About Us
Lerato was born out of passion for making beautiful colourful things and love for printed fabric and in our case we love the African prints.
Hi, I am Asiyah the co-founder of Lerato, and thank you for your interest in knowing more about us. So, I am an African woman from Botswana and my husband is local orang Malaysia and here is a little bit on how we got here…
African prints have always been a big part of our lives in Africa as a whole when it comes to clothing and big celebrations.
I remember I have been a brides maid a few times when I was young and in all the weddings we had to wear baju made from the shweshwe prints or African prints fabric, it wouldn’t be a complete wedding without Jeremane as we call it in Botswana.
So for me it was basically part of my identity and for that reason I knew it was beautiful but I think I didn’t appreciate it as much as I do now.
Thanks to my husband whom on his second trip to my kampong we had to make baju for our wedding so you know straight to basics I brought him to a fabric shop to choose his own material as per his liking together with my mother in law and sister in law.
Their reaction to the fabric when they first walked into the store was like waaaaaahhh cantiknyeeee…. “that’s Malay language for wooooow that is so beautiful”.
They had a great time choosing, confused at some point on what to go for but it was interesting to watch them. So afterwards, all wedding done, they went back for more and so did my husband, he asked me buy some and bring back to Malaysia.
We gifted some of the fabric to friends and family who loved them and used them as they wished on different projects.
My husband was so taken by the colours and prints of the shweshwe fabric and we kept on having conversations on what we could actually do for our house using the fabric in terms of décor.
At that time I also started to see shweshwe/jeremane with their eyes if you know what I mean. I got obsessed with thinking of what it could become and a whole lot of ideas started pouring into my head. We brainstormed and made some samples.
The turnout was lovely and so we decided to do more and share this part of Africa with Malaysia and the world at large, no limitations right….
So yea the appreciation for this fabric by Malaysian made me realize that it wasn’t just a beauty and a part culture in africa only, it is be a beautiful fabric that can be shared with the rest of the world to see and appreciate it, wear it, adorn themselves in it, decorate homes with it, and the list is endless…
I hope my dear Malaysians will receive and embrace the beauty of these prints and find them as beautiful and exciting as we do. Its Art, lets appreciate it and embrace it and have fun with it.
So that’s the story dear friends, now please browse, enjoy and let’s make beautiful colorful happy homes.
Thank you
Xoxo ~ Asiyah