblems on its cheaper products. With consumer
debt at an all-time high, counterfeiters make
a killing with these products at flea markets
or street corners targeting cash-strapped poseurs
who strut around Hyde Park or Constantia
Village smugly confident that we can’t tell
it’s fake. Bitch please, we can. >>
The Rise
of Artisanal
Luxury
Words by Grant Davison
/ GQ.co.zA gqstyle • spring/summer • 2016/17 99
GQStyle10_Voice.indd 99 2016/09/27 4:10 PM

2. man
Alive
Then ‘millennials’ happened.
A generation who live permanently
online and quickly came of age
with a sense of entitlement and
diktats driven by conscious not
competitive consumption. Niceties
like ‘sustainability’, ‘locality’ and
‘Fairtrade’ informed their
purchasing habits along
with narcissism and boredom.
Terms once deemed old fashioned
were suddenly thrown around
like confetti in press releases,
marketing campaigns and dinner
conversations. ‘Artisanal’, ‘craft’
and ‘handmade’ became synonyms
for ‘luxury’ and ‘designer’, while
‘foraged’ became the new ‘free
range’. Herald the rise of pretentious
food trucks and cocktail bars with
prices often matching inflated egos
of hipster proprietors.
‘We already have a strong
artisanal currency in South Africa
showcasing great quality leather
goods but perhaps lacking
[innovative] design,’ comments
Jackie Burger, our Doyenne of Style,
over [Fairtrade] coffee. ‘Thoughtful
luxurians seek brands with a strong
narrative and articulated curation
process, which extends beyond
the notion of a price tag. These
attributes create highly niche
and viable entrepreneurial
opportunities that cannot be copied,
mass produced or absorbed by
commercialised retail brands.’
South Africa produces, albeit on
a small scale, high-quality leather
products for the ‘glocal’ consumer
in mind. ‘Our products are made
by hand – from the dyeing and
polishing to stitching of the leather
– which means we don’t produce
massive quantities but a superior
product,’ says Erin-Lee Petersen,
creative director of Research Unit.
‘With the surpassing of generations,
we feel that new luxury brands,
especially from Africa, are
deservedly coming to the fore.’
Testament to this would be a walk
around local hotspots on any
weekend where the pretty young
things gather and you’ll see them
all: Wolf & Maiden, Research Unit,
Matblac and Freedom of Movement
stylishly being bandied about.
‘What started out three years
ago as “must-have” leather bags
by students in Stellenbosch, quickly
evolved into a national premium
lifestyle brand through word of
mouth,’ explains Léan Boezaart,
cofounder of Freedom of Movement
(FOM). ‘We started with just one
leathersmith, Benjamin, originally
from Port Elizabeth with 40 years
of experience, who now heads
up our workshop at Woodmill
Lifestyle Market with a team
of skilled artisans.’
Sourcing roughly 90 per cent of
its first-grade leather from South
African and Namibian tanners,
FOM is able to design, produce and
retail its range of seven individually
named leather bags, timepieces and
clothing not just nationally but also
to aficionados in the boroughs of
Amsterdam, Brooklyn and
Melbourne alike.
So while our local brands
are relatively embryonic when
compared to their international
cousins like Ettinger, Hermès and
Mulberry, they’re making inroads
to those who matter most. As is
the case of Matblac founded by
Mathew Nielson, who first learnt
to sew leather when he was just
15 years old and now oversees
a workshop teeming with artisans
using German sewing machines
and Japanese tools to craft a classic,
yet highly functional product.
And like Research Unit, who has
achieved cult-like status in many
Nordic countries and in Berlin
where they have a pop-up store,
Matblac’s product is carried
back triumphantly as a trophy
by well-heeled tourists to far-
flung countries.
‘There has never been a better
time to make noise in a loud and
over-saturated marketplace to
communicate directly with your
client base and deliver your brand’s
essence than via social media,’
offers Wade Skinner of Wolf &
Maiden. ‘These days you don’t
need to be centuries old to establish
a design language and emotion.’
In Defence
of Self
Words by Kojo Baffoe illustration by QUasiem Gamiet
y father travelled
the world several
times over when I
was growing up. As
a result, my T-shirt
collection at 10 years
old was a wonderful
graphic potpourri
of ’70s and ’80s pop
culture mixed with
names of cities
and countries.
My standard
fare at the time
was T-shirts, shorts (or long pants) and North
Star running shoes. But, tucked in between
these were items I wasn’t a big fan of – the
clothing I’d be forced to wear when visiting
family friends.
For example, there was the pink/purple shirt,
covered in Ghanaian symbols and patterns in an
array of colours. It hung loose to just beneath the
belt with sleeves that widened dramatically to the
elbow. It was what has become all the rage these
days under the moniker ‘African dress’. I wore it
with brown corduroy trousers and sandals, often
with socks, white or brown. Or, to my dismay,
with traditional clogs that my father picked up in
Holland, and decided they were a thing to wear.
Being of Ghanaian-German heritage, living
in the small city of Maseru and attending a British
International school with more than 30 different
nationalities made for diverse influences. Whether
it was in the music we listened to, the films we
watched or the books we read, the boundaries
around genre were very blurred. After high school
I spent a year in Germany before going to varsity
in Durban, my first real live interaction with
South Africa. Prior to that, I consumed what
was broadcast on South African television,
when the country was still very isolated from
the rest of the world.
As the country has opened up to the rest of
the world, it has been interesting to watch and, to
a certain extent, contribute to the idea of identity
and context. What is the South African identity?
This is a fundamental question that I think
we are all grappling to define and understand,
exacerbated by the world that has become
increasingly smaller with the advent and growth
of the digital world. What happens in the smallest
corner of the world is broadcast via social media,
YouTube and the internet in general. Add the >>
‘Artisanal’,
‘craft’ and
‘handmade’
became
synonyms for
‘luxury’ and
‘designer’
/ GQ.co.zAgqstyle • spring/summer • 2016/17100
GQStyle10_Voice.indd 100 2016/09/27 4:10 PM