Maame Efua Tandoh: The lady behind bespoke Love Ankara

By Anny OSABUTEY

Love Ankara was born out of pain, says Maame Efua Tandoh, as she glides her pencil through a plain sheet of paper which contains patterns of soon-to-be-designed bespoke shoes for the market.

Then in 2017, wearing what she describes as a “poorly constructed” pair of shoes, she slipped and badly hurt her knee. Despite the pain from the fall, she thought no bone had been broken but was still uncertain. But a conducted scan confirmed her fears, and she was to spend six months in a knee cast. With her movements very much restricted and thinking about how to nurse herself back to health, she had lot to think about and thought about how many people might have been hurt by bad shoes.

“I realised how many African women were being forced to choose between fashion and safety,” she told me. The solution from that deep reflection was what has now become Love Ankara, and with it has come shoes in different sizes and patterns, which are gracing floors in Africa, Europe and the United States. According to her, she decided to create shoes that were not only beautiful and functional, but culturally rooted and safe for everyday life.

“That accidental fall led to a mission; to build the most comfortable Afrocentric shoes on the continent – made by Africans, for Africans, using African textiles,” she added with a smile. The authenticity of Love Ankara lies in the quality of its product, as well as the intentionality of it, as some customers continue to testify.

A sustainable fashion brand that continues to define the frontiers within the Ghanaian entrepreneurial space, Love Ankara combines safety and comfort, afrocentric storytelling as reflected in the patterns of different fabrics in the production, zero waste fashion and fully produced in Ghana.

Again, Love Ankara’s mission is to give the working class woman “stylish, safe, heritage-rooted shoes” that bring out the self confidence, while building Africa’s most sustainable fashion brand powered by zero waste textiles and artisan craftsmanship. The flexibility Love Ankara offers to the user is that, the shoes are foldable, machine washable, full grip, lightweight and made from 100 percent African deadstock textiles that would otherwise have found themselves in a dumpsite nearby.

“We are not just a fashion brand-we are a sustainability and identity movement,” she affirmed with boldness. The quality of its products is reflected in the growing appetite for the shoes, where the customer base is diverse; from Ghana to the United States, Canada to the United Kingdom and across West Africa. The company maintains an 85 percent repeat customer rate, and the trust in their products also reflects the customer demands.

“In August 2025, we won First Place and a GH¢150, 000 grant at the Fidelity Bank Ghana Orange Inspire Creative Challenge. More than four hundred applicants were shortlisted in the competition. The prize further cemented Love Ankara’s product acceptability, authenticity and strict adherence to seemingly potential wasteful products into fit-for-purpose products that easily compete with any brand outside of Ghana.

Maame Efua Tandoh says beyond relying on the use of wasteful products in the manufacturing process, the continuous patronage of local artisans is a major incentive which has served the brand well. Especially in an environment where local artisans are often said to be unprofessional and not competent enough to work to global standard, Maame Efua Tandoh is happy with the team of artisans who form part of the spine of their products.

“Our long-term commitment is to save 5 million yards of waste fabric and cut fashion-related carbon missions in West Africa by 2030,” she said, while twiddling her thumb in the process. The rising taste for African textile and fabrics goes beyond a fashion brand; it is the preservation of African culture and storytelling.

“Every yard of authentic African cloth carries history – a proverb, a tribe, a way of life, a meaning. We lose that when we outsource identity,” she added. According to her, wearing African fabric is not only a fashion but a bold statement of economic power, cultural preservation and generational respect.

A former student of the University of Ghana, she studied Geography and Resources Development. She later worked in Fintech and real estate. She later worked at Vlisco Group, one of the world’s largest producers of African print textiles; and experience gleaned from the latter is very much reflected in the final outlook of Love Ankara’s shoes and associated products.

For the future, according to Maame Efua Tandoh, Love Ankara will be launching the “Corporate Soles Programme” and will partner with 100+ organisations to provide safe, zero-waste Afrocentric footwear to Africa’s working women.

Love Ankara’s eight-year journey has not always been rosy. There have been some tough moments; but resilience is what has kept the brand moving in the right direction. She says customer feedback is pivotal to the continuous survival of the business. She reflected on one which has since stuck with her. “I am physically challenged, and this is the first pair of shoes I can wear all day without pain.”