Rosario Dawson & Abrima Erwiah: Studio 189

A Mission Born from Shared Activism

In 2013, Rosario Dawson, an award-winning American actor and activist, and Abrima Erwiah, a former executive at Bottega Veneta, came together to launch Studio 189. Their shared experience with One Billion Rising, a global campaign to end violence against women, influenced the brand’s values. They saw how a lack of income keeps women from leaving harmful situations. They wanted fashion to be a source of power. Studio 189 was created to tackle economic inequality, artisan invisibility, and broken fashion systems, starting in Ghana.

Studio 189 Africa's Fashion to Global

Most global fashion brands ignore where their products come from. Women in the Global South do the work but remain unseen and unpaid. Studio 189 works directly with communities in Ghana, especially women-led cooperatives, to produce clothing using batik, kente, hand-weaving, and natural dyeing. These are salaried jobs with dignity, trying to solve the problem of craft extraction without return, which is a common issue in the fashion industry.

(Image credit: Studio 189)

Fashion as a Tool for Employment

Studio 189 invests in the full fashion cycle from fibre to final product. Their model includes education, manufacturing, and retail, with a focus on long-term skill development. They have a manufacturing unit in Accra, and their model has already created hundreds of jobs, mostly for women.

The cultural heritage is preserved and produced through a process that is both low waste and high impact. The clothes are sustainable in materials and are sustainable in what they return to the people who made them.

The platform exists to spotlight African artisan-made fashion and let real craftsmanship reach a global audience. They believe clothing is never just something you buy. There are real people and real situations behind it. When someone chooses what to buy, they show what they support and the kind of world they want to be part of.

Recognition for a Real System

Studio 189 won the CFDA Lexus Sustainable Fashion Award, one of the highest recognitions in the American fashion industry, often called the Oscars of fashion. They have partnered with the United Nations Ethical Fashion Initiative and have been featured in Vogue, WWD, BoF, and Elle.

Studio 189 addresses three problems at once: unfair fashion wages, lost artisan knowledge, and the invisibility of African makers in global fashion. Their work gives women global visibility.

For Abrima, opportunity should not depend on your passport, your background, or the shade of your skin. Those factors should never decide whose dreams get funded or whose voices get heard. She wanted to build something grounded in shared effort, where the skills she carries can support others and create real pathways for growth. Studio 189 became her way of paying forward the support she once received and making space for more people to rise with her.

If you believe that sustainability should mean more than just organic cotton, look here. Studio 189 is fashion that can be circular and empowering without extracting, and it does all of this at once.