DESIGN COMMUNITIES IN AFRICA
As defined by the Oxford dictionary, a community is a condition of sharing or having certain attitudes and interests in common. As social beings, being in a community is very important not just for our social health but also our mental health. And of course, we do not imply that all communities are beneficial as some communities are labelled ‘social menace’ and can be detrimental to the wellbeing of the society at large.
One of the pillars which have held the tech-industry is its community. The tech community can be virtual or physical. While it’s virtual(e.g. StackOverflow), its invisibility(well, sorta) does not dilute its population strength. Its physicality(e.g. DEVFESTS), does not dilute its accessibility strength either.
As I said earlier, being a part of a community is beneficial to our social health and mental health. Let’s explain these better…
As a member of a community, you can interact with fellow community members who have similar goals as you, and feel connected with them. You’ll also improve your communication skills from interacting with them. You can gain public recognition from a hackathon organized by your community. Besides, you learn one of the most crucial soft-skills, teamwork, as a member of a community. All these insinuate better social and mental health.
There are a lot of popular developers’ communities in Africa but, less is known about designers’ communities. Fortunately, we’ll be discussing four of the design groups in Africa taking into account their missions and histories.
Figma Africa
This design community is a subgroup of the Figma community run by Namnso. It is a community of more than 3,000 members from more than 8 countries in Africa. Initially, Figma Africa was thought out as Figma Nigeria. However, its first event, which happened in January 2018, was so huge that Figma Nigeria had to be expanded to contain other African countries hence, Figma Africa. With a motive of making design education accessible, Figma Africa is a structured community as it has 30 ambassadors to disseminate and improve design education among their respective communities. They use slack as the main platform to reach out to all their members at once and also WhatsApp to reach out to smaller groups based on location, area of specialization etc. One of the interesting things happening currently in Figma Africa is the weekly design challenge. A general topic is selected and everyone designs concepts based on it and sends it in for submission. Find out more about Figma Africa here.
21px Design
This is a design community initiated by a UI/UX designer, Tomide. Once a friend who owns a company in Akure needed a UX designer and asked him to recommend one as he was too busy to help. But unfortunately, he didn’t find any, in his words, “I scanned my brain and contact list for UX designer available nearby and I realised I don’t know any”. So he decided to start a community and sought for help on design twitter(a pure coincidence to ask a community on how to start one, I tell you!). Praise, a friend on twitter opted to assist and together, they created a platform to train designers. Today(since 16th of May this year), this platform has 153 members online and is run by two additional persons. To join this community, click this.
DesignJobCaster
Like Indeed but for design, DesignJobCaster is a community that desires to connect designers with job opportunities. In Debby, the cofounder’s words, “We’re like Tinder but with SuperHeroes and we send mad portfolios instead of nudes”. Going a little forward, this community reviews designers work collections to make them job ready. They’re currently available on Telegram. You can also follow them on Instagram to stay abreast of recent job opportunities.
DearDesigner
This platform started as Twitter threads in 2018. Founder, Tunji would share design tips, process and principles via #DearDesigner. Due to the infancy of the design industry in Nigeria, Nigerians were fed on foreign design contents. DearDesigner introduces Nigerians to ‘local’ designs from renown Nigerian designers. Aspects of design covered cuts across Branding, Product, Graphics, Advertising and Digital Arts sphere. Apart from activities on Twitter, this community is active on Instagram Live and also has a blog. The blog contains design case studies and articles that expose readers to thoughts, paradigms, process and rationale of design projects. Find more about the blog here.
Credits: I’m grateful to Namnso, Debby, Tunji and Tomide for taking the time and extra effort to provide me with details about these communities they run as well as the copyright to use their logos.
