In the vibrant tapestry of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, threads of seemingly disparate disciplines converge in the compelling figure of Abigail Nyasha Hunda. Founder of Ajewu Crafts, media practitioner, gender climate champion at Green Hut, visual artist, fashion designer, stylist, urban futures champion and writer.
Abigail embodies a potent, almost protean, engagement with her environment and its myriad challenges. Her genesis, she recounts, was nurtured by parents who just encouraged her to find out more, fostering a relentless curiosity that now propels her across a remarkable spectrum of creative and activist endeavors.
“If something never worked out for me, they just told me that it was okay and I could always do something else. I could always choose something else. So that has always been the case with me. I’m a curious person,” she recalls.
The Alchemist of the Everyday: From Herbs to Entrepreneurship
Abigail’s journey into the tangible realm of Ajewu Crafts emerged unexpectedly from the crucible of the COVID-19 lockdown. Facing depleted savings, she pivoted to a deep passion ignited years prior during a visit to her sister in Eswatini in 2016. There, amidst a community gardening project she absorbed invaluable knowledge of herbs – their cultivation, their pairings and their latent power. This wasn’t merely botanical interest for Abigail, it was deeply personal.
“I learned a lot about the health benefits, hair benefits and as for skin benefits, I had to research that because I have a complex skin type and I was struggling with growing my hair, I was struggling with, you know, beauty products that I could use for my skin,” she vividly recalls.
Grappling with a complex skin type and the frustrations of hair growth, she embarked on a journey of self-discovery, learning to formulate her own remedies. This personal alchemy transmuted into an entrepreneurial vision, beginning with an “all-in-one hair oil” that, through a process of community feedback and understanding, evolved into a focused line of natural products for hair, beard and face.
The initial ambiguity of a “miracle oil” gave way to a grounded understanding of specific benefits, driven by Abigail’s direct engagement with her community, witnessing firsthand the oil’s efficacy on “people with weird skin infections.”
Recognizing the need for targeted solutions, led to the establishment of Ajewu Crafts.
“I would give the oil to people who had, you know, complex skin problems. I would see people with weird skin infections and then I would give them the oil and it was working. So,the journey began with four oils particularly for hair, beard and face and the tissue oil and then from there I started introducing soaps, dried herbs, the herbal plants themselves because now I can grow,” she says.
Eco-Aesthetics: Upcycling the Scars of Consumption
Abigail’s artistic practice is deeply intertwined with an acute awareness of environmental responsibility, a consciousness sharpened by her involvement with Green Hut, Hivos and the Bulawayo Vendors and Traders Association. Undergoing training in urban food systems and green technologies, she became acutely aware of the “how much waste people are actually putting into the environment and not doing anything about it.” This realization fueled her commitment to upcycling, transforming discarded materials into compelling artistic statements.
Wine bottles morph into elegant candle holders and drinking glasses, while “old scraps of clothing” find new life in her artwork. A particularly resonant project involves repurposing the frame of a broken solar panel, a poignant symbol of both technological advancement and its potential for obsolescence, reimagined as a canvas for creative expression.
This practice extends to her fashion design, where fabric off-cuts are deliberately integrated into her art, minimizing waste and blurring the boundaries between garment and artwork. Even her choice of materials reflects this ethos, favoring “environment-friendly paints” and upcycled wood for her canvases, particularly the enduring and slow-to-degrade nature of denim.
A Champion for Justice: Where Gender and Climate Intersect
In a region acutely impacted by the escalating realities of climate change, Abigail’s role as a gender climate champion takes on profound significance. For her, this title signifies an active commitment to addressing gender inequalities within the climate discourse. She advocates for inclusive policies that recognize the disproportionate impact of environmental crises on marginalized groups, particularly women and girls. Her work involves amplifying the voices and experiences of her community, sharing their stories to foster a broader understanding of diverse climate impacts.
“I try to be part of movements or part of groups that are actually advocating for policies that are inclusive of marginalised groups that are deeply affected by climate issues. Could it be women or men or those who are mostly affected who are usually women and girls? I hope that makes sense. And I get to share. I get to share my own experiences,” she reflects.
Being a gender climate champion, she asserts, means standing as an advocate for diverse genders and ensuring that “no one is left behind and no one’s voice is left unheard” when formulating solutions to the climate emergency. Her affiliation with Green Heart Trust has instilled a deep consciousness regarding sustainable practices in both her craft and her art, leading her to prioritize indigenous knowledge and environmentally sound resource management.
Indigenous Wisdom: A Legacy of Sustainable Living
Abigail champions the revitalization of indigenous knowledge systems as a crucial pathway to building healthier and greener communities. She highlights the sustainable practices of her ancestors, who lived in harmony with their environment, avoiding the climate crisis of the present. Herbs, in this context, are not merely commodities but potent agents of natural healing, reducing reliance on pharmaceutical drugs and their potential for addiction.
“Herbs help in the sense that they contribute to natural healing, they reduce the dependency on drugs and while reducing the dependency on drugs it also mitigates the challenges that we then face of having to be or developing addictions on certain drugs, certain clinical drugs,” she says.
Abigail also sees the integration of indigenous knowledge and herbal practices as a vital avenue for economic empowerment, particularly for women and youth, who constitute the majority of the population and can impart this wisdom to future generations. These systems also offer invaluable lessons in environmental stewardship, promoting mindful consumption and a deep respect for natural resources, echoing ancestral practices of selective harvesting and reverence for specific tree species.
Navigating the Intersections: A Polymathic Approach
The apparent multiplicity of Abigail’s identities – media practitioner, artist, urban futures champion – is, in fact, deeply interconnected and mutually reinforcing. Her background in media studies provides an ethical framework, reminding her of the “lines I can’t cross” when addressing sensitive issues through her art. It also equips her with the narrative tools to shape her artistic expression, recognizing that “art in itself, as a visual artist, it’s some form of journalism on its own.”
Her role as an urban futures champion informs her artistic lens, allowing her to visually articulate and advocate for climate issues. These seemingly disparate threads, she notes, are “different threads of the same basket,” each feeding into and enriching the other.
The Green Hurdle: Certification and the Path Forward
Despite her unwavering commitment to organic and sustainable practices, Abigail faces tangible challenges in the green economy, particularly the arduous and expensive process of obtaining green certification.
“It’s quite expensive to get my business green certified because I’m pushing for the 100% organic narrative and it doesn’t just happen easily because how I produce my products or getting each product certified, green certified, it requires a lot of money,” she reveals.
This financial barrier limits the number of products she can certify and, consequently, her capacity for wider distribution. Undeterred, she is actively exploring solutions, including potential membership in commerce organizations, demonstrating a pragmatic approach to overcoming systemic obstacles in her pursuit of a truly sustainable enterprise.
The Allure of Transformation: Finding Value in the Discarded
Looking ahead, Abigail’s artistic excitement lies in the transformative power of upcycling, in “turning scrap into priceless art.” This fascination with imbuing waste with new meaning positions her work within a contemporary artistic discourse that increasingly values ecological consciousness and the re-evaluation of material value. She also joined the Elevate Team that hosts radio shows at NUST FM on Mondays.
She volunteers with child-support organizations such as Do It For The Kids and is a member of the Women’s Coalition of Zimbabwe. Additionally, she serves as an Urban Futures Champion at the Bulawayo Vendors and Traders Association. She is also part of a youth advisory board committee that addresses various issues in Bulawayo, working to develop effective mitigation strategies.
Her journey, therefore, is not just a personal narrative of creative entrepreneurship but a powerful articulation of the urgent need to reimagine our relationship with waste, with our environment, and with each other, guided by a profound curiosity and an unwavering commitment to a more just and sustainable future.
