Sewing the City: Dressmaking and Modernity in Postcolonial Lubumbashi

Sewing the City will provide a new history of the modern African city through an analysis of the design, production, and wearing of clothing in postcolonial Lubumbashi, DRC.

I argue that Congolese seamstresses created new interpretations of what it meant to be modern, urban and Zairean, drawing on formal training, informal apprenticeships, and evolving networks of production, craft and taste.

I trace this history through interviews and in the personal collections of clothing, photographs, and equipment owned by many local dressmakers - what I term "Closet Archives". This project explores how women's labour and creativity crafted the postcolonial city.