To dress “African" means walking into a room and being seen and misread. It is to bear the weight of continent-sized assumptions—color, fabric, ancestry, pride, politics, and sometimes protest. The word itself is deceptively simple, often bandied about in fashion media or boldly emblazoned on Ankara-infused runways in Paris, Lagos, and Johannesburg. But the truth is more layered. Dressing African does not usually mean wearing kente or kaftans. It doesn't always feel like heritage. It feels like tension—the kind that arises when identity meets expectation and tradition is fashioned for an audience that may or may not understand the codes. Nonetheless, African fashion thrives despite the intricacy, not because it has resolved it. The style survives, often stitched together by people who turn identity into art and resistance into aesthetic.

Dressing African in marketplaces and malls across Africa has evolved into a negotiation between the past and the present. You'll see a girl in Nairobi wearing a bold Kitenge dress with Converse sneakers, and a young woman in Lagos sporting a tailored iro and buba with Nike dunks. Despite their disparate references, they may both be described as dressing African. This is because the idea of Africanness in fashion has evolved with each generation, to accommodate the diaspora, the internet, and individual expression. But it's also because the fashion industry, both local and global, has sold us the fantasy that African design is easily identifiable, as if centuries of various dressing customs can be reduced to a few colourful prints and structured head ties. But, the reality is more hazy. There are no universal signposts. For some, it’s a waist bead peeking from under denim; for others, it’s the subtle elegance of an Ethiopian gabi worn at an airport check-in. For many, it’s simply whatever makes them feel like home, even if that home no longer exists in a single place.

And yet, even in its looseness, there is pressure. There is an underlying demand particularly for African women creatives to look "African enough"—especially on stages where representation is political currency. A Nigerian designer exhibiting in Milan is expected to reflect her roots. But what happens when her roots are entwined—when her influences include Afrobeats, London grime, postcolonial feminism, and streetwear? Will she be told that her work lacks "African identity" if there are no cowries or kente? This expectation isn’t always hostile; it is often motivated by a desire to preserve what has been historically erased. But it can also become limiting, leaving little room for development. In trying to prove our authenticity, we sometimes perform it. The irony is that African fashion has always been plural and migratory. Even the famed Ankara prints, which many people associate with West Africa, were introduced through colonial trade. If African fashion is anything, it is a story of exchange—not a pure origin.

Growing up, I remember how “looking African” was code for looking different, and not always in a good way. In my secondary school, you could be mocked for coming to class with your hair in thick thread, or for going all out on Cultural Day—wearing full traditional attire with coral beads—while others played it safe with a simple wrapper over jeans or something Western-inspired. Dressing African wasn’t aspirational—it was rural, unserious, too native. But the same people who once hid their culture are now curating Instagram feeds where they reclaim that style with pride. What changed? Certainly not the fabrics. What changed is how we understood power. The same adire cloth that was once reserved for local ceremonies is now a luxury item featured in fashion editorials. This isn’t just a matter of aesthetics—it’s also about who gets to define what counts as style. For decades, global fashion editors ignored African style. Now that the tables are turning, Africans are using the same platforms to challenge what visibility looks like.

Still, there's something unsettling about how global interest in African fashion often flattens its richness. Western brands collaborate with African designers, but only when it meets their diversity quota. African prints are widely utilized in high fashion, but the artisans behind the motifs are rarely recognized. When celebrities wear "African-inspired" designs, the debate rarely involves the communities that gave origin to the ideas. Even within Africa, particular regions or ethnic groups may dominate the concept of dressing African. Yoruba styles, for example, often dominate the visual language of "African weddings" online, sidelining the beauty of, say, Kalabari or Fulani traditions. The politics of representation are both local and global, and fashion is no exception. Dressing African means being hyper-visible yet unseen.

There is also a class element to consider. Much of what we now call African fashion—custom-made fits, bespoke tailoring, vintage upcycling—is too expensive for the average woman. In urban centres like Lagos or Accra, to dress African with flair often necessitates disposable income. The irony is that many of these styles are rooted in working-class creativity—in the resourcefulness of women who turned wrapper remnants into accessories or dyed their own fabrics at home. Today, dressing African stylishly often means paying thousands for styles that used to be made by your mother or tailor next door. This doesn’t make the new fashion scene any less valuable, but it does raise questions: who are we designing for? Whose Africanness gets the spotlight, and whose remains backstage?

But despite all these tensions, African fashion has continued to evolve. It is alive in the hands of the Ghanaian designer who, although not having an Instagram account, creates magic with each stitch. It is alive in the Kenyan fashion blogger who combines vintage thrift with Maasai accessories. It’s in the owambe photo dumps, in the viral pre-wedding photographs, in the rush to the tailor before a cousin's matriculation. Dressing African does not mean looking a certain way; rather, it is clothing from memory, from longing, from celebration. And that is why, even when trends fade, the spirit endures. Because fashion is never only about clothes.

So what does it really mean to dress African? Maybe it means exactly what you want it to. Or maybe it means embracing contradiction. It means wearing your story, not just your style. It means understanding that fashion is both past and future tense—rooted in what came before, and stretching towards what is possible. It means sometimes feeling misunderstood, but still showing up in full colour. Because to dress African is not to dress the same. It is to dress loud or soft, borrowed or bespoke, filtered or folkloric. It is to say: I am here, and this is mine, even if it looks different from yours.