Ndingililo Gaoswediwe
8 January 2009
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FRANCISTOWN — 25-year-old Michelle Reginah Tlhasela, started in October 2004 with no dream or goal, but today she earns a living through designing handbags from table reed mats.
The well-known products in Botswana society are the reed mats. Today many more items are being produced using this craft.
The bags are kept light by the reed exterior, which has vibrant colours and a subtle texture, while the leatherette trim adds that bit of sophistication that we all enjoy.
The hand-finished interior is fully-lined with a cloth perfect for a cell-phone or MP3 player and a medium sized wallet.
The common shapes of the bags are rectangular, cylindrical and triangular. She simply uses reed tablemats, cardboard boxes, a cloth and voila.
Reginah has never been to a craft school. She is a mother, a hairdresser and holds a diploma in business administration she attained at Informatics in Francistown. The hardships of life drove her away from her academic career. Having pierced her chin, she shies away and with a smile, she tells how she started making the handbags.
"It all began when I went window shopping with my cousin at Riverwalk shopping complex in Gaborone when I saw a handbag in a boutique," she says.
She says that she was inspired to produce the same product.
As she continued with her window shopping she saw the material that was used to design the handbag in one of the shops.
"It was just a simple reed mat but I decided to buy it and later tried to produce a bag from it," said Tlhasela. By the end of the day the young woman had two cylindrical bags.
"People liked the bags as they appeared new and stylish to them," said Tlhasela.
A month later, she relocated to Ghetto where she started designing more bags. She turned her house in Block 7 location into a handbag boutique.
Her handbags come in five colours, black, blue, pink, brown and lime. She said ladies prefer brown in a cylindrical shape.
She said the colours of the bags are limited to five.
The materials she uses are locally available and cheap. Though she complains about the instability of the business she has expanded to the big city of Gaborone.
"There are shops in Gaborone where I sell in bulk at P70 per item," said Tlhasela.
Tlhasela has added another variety of handbags. She has started making handbags with leatherette, a material that is available in many local material stores.
The material she has recently started using seems to be giving her some problems.
"I do not own a leather sewing machine, but have to travel to Gaborone when I have orders," said Tlhasela. The price of her latest designs will be determined by expenditure and the size of the bag.
Her ambition is to get a youth grant and buy all the necessary equipment she will need to make her business grow.
"I wish the country's external trade relations can grow to give us more chances of exporting our products," said Tlhasela.
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