Nehanda Design, the Cape Town studio behind handcrafted mobiles and décor inspired by South African wildlife, is growing its range while deliberately keeping production in the country, founder Nehanda Magan says in a profile published by Bizcommunity on 23 September 2026.
Magan studied Industrial Design, and she says that background has helped her judge when a hand-made detail adds real value and when it only slows the business down. The brand began with single commissions and now relies on a team of artisans, many of them women working from home.
Where the brand started
Nehanda Design’s own website dates the business to 2019, when a request for a baby mobile turned a side project into a company. In an earlier Q&A with design platform Visi, Magan said her cousin asked her for a custom mobile with African animals. She made the first one at night after her day job as an industrial designer. It carried a giraffe, lion, zebra, rhino and Table Mountain. A friend then commissioned a protea-themed mobile, which is the piece she credits with turning the work into a passion.
Magan chose the name after Mbuya Nehanda, the influential Zimbabwean spiritual leader, Bizcommunity reports. The company website describes her as a revolutionary who resisted colonial rule in the late 1800s.
During the Covid-19 lockdowns, as demand rose, Magan trained women to work from their homes and employed them. The business today draws on skilled artisans, including people with fine needlework experience. The company website also names a local partner, Rise 5, a sewing and hand-stitching business run by five women.
Streamlining without losing the craft
The Bizcommunity profile gives one clear example of the trade-off. A King Protea mobile initially featured an intricate hand-embroidered pattern on its white core. When Magan trained another staff member to replicate the stitching, it took significantly longer to produce. She replaced the embroidery with a simpler painted pattern.
“The piece is still handcrafted, but the processes to make that piece have been streamlined for commercial purposes,” she said. Deciding where to simplify is a continuing exercise. “It’s a constant balancing act, and one I work through with my team on a weekly basis,” Magan says.
Each mobile involves several stages of work. In the Visi interview Magan described eight, from preparing bamboo hoops and threading beads to designing patterns in graphic software, hand-stitching details and assembling the final piece with pom-poms and felt balls.
Magan also argues that keeping the supply chain local can be better for the environment than it looks. Reducing the distance materials travel, she says, can sometimes have a greater environmental benefit than importing materials that are marketed as organic or sustainably produced. The brand describes its products as “heirloom-quality keepsakes” designed to last, and its website lists “quality over quantity”, small-batch and made-to-order production among its values.
Customers, retailers and what comes next
Customers can visit the studio, meet the people making their products and contact Magan directly by email, WhatsApp or phone. “In an age of AI chatbots and increasingly limited customer service, I think this softer side of business makes a huge difference,” she said.
Wholesale has helped extend the brand’s reach, but Magan says not every retail relationship suits a small craft business. She looks for independent retailers who understand the value of handcrafted work. She has lost partnerships with larger retailers such as TFG, and says the brand now prefers partners who share its story.
Nehanda Design has attended three international trade shows over the past year, two in Paris and one in New York. Magan wants to move beyond mobiles into interactive, sensory products made from natural and waste materials, and to place the brand with retailers abroad. In the Visi Q&A she also spoke of eventually employing more Cape Town artisans and reaching European and Australian buyers.
More coverage of owner-run firms is in our SME and entrepreneurship section, and the Magan tag collects the founder’s stories on the site.
