Maleda Craft

Location: Addis-Ababa, Ethiopia

Alemayehu founded Malada Crafts to provide an outlet for his creativity while making an environmental impact. In his workshop, Alemayehu designs bags and shoes out of diaper bags and textile scraps. Alemayehu has found a way to weave these items into unique patterns that become incorporated into shoes and bag in combination with local leather. Because the formal waste collection process doesn’t have source segregation, it is difficult for Alemayehu to get clean materials to form waste collectors so instead, he relays on his immediate community to give him the diaper wrapping plastics and he buys the textile scraps from his small-scale garment manufactures. Being a company that works in upcycling, Alemayehu also thinks about ways he can reduce his waste by reusing his materials as much as possible.

Read more: Fashion Art Food: Stories of people turning waste to livelihood.