The Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi Ojaja II and the founder of the Africa Fashion Week, Princess Ronke Ademiluyi, are set to launch the Adire Textile Factory in Ile-Ife, Osun State.

The project, which had been described as the biggest Adire textile factory in Nigeria, will be launched on Monday, February 22, 2021, to commemorate the annual Aje Festival in the state.

Ademiluyi explained that the project is being embarked on so as to provide opportunities for cultural exchange between African and international students of design to learn about the adire fabric.

In a related development, the Ooni has commissioned Ademiluyi’s Africa Fashion Week to build a new cultural centre located in Ile-Ife.

The new cultural center has been described as a massive capital project, that will require both local and international fundings, and it will be sited on a 30,000 squaremeter of land in Ile-Ife.

According to Ademiluyi, the cultural centre will be a repository for the indigenous arts and crafts found in Africa.

“It will provide an ecosystem for development, teaching and learning guided by tradition, innovation and sustainability and will connect the stories of indigenous arts to the heritage of Africa.”

According to her, “Other facilities within the complex will include a gallery for visiting exhibitions, a textile museum, a digital library, heritage artisan village (which will include the bronze casting, terracotta pottery and wood carving); an aso-oke cloth weaving pavilion, Yoruba culture academy, a design innovation lab and timeshare residential lodges.

“The cultural complex project starts with the opening of phase one – an Adire Textile Hub which heralds the revival of indigenous fabric production and creative arts in Ile-Ife. It will include a film village and we will work with Textile and Design students from Obafemi Awolowo University, who will use the facility for their IT programmes.

“The hub will generate employment and become an example of the Non-Oil Export Initiative promoted by the Nigerian government. It will increase the capacity of the artisans working in Ile-Ife and educate on the importance of sustainability and ethical and environmental practices.”

Princess Ademiluyi is an award winning fashion icon with huge commitments in positioning Nigeria as formidable force in the leading other top nations in the world’s fashion industry. She is the founder of the Africa Fashion Week, a project that promotes African fashion designers through its subsidiaries, the Africa Fashion Week Nigeria and the Africa Fashion Week London.

A graduate of Law, Ademiluyi is a fashion expert and entrepreneur. She is the Global Ambassador of Queen Moremi Ajasoro Initiative and the creative mind behind Moremi the Musicals, a stage show, which dwells on the life of Queen Moremi.