Lioness Spotlight
2025 looks set to be an exciting year for Africa’s women-founded luxury handbag brands, with many confidently expanding across the continent and into key global markets with a bang. If your weakness is for stylish, finely crafted, sustainable handbags, then there is no better time to add a luxurious, hand-crafted African-made piece to your wardrobe.
For decades, handbags have been the ultimate accessory and status symbol for women around the globe. However, today’s power women spend significant time, effort and money on ensuring their handbag speaks volumes about themselves, their personal philosophy, and their place in society. However, for 2025, watch out for a shift away from the iconic designer bags of Paris, Milan, London and New York, as the hottest handbags on the planet are now ‘Woman-Made in Africa’, and are the latest must-have accessories. This year, the emphasis is not simply on luxury and unique design style, although Africa’s woman handbag designers exude it by the bucket-load. It is also about creating highly desirable and beautiful handbags that have a great social entrepreneurship back-story to tell. In 2025, the emphasis is on style and sustainability, a positive eco-footprint, and ethical production practices helping to improve the lives of African artisans.
From bold artistry to sustainable innovation, meet 10 trailblazing women entrepreneurs who are elevating African fashion, one handbag at a time.
DATHONGA, a sustainable design business merging traditional techniques with contemporary artistic sensibilities in Mozambique
Márcia Nangy O’Connell, or Marcita as she is affectionately known, is the founder and artistic director of Dathonga Designs in Mozambique. Since 2010, she has established herself in the world of Mozambican design. Dathonga has participated in national and international fairs, showcasing the beauty of Mozambican crafts to audiences in South Africa, USA, Denmark, Spain, Germany and, recently, at South African Fashion Week. Márcia’s commitment goes beyond her own brand. In 2010, she created Galeria Dathonga in Inhambane, providing a platform for other Mozambican and African artists to showcase their work.