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We started the company due to our collective interest in the cultural retention of storytelling, transference of storytelling narratives in the family context, and the reclamation of these narratives within the black community. We are particularly interested in how these narratives are expressed communally, spiritually and in the present time. How do you bring your own personal experiences into what House of Aama is doing? We have looked to our own family legacy to inform the stories we can tell in a sartorial fashion. The Bloodroot collection was inspired by Rebecca’s maternal grandparents in Shreveport, Louisiana. Every summer, when Rebecca was a child she would spend her summers in Louisiana on her grandparents’ farm.
House of Aama Collections
As a child, she did not know what bloodroot was but later as an adult she learned that bloodroot is a rootsworker herb and that her family has a rootsworker legacy. Their creative direction is drawn from the Southern experiences of Southern Parlor ladies, Conjurer women and blues men and their intersections. “May there be peace, love, and perfection throughout all creation, oh God” were among the first words chanted over the soundtrack during the opening moments of House of Aama’s fall presentation. Since 2015, Rebecca Henry and Akua Shabaka, the mother-daughter duo behind the brand, have used their strong sense of spirituality and connection to their ancestral legacy to bring their designs to life. This time, the tradition continued at the Canary Club, a Lower East Side spot known for its jazz brunch.
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For Fall/winter 2023, mother-daughter duo Rebecca Henry and Akua Shabaka presented a collection that taps into the intersection of their African and West Indian cultures. The ambiance was set to pay homage to family and an old story of a spider on a long journey surviving obstacles and his own foolishness at times. An altar was set up front right next to the curtain opening, where models walked out. It was a dedication to Akua’s father and Rebecca’s family members, as well as photos of them were placed on a table with ornaments of colorful cloth, fruit, and coffee for the well-being of those ancestors. House of Aama enters the latest season of New York Fashion Week with a continued commitment to ritual, exploring new modes of materiality.
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NYFW presentation coverage from Paper Mag and Fader, where they built the space and brought the story to life behind the BLOODROOT collection. Rebecca and Akua were motivated by a desire to form a relationship with African Artisans in the development of House of Aama products and also to provide a commercial platform for African wares. This collaborative project consisted of Unisex Men and Women’s shirts, pants and traditional woven Senegalese baskets.
The intentional mother-daughter design duo has used its latest presentations to highlight the intangible matter that comprises Black spirituality and ancestry. Jute dresses and menswear separates, together with styles made out of raw woven silk with loosely interlaced panels brought in texture, as did spider-inspired motifs applied onto deep indigo denim in the shape of delicate crystal spider webs. “In the Caribbean, there’s an emphasis on how you present yourself and how you dress, and so we wanted to have the suiting elements against raw materials,” said Henry. After Afropunk, Rebecca and Akua decided to rebrand House of Aama and develop a collection for an older, sophisticated adult market. At Afropunk, they saw how many other designers were also utilizing African fabrics, so they decided that from then on they would take a more nuanced approach to expressing their cultural identity. There were certain stories they wanted to tell that didn’t involve just using Kente cloth, but might involve modern pieces and stories within that that pertain to Black people.
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Meet the Mother and Daughter Duo Behind House of Aama
Akua, the daughter of the duo is a 2019 graduate of Parsons The New School for Design in Manhattan, New York with a BBA in Strategic Design and Business Management. Akua was exposed early in life to her mom and dad’s entrepreneurial enterprises, artistic leanings and culturally based lifestyle (Akua’s dad, Jamaiel Shabaka is an avant garde jazz musician and drummer). Black Ivy-inspired cardigans, sailor-collared letterman jackets, and button-downs embossed with the brand’s logos and never-before-seen emblems welcomed viewers to a world of stylized leisurewear. These pieces drew comparisons to historically Black college campus photos from the ‘40s. “We’re still having fun with materials, still doing embroidery work, but also this time, we want people to feel like they’re part of like the Aama club. We were thinking a lot about the relationship between the aspirational and the accessible, [all] while staying honest to our storytelling,” Shabaka explains.
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Sonic and set components of the show were reflective of the collaboration between artists that defined the Jazz Age. Before the show, visitors could notice the intention of every team member, with each person working to maximize their use of space without sacrificing any of the inconspicuous charm of a typical speakeasy experience. It was bustling, but organized, emitting a thoughtful and resoundingly joyful noise.
On the farm, Rebecca would help with planting crops, fishing, feeding farm animals and other country chores. At the end of each day, Rebecca’s grandmother would administer a spoonful of Bloodroot as a medicinal. House of Aama chose to not present a new clothing collection but instead focused on gathering archival data and field research to enhance the storytelling which forms the basis for our clothing collections.
This experimentation led to the birth of the youth oriented Urban Nomad capsule collection. Urban Nomad was geared toward the modern savvy youth consumer who wished to identify with an African ethos and express this interest in clothing and lifestyle choices. In keeping with this African ethos, fabric and motif selections for the Urban Nomad collection drew from West African Ashanti, Ghanaian Kente Cloth and Adinkra symbols and East African Maasai, Kenyan tartan plaid fabrics. We look forward to continuing our mission to explore narratives around the black experience that inform our timeless garments.
But Henry and Shabaka aren’t just in it for the clothes; they’re as passionate about storytelling and sharing knowledge, particularly about the lesser-known histories of Black people in America. Built along Midwest lakes and California coasts, the resorts were a joyful respite at a time when most beaches were not yet desegregated. As a child, Akua Shabaka loved watching her mother, Rebecca Henry, at work. “She was a self-employed female attorney in a male-dominated field,” Shabaka says. “I watched my mother working for herself and I was inspired to be an entrepreneur.” As fate would have it, the mother and daughter forged their own business relationship with a fashion brand, House of Aama.
These looks transported onlookers between the various eras of folk and jazz aesthetics. At once showgoers were a part of multiple eras of ancestral pasts simultaneously. In its entirety, the House of Aama showcase was a welcome warmth on an otherwise chilly, dimly-toned day. The experiential component of this season’s show was in careful conversation with all the textile elements of the pieces themselves.
Overall, the show is sure to have commercial success with a blend of different aesthetics. House of Aama’s ability to stay true to different historical subtexts at the same time, is in no small part thanks to the execution of styling, production, and casting partners. Cochrane, for example, has managed model selection for more than one hundred Black artists and creatives. As a collaborator, she seeks faces that can represent the brand with a freshness communicable through striking new runway and editorial talent.
“Many of the models this season, are walking for the first time,” Cochrane adds. Your pieces are made to order; do you think this is something we’re going to see more brands turning to? Especially during this time of major uncertainty, the last thing we need in fashion is unused gametes, fabric, and waste. Rebecca and Akua hope that Bloodroot conveys to people of color the strength and resilience of the experience of African people in the Southern United States and that this strength and resilience can be conveyed in a sartorial artistic medium. Akua's friends became interested in her clothes and in response Rebecca and Akua began making simple items for sale, such as culturally adorned cut off shorts and t-shirts with African fabric sleeves. A deep exploration into the night sky.Due to the unique printing method of this design, colors and patterns may vary slightly.
“Part of our creative process is looking at the past and seeing how it informs the future,” said Shabaka backstage, winding between models in tie-neck dresses and cherub brocade suiting. Accessorized with floral shoes and the occasional bonnet, the collection set a scene. With a collection titled Sun Records, of course there were a few sartorial high notes that felt ideal for a warm-weather getaway, from a mesh maxidress with an artistic sunburst print to the marigold tiered-ruffle eyelet dress that closed the show. Those pieces and the magnetic energy of both designers were bright spots on a gloomy, snow-filled day. House of Aama explores the folkways of the Black experience by designing timeless garments with nostalgic references informed by historical research, archival analysis, and storytelling. We aim to evoke dialogue, social commentary and conversations around heritage, remembrance and shed light on nuanced histories.
In the summer of 2019, Rebecca and Akua traveled to Jamaica and collected personal narratives as part of our storytelling gathering. In addition, they have previously traveled to Cuba, Louisiana and Senegal to conduct research and archive personal narratives. In furtherance of their storytelling interests, they launched an online platform for their social media guests to share narratives from their personal family histories. These narratives included favorite familial narratives, folktales, quotes and sayings. Rebeca and Akua soon realized that a niche market existed for modern, contemporary cultural wares and thus House of Aama was founded. Soon thereafter, they began experimenting with original designs reflective of their individual and collective cultural influences.
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