Fabric of a Shared Future – A Textile Dialogue and Design Project Between Hamburg and Kampala
How textile art merges design worlds, builds bridges, weaves knowledge, and shapes the future.
With Fabric of a Shared Future, a visionary project emerges that links fashion, craftsmanship, and cultural exchange into a new chapter of international collaboration. The aim is to promote textile practices, knowledge transfer, and artistic co-creation between designers from Germany and Uganda – creating a space where cultural diversity is understood as a driver of trust and innovation. Cultural sustainability meets cultural innovation.
Eight emerging designers – four from each country – collaborate to develop new aesthetic and design expressions. They are guided theoretically and methodologically by curator Beatrace Oola. At the heart of the project is dialogue: around materials, textiles, identities, memories, and visions for a shared future.
In collaboration with curator Annika Fitz of the Design Zentrum Hamburg, the project forms a creative bridge between Hamburg and Kampala. While Hamburg has already seen the emergence of the international Fashion Africa Now network, this project takes the exchange a step further – moving it in both directions to create new creative synergies in both countries.
The first two phases took place digitally, through tandem collaboration. In this hybrid format, the project establishes not only a transnational exchange but also a model for how creative collaboration across borders can be conceived, processed and realised. In this way, a creative space emerges that weaves cultural perspectives together – a vivid example of how design can shape meaningful change and connections. After months of collaboration and creative exchange, the project’s journey comes together in a final event on November 26, 2025, at Xenson Art Space in Kampala
Read more on Fashion Africa Now.
The project was initiated and developed by Beatrace Oola, founder of Fashion Africa Now. It is being realised in collaboration with Design Zentrum Hamburg and is funded by the Ministry of Culture and Media Hamburg.