Errmon Striped Cushion

Errmon Cushion

Handwoven on traditional looms, from traditional patterns, and made from cotton grown by smallholder African farmers.

Handmade from start to finish.

40cm x 40cm

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Boon & Up homeware is created in the small town of Lawra in the rural far north of Ghana. Our hand-grown and carbon-neutral African cotton is woven on handlooms by women of the Dagaaba tribe, and our patterns are all based on a traditional template that mimics the feathers of the Guinea fowl. To complete the story, we have dyed all our cotton a range of colours that reference the hues that the local Dagaaba people paint their huts and houses. Finally, local seamstresses manually finish the homeware.

We originally met the weavers in 2017 when they told us of the increasing difficulty they experience in selling their traditional fabric to the local population, primarily due to difficulties caused by climate change: 95% of the Dagaare people depend on subsistence farming and as yields fall there is less cash in the economy to buy the traditional fabrics. 

After consultation with retailers in the UK we adapted the weavers’ output in order to create homeware and fabrics that would appeal to the Western consumer: we changed the yarn that the weavers previously used from Chinese polyester to 100% cotton, grown by smallholder African farmers under the ‘Cotton made in Africa’ initiative (dedicated to assisting local farmers and ensuring their produce is carbon-neutral), and we have adapted their narrow looms so that they are now able to weave to widths of 110cm. 

Boon & Up was set up to provide employment opportunities in a very impoverished part of our world, and 20% of profits are invested in projects that create more jobs for the locals.