Shopping in Africa
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Old Biscuit Mill
Even if you don’t make it to Saturday’s Neighbourgoods market there are plenty of other good reasons for putting the Old Biscuit Mill towards the top of your to-do list. The converted biscuit factory is home to a fantastic collection of arts, craft, fashion and design shops. Apart from the pottery stores Clementina Ceramics and Imiso Ceramics, particular favourites include Love Africa, for colourful locally designed jewellery and fashion; a branch of the craft store Heartworks; ArtLab, where you can get new prints from the Tretchikoff collection; the rustic emporium Karoo Moon Country Store; Julestones for hand-crafted resin products; and the fantastic Mü & Me, the…
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Rue des Consuls
Rue des Consuls is the best place to go if you want to shop at the stalls and choose crafts or gifts. Rabat was traditionally an artisan centre and a wide range of handicrafts are still practised here, so the choice and quality of goods is generally high. There are more offerings along Blvd Tariq al-Marsa towards the kasbah. You'll find everything in this area from jewellery, silks and pottery to zellij and carved wooden furniture.
Weaving was one of the most important traditional crafts in Rabat, and the more formal, Islamic style is still favoured. On Tuesday and Thursday mornings women descend from the villages to auction their carpets to local salesmen at the carpet…
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Mezimbite Forest Centre
Central Mozambique's forests have long been plundered, but there's finally some good news on the scene. If you have extra time and are interested in learning about local sustainable development projects, take a few hours to visit Mezimbite Forest Centre, about 50km west of Beira along the EN6.
In addition to promoting sustainable conservation of the surrounding forests through maximising the forests' benefits to local residents, it trains artisans and craftpersons to be competitive in quality at the highest levels, producing exclusive furniture designs, jewellery and other items that are marketed internationally.
The centre can be visited during the daytime (and preferably…
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Albert Market
In Banjul, the best place to go shopping is Albert Market. If you enter via the main entrance you'll pass stalls stacked with shimmering fabrics, hair extensions, shoes, household and electrical wares and just about everything else you can imagine. Keep going and you'll reach the myriad colours and flavours of the fruit and vegetable market. Beyond here is the area usually called the Craft Market, with stalls selling tourist-tempting souvenirs.
Give yourself a good couple of hours to wander around - long enough to take in all the sights, smells and sounds, and get your haggling skills up to scratch. There are several drinks stalls and chop shops in the market to pacify…
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Caravanserai
This delightful shop, the only one of its kind on the West Bank, is kept by the friendly Hamdi and his family in a beautifully painted mudbrick house near Medinat Habu. He began travelling around Egypt and realised that making things was one of the few things poor people could do to earn money, so he decided to set up shop to encourage and help them, the women in particular. Hamdi buys almost everything people make, telling them what sells well, suggesting ways of improving their goods; above all he loves the people’s creativity. The shop has the beautiful pottery from the Western Oases, Siwan embroideries, amazing appliqué bags and lots of other crafts that can be found…
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Central Market
Port Louis' Central Market has a wide selection of T-shirts, basketry, spices and souvenirs; bargain to get a decent price.
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Art Naji
Ceramics seem to be everywhere in Fez – from the distinctive blue pottery to the intricate mosaics decorating fountains and riads. Art Naji is the place to go to buy the real deal. You can see the entire production process, from pot-throwing to the painstaking hand painting and laying out of zellij (tilework) – it’s a joy to behold. The potteries are about 500m east of Bab el-Ftouh, an easy trip in a petit taxi – look for the plumes of black smoke produced by olive pits, which burn at the right temperature for firing the clay. You can even commission a mosaic and arrange for it to be shipped home.
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Institut National de Cartographie et de Télé-Détecion
The Institut National de Cartographie et de Télé-détecion is the state mapping agency and produces excellent 1:7500 large-scale sheet maps of the city. You usually have to buy them in sets of six, but Sheet 1.5 covers all of central Algiers, from Bologhine in the north to beyond the transport hubs at Sidi Mohamed in the south (and with a larger-scale inset of the Casbah). The INCT maps may also be available, or can be ordered, in some bookshops. Agir-Plus Edition has used these maps in its pocket-size Guide et Plans d’Alger (DA750), also packed with practical information.
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Rue Sekkakine
For centuries, trading in gold or silver was forbidden to Muslims. This was because working precious metals to be sold at higher prices than their base value was considered usury, something forbidden under Islamic law. Jews faced no such prohibitions, though; when members of Fez's Jewish community moved into the Mellah in the 14th century they set up goldsmithing businesses in Rue Sekkakine.
Originally patronised by the palace, these days the shops are run by Muslims and cater to the locals' penchant for bling, specialising in jewellery made from garish yellow gold and sparkly stones of every description.
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Monkeybiz
You won’t miss this yellow building painted with red monkeys! Equally colourful beadwork products are found inside, all made by township women. The shop also stocks funky jewellery and gifts by other quirky Capetonian designers. Profits from the beadwork support the Monkeybiz Wellness Clinic for HIV/AIDS-affected women, held upstairs the same day women artists pack the street outside the head office to sell their beadwork – it’s a very lively scene. You’ll also find Monkeybiz products for sale at Carrol Boyes at the Waterfront.
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Mercado de Xipamanine
Not exactly a tourist attraction, but a Maputo institution nonetheless, is the enormous and chaotic Mercado de Xipamanine. The market, which sprawls over the length of several football fields beyond the termination of Av Eduardo Mondlane, is the place to go to buy everything from used appliance parts to mattresses and sofas. More interesting is the enormous selection of traditional medicines and remedies, including an array of animal pelts, bird claws and more.
Xipamanine is also notorious as the hub of the local underworld, with an impressive assortment of stolen items for resale.
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Bombolulu Workshops & Cultural Centre
This nonprofit organisation produces crafts of a very high standard and gives vocational training to hundreds of physically disabled people. You can visit the workshops and showroom for free to buy jewellery, clothes, carvings and other crafts, or enter the cultural centre to tour mock-ups of traditional homesteads in the grounds, where various activities take place. Bombolulu matatus run here from Msanifu Kombo St, and Bamburi services in either direction also pass the centre.
The turn-off for the centre is on the left about 3km north of Nyali bridge.
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Montebello
This development project has helped several great craftspeople and designers along the way. In the leafy compound, check out the colourful bags made from recycled materials, the fashions of Mielie, and Thando Papers, started by Joseph Diliza who had the idea of turning invasive reeds from urban rivers into exclusive paper products. On weekdays you can visit several artists’ studios. There’s also a good café, the Gardener’s Cottage, and you can get your car washed.
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Souvenir Shops
In some of the Adare houses in the Old Town, the ever-enterprising Adares have set up souvenir shops displaying beautifully made baskets, and silver and amber jewellery. The house of Fatuma Safir Ahmed, just north of the main market, is one example. Another is Zeituna Yusuf Grille's shop, just south of the market, which is as good as an antique shop.
Amber necklaces and baskets are on sale, but remember to bring your sharpest bargaining skills! Because these shops are family-run, they may not always be 'open'. Knock on the doors.
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Sayed el Safty
Certainly the most fun, is Sayed el Safty, a 2nd-generation antiquaire who runs a small shop piled to the rafters with antique and reproduction Oriental furnishings in wood and metal – tables, chests, maps, bowls, beautifully inlaid backgammon sets, and more. The store itself is worth the trip alone, with graceful Arabic text carved into the stone walls. Sayed himself is enthusiastic, friendly and knowledgeable. The sign above the store says ‘Ibrahim el Safty’ (Sayed’s father).
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Penduka
Penduka, which means 'wake up', operates a nonprofit women's needlework project at Goreangab Dam, 8km northwest of the centre. You can purchase needlework, baskets, carvings and fabric creations for fair prices and be assured that all proceeds go to the producers. To get there, take the Western Bypass north and turn left on Monte Cristo Rd, left on Otjomuise Rd, right on Eveline St and right again on Green Mountain Dam Rd.
Then follow the signs to Goreangab Dam/Penduka. To be picked up for free from town call 0811 294 116.
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Michi
Berber wabisabi is the design ethic at Michi, a creative partnership of Japanese Marrakesh resident Masayoshi Ishida and Marrakshi master craftsmen. Together they've created a look that combines natural materials, spare forms, and a whimsical sense of humour: woven raffia wing-tip shoes, a long-handled mug with a tiny orangewood spoon, flour-sack tote bags lined with basketry.
Even with your most winsome bargaining behaviour, Michi is more expensive than most souq shops: staff know you won't find this stuff elsewhere.
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Woodcarving Workshops
Essaouira is well known for its woodwork and you can visit the string of woodcarving workshops near the Skala de la Ville. The exquisite marquetry work on sale is made from local fragrant thuya wood, which is now an endangered species. Although the products are beautiful and sold at excellent prices, buying anything made from thuya threatens the last remaining stands of trees by increasing demand and therefore encouraging illegal logging. For a guilt-free conscience look for crafts made from other woods instead.
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Enfin
Trim, modern, hottie tunics for men in sumptuous materials and colours: deep red linen, ivory with black trim around the neck, black raw silk with a single off-centre grey stripe. Prices aren't cheap, but with the right bargaining banter you can get better deals here than in Enfin's factory outlet in Sidi Ghanem. The pink-and-black boutique and sharply dressed staff are incongruously glitzy for the raw, hardworking northern section of the souqs - but that's what makes Enfin so quintessentially Marrakesh.
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Canal Walk
With over 400 shops, 50-odd restaurants, 18 cinema screens and parking for 6500 cars, you’d be a fool to argue with its claim of being the largest mall in Africa. The food court is so big that acrobatics shows are often held over the diners. Also in the mall you’ll find the MTN Sciencentre and Intaka Island, a wetland reserve that’s a haven for birdwatchers. Drive here along the N1, or check the website for details of a shuttle bus service (R35) from the city.
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Ensemble Artisinal
Chefchaouen remains an artisan centre and, as such, an excellent place to shop - especially for woven rugs and blankets in bright primary colours. Many shops have looms in situ, so you can see the blankets being made. Previously silk was the material of choice: the mulberry trees in Plaza Uta el-Hammam are a legacy of these times. Most of the weaving nowadays is with wool, one of the area's biggest products.
It's worth stopping at the Ensemble Artisinal, if only for the sake of comparison.
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Souq al-Gomaa
In the Southern Cemetery south of the Citadel, this sprawling weekly market is all the craziness of a medieval bazaar in a modern setting: under a highway flyover, expect new bicycles, live donkeys, toilets and broken telephones. Savvy pickers can find some great antiques and vintage duds. Go before 10am, when the crush of people can get overwhelming. You’ll need a taxi to get there (about E£12 from Downtown); tell the driver ‘Khalifa’, the name of the neighbourhood.
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Bob Music
In case you hadn't noticed the Bob Marley posters and music throughout the souqs, this store makes the Marrakesh-Jamaica connection even more obvious. Gnaoua musicians are quick to point out the similarity in some rhythmic patterns and tunes, but you can put this ethonomusicology theory to the test yourself: pick up some Gnaoua castanets or a drum in this shop, and try your own Gnaoua rendition of 'Redemption Song'. No matter how badly you play it, you're bound to make their day at Bob Music.
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Parfumerie Medina
The knowledgeable owner Rachid Ouedrhiri will explain all about the perfumes, cosmetics and essential oils he stocks in his small stall in the Henna Souk, off Talaa Kebira and if you've always hankered after arabesques swirling of henna, here's the ideal place. The henna artist applies the mixture while you relax under the plane tree in the Henna Souk, off Talaa Kebira. She charges around DH30 for a finger-and-wrist design, or around DH200 for the full treatment of hands, forearms and feet.
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Monkeybiz Wellness Clinic
You won't miss this yellow building painted with red monkeys! Equally colourful beadwork products are found inside, all made by township women. The shop also stocks funky jewellery and gifts by other quirky Capetonian designers. Profits from the beadwork support the Monkeybiz Wellness Clinic for HIV/AIDS-affected women, held upstairs the same day women artists pack the street outside the head office to sell their beadwork – it's a very lively scene.
reviewed