Miriam & Stokely Tour the Factory
The story of two civil rights icons at the Vlisco Factory.
In 1969 revolutionary uprisings shook the world. During a season of tumult and change, the most notorious power couple of the Black Panther era came to The Netherlands. On their visit, South African singer Miriam Makeba and her husband Stokely Carmichael witnessed the making of Dutch wax.
They came not just to observe Vlisco as a cultural phenomenon - one that had grown to influence Afrocentric expression worldwide - but also to relish in the production behind some of Miriam’s favourite prints.
Miriam Makeba was perhaps the most beloved African female singer of all time. She was known for her talent, and for her fashion—she wore Vlisco extensively throughout her life and career. Exiled from South Africa for her anti-apartheid work, Makeba forged bonds throughout the continent and its diaspora with her albums, her acting, and her activism. Stokely Carmichael (also known as Kwame Ture) was one of the most important Pan-African thinkers of the 20th century, and a well-known leader within Black liberation movements. Stokely and Miriam fell in love and married in 1968 in the United States. They then moved to Africa, and made a home in Guinea amidst its revolution.
It was just after their move to Africa that Miriam and Stokely took their European trip, captured in these black and white photographs.
After Miriam’s death in 2008, Vlisco’s Angelina design became known in the Congo as the Miriam Makeba, as a tribute to her and her affinity for that particular design.
