We had the good fortune of connecting with Lewis Olaoluwa and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Lewis, what was your thought process behind starting your own business?
We understood that there was a growing desire/trend amongst the African American population and overall African diaspora in consumption of West African culture. We saw the trend in music, movies, and even food, but not so much fashion. We took a trip to Nigeria in 2018 where we fell in love with many of the clothing we grew up wearing, but the recent trend of clothing seemed more sophisticated. The incorporation of different textiles, cuts, patterns, and designs inspired us to introduce these fashions to the African diaspora especially in the United States, where there was greater demand to express west African culture with a more upscale approach. The idea of starting our own business was to provide a different category of apparel and provide a nuanced concept of clothing inspired by West African Traditional attire, made and designed for various everyday lifestyles.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
We are Traditional Trims L.L.C., and our name speaks to what we a hope to provide our consumers, West African Traditional Clothing. We offer high quality, premium handcrafted, African clothing that is designed and tailored to uniquely satisfy every day, occasional, and professional lifestyles. Our brand is rooted in culture and seeks to target men of African Ancestry to fully embrace their heritage through clothing. Clothing has long been an extension of one’s identity and self-expression. Our platform allows patrons to embrace African cultural styles by selecting a wide variety of personalized fabrics, combined with contoured-to-fit tailoring. We believe that our production process, selection of premium fabrics, customizable designs, colors, sizing, and attention to detail is what sets u apart from other brands that may offer similar traditional attire. Many of the clothing brands on the market currently only sell select styles of African clothing. The traditional styles of loose-fitting “Kente” cloth or the “Dashiki” are still popular, yet outdated. Many Africans in diaspora are unaware of the evolution of African Traditional styles and clothing. We are proud of our modern approach to premium fabric selection, minimalist and chic designs, and various sizing options, combined with our online store for which allows access to customers globally. Curating a full scale business operation which sources fabric, manufactures clothing, and employs top tier talent to produce our clothing proved challenging in our early stages of development. Our dedication to ensuring a seamless customer experience and process suggested to us that we had to go back to our roots in Nigeria, and create the system that we wanted to see. We overcame our challenges by structuring our operations where we could not only source our material, but also control our production and supply chain, ensuring a seamless direct to consumer experience. Our customers have taught us the biggest lesson along the way, and that is to “listen”. Listen to what they like, what they want to see, in what setting they feel comfortable in their attire, and ultimately their experience with our process and customer service. We want the world to know that we are dedicated to providing premium quality, excellent customer service, and handcrafted designed clothing that is timeless.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
If I had a best friend come into Atlanta, I would first take them to the neighborhood that influenced the most and that made me fall in love with city which is the Historic Old Fourth Ward Community. We would have to visit local Atlanta fixtures such as the MLK center, MLK home, Jack’s Pizza and Wings, walk the beltline and visit many restaurants and breweries there as well. Visit five points for the shops, on our way to freedom park or piedmont park for good weather, music, and a work out (Yoga). The nightlife would be difficult and would completely depend on my friends mood. Dinner and Food I like Midtown or Buckhead. I love bar hopping in East Atlanta Village and Virginia Highlands. For dancing/dancers I like Club Havana or MJQ concourse. For lounging, good hip hop and afro beat fusion I like The Living Room and Ace nightclub. In a city that helped raise me, it would be difficult to choose one.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
We would love to acknowledge the unwavering support of our families and friends to whom supported us from the first concepts of our Traditional Trims Clothing, through the planning, launch, and ascension of our business. We must also acknowledge Boominis & Co for inspiring and assisting us along our journey as entrepreneurs and allowing us to learn from him. We would also like to acknowledge our manufacturing partners, design, and production team that makes this all so possible.

Website: www.tradtrims.com

Instagram: www.instagram.com/TraditionalTrims

Twitter: twitter.com/tradtrims

Facebook: www.facebook.com/TraditionalTrims

Youtube: www.youtube.com/@Tradtrims

Other: pin.it/4axwzxZyw www.tiktok.com/@traditionaltrims.com

Image Credits
Lloyd Mackayi

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