KWATZ is a small independent label that creates fresh, hand-printed, high quality T-shirts full of soul and personality for fashion followers who value originality.
KWATZ is the brainchild of artist and screen printer Amanda Roseveare who works from a small studio in the UK. Amanda’s passion for African textiles, heritage and design began as a child growing up in Lagos, Nigeria. Her art is inspired by the energy, music and visual vocabulary of Africa mixed with alternative subcultures that she encountered during the 1980s and ’90s. With KWATZ she brings these inspirations together in her own unique visual style.
During the 1980’s, Amanda started KWATZ, a niche but successful mail order company that hand printed African inspired images onto large T-shirts, an ideal platform for her art. Between 1985 and ‘89, she was a regular designer of T-shirts used for campaigning and fundraising by the Anti Apartheid Movement in London. Amanda’s designs were used for stage backdrops at Mandela’s 70th birthday Rock Concert, Wembley Stadium London 1988.
KWATZ was put on pause in the late ’80s to enable other pursuits in Sudan, Ethiopia and Mozambique but is now back in business. Amanda has decided that after (25 years of) raising kids, working in education and painting, it is time to return to her original passion. Welcome to KWATZ!
