I had the pleasure of working with Initiatives of Change USA on some artworks for the launch of their 2019 Narrative Change Collaborative (NCC) for the city of Richmond in Virginia. The NCC is a change-making program that connects three mentors - a.k.a. architects - with three mentees - a.k.a. weavers -for a year long program looking to disrupt negative racial narratives in the city of Richmond, Virginia (the former capital of the confederacy and second largest slave landing in North America).

I collaborated with their amazing communications director Sionne Neely on the ideation for the artworks and we came up with some really cool interesting ideas. Merging traditional African symbolism and themes with elements of the Richmond narrative.

And some time after the first part of the work was done Sionne sent me an invite to Richmond to attend the launch of the program. I couldn’t believe it, I actually read the email then put down the phone for a few hours to absorb before I responded. The experience was amazing, I got to teach a couple of workshops while I was there, met wonderful, warm people and discovered an extremely interesting city with levels on levels of history.

Sionne did a write up about the project here and explained the artwork so eloquently:

The Architects poster ‘combines symbology from the Ga ethnic group of Ghana; Berber codes from Niger; innovative architecture from Mali; three hand mudras used in meditation practices in India; and pan-African cosmograms (developed by spiritualists from the Democratic Republic of Congo and Trinidad) reconfigured to reflect important dates in Richmond and Virginia’s journey towards racial equity and justice. Together these codes illustrate the repelling of negative and chaotic energies; the importance of self and community awareness; the capacity of healing, wellness and regeneration to take shape; and the deep insight that social shifts are in the works.’

Whilst the Weavers poster ‘ reflects three hands (of the NCC architects) on a drum, the communication technology used between African communities to share critical messages of support, subversion, and preparation. The drum unearths a multitude of symbols that speak to the creative transformation of community action that is currently taking place in Richmond and Nairobi.’

This project makes my heart full of warmth and gratitude, it was a paradigm-shifting experience.

First edition of newsletter design for Brainstorm.co.ke - 'When Women Speak'. 

This was really cool to work on, Brenda and Michael of Brainstorm gave me a lot of creative freedom on this project and although the deadlines were tight, I really enjoyed working on it. I worked on three more editions, the covers can be seen at the bottom of the page. 

You can download the full Brainstorm newsletters here. There's the newsletters and a blog that gets updated regularly - it's heart warming, humourous, challenging - great stuff.

I have always loved illustrated stationery items and a few years ago I decided to create my own product line - Kulula.
Kulula means 'to draw' in my Kenyan mother tongue, Kamba.
I have been selling at pop ups and at a couple of vendors for about a year now and its still a work in progress, but Im trusting the process to keep developing and growing with it.

You can see more at my Instagram page @_kulula and soon on my ‘coming soon’ website kululagoods.com .

You may also contact me directly on nzilani@gmail.com or kululagoods@gmail.com :)

Check out the hand drawn type section for more hand drawn items that are also available as prints.

Logos and further brand extensions 

Leading from the South (LFS) is a feminist philanthropic fund and alliance conceptualised and managed by four leading women’s funds: African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF), Fondo de Mujeres del Sur (FMS), International Indigenous Women’s Forum (FIMI) / AYNI Fund (AYNI), and Women’s Fund Asia (WFA).

Back in 2017, I worked primarily with AWDF to develop this brand for the fund. It was lovely working on a brand that aligns with my core values so strongly.

Nyota Farsamo is a Somali-Kenyan artisan collective from Dadaab making beautifully handcrafted products inspired by their Somali heritage.

I had the pleasure of working on the development of this brand and some other elements. Inspiration for the logo was drawn from the Somali flag and the henna patterns that adorn many of the artisans hands.

Various infographics displaying Kenya's performance at the Olympics

I was commissioned by SportsKenya and Smurt Notes to create an infographic on Kenya's performance in the Olympics for the London 2012 Games. A fascinating history of Kenyan sportsmanship unraveled as I researched this and it became a truly enjoyable project. That coupled with my love for the Olympics in general made this very fun to do and I eventually engaged with the project on a personal level. I then made a decision to try do this every Olympics even without a commissioning.

When the Rio 2016 Games came around I re-did the fist infographic in a portrait format and added in the 2012 stats. And during the Games I did smaller infographics each time a Kenyan won ( a lot of times :) ) and posted them on twitter - making this my first personal content creation project. These eventually culminated in to the visualization displaying Kenyas performance in Rio.

Looking forward to Tokyo !

I worked with the International Trade Centre’s to develop brochures for the RESI - Refugee Employment and Skills Initiative project that aims to link refugees in Dadaab, Kenya to IT-enabled market opportunities.

I love hand drawing type, particularly quotes and especially song lyrics. It's one of my favourite mindful activities. I'm still working on it and figuring out my personal style. Here's a few examples from 2012 to present. 

I usually experiment on my instagram @_kulula . If you're interested in buying one of these as a print or greeting card, message me - nzilani@gmail.com :)

Illustrations for Africans-Rising.org social media.

Working on this digital report for Nendo was exciting. Mark of Nendo gave me a lot of creative freedom - allowing me to experiment with cool brand elements and a vibrant colour palette.

You can download the full report here.

A few different data visualizations and infographics

Illustrated content for Kenyan spa booking website - Spadreaming . This work mainly appeared on SpaDreaming's super interesting Me-Time blog.

HEVA Fund illustrations commissioned to for their Creative Economy report

The ADMI brand is very colourful and vibrant - a lot of this project was about trying to find a balance between presenting the information and still keeping it fresh - whilst still trying to make it not look like a 1980's video game screen.

The full ADMI prospectus can be found here .

Layout design for the CCTO report.

A few event posters.