In Africa, sometimes tradition is everything. That's especially true with the art of creating traditional royal beaded crowns in Nigeria.
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00:01This is no ordinary cap.
00:04This is a Yoruba crown.
00:06Modern Yoruba kings usually have several crowns,
00:09which they wear depending on the occasion.
00:13But it's actually just a beaded cap, isn't it?
00:30The beaded crown is very, very significant,
00:33particularly in Yoruba land.
00:36In southwestern Nigeria,
00:38the traditional beaded crowns of the Yarabe monarchs are indispensable.
00:42Even ancestral figures such as Oduduwa have crowned heads.
00:47You can't do without them,
00:49and that's where the royal cultural heritage is under threat,
00:52because the kings are running out of crowns.
00:55If we see the life of the graduate these days,
00:58we're all looking for white-collar jobs that will always pay high.
01:01But there are some little, little jobs that are being inherited
01:06from your forefather or from your father,
01:08that is even giving you money more than what you might be expecting.
01:1334-year-old Kalada from Ile-Ife in Osun State, Nigeria,
01:18is actually a computer science graduate.
01:20So why did he decide against an office job
01:22and now prefers threading glass beads?
01:26What kept my interest in this work
01:28is my dad was a crownmaker.
01:31He always tell us something,
01:33that he knows that we are all graduates,
01:36that he don't want this work to go down.
01:38The purpose of him sending us to school
01:40is that we should go and learn more.
01:43As if crownmaking itself wasn't already inefficient,
01:46Before Kalada shows us how a simple cap becomes, in Adi,
01:50a symbol of royal heritage,
01:52let's discover the symbolism behind the beaded headdress.
01:56No two Yoruba crowns look the same.
01:58A crownmaker chooses colors, patterns, images, and even the shape,
02:03depending on the king's personal interest or taste.
02:09This is what we call a boat crown.
02:12This is what we call a boat crown.
02:15You can see it looks like it's in the form of a boat.
02:19The Yoruba can put it on whenever they are doing their traditional festival.
02:25Or you can even use it to go to church, since it's white.
02:28This is a six-colored crown.
02:31You can see we have six sides of it, on top of it.
02:36So this is what we call a six-colored crown.
02:39It can be made of beads, and it can be made of stones.
02:42This one has a pointed front.
02:45And it has, like, five bows around it.
02:51Crownmakers often work with precious materials and intricate designs.
02:56In the late 19th century, beads would have been imported from the British.
03:01At this time, glass beads were a sign of wealth.
03:04Elaborate bead embroidery still emphasizes royal status today.
03:09Where does Kalada get his seed beads from?
03:13This is one of the markets where I buy some of the stuff that I use in making the crown.
03:19Sometimes I do go to Lagos to get it in bulk,
03:22because there are some projects that I might need that I might not find here.
03:27Making crowns requires experience and attention to detail.
03:30The craftsmen who still master this art are usually of an advanced age.
03:35Could Kalada offer the craft a future?
03:39I love small boys or small girls doing their mother's job or their father's job.
03:44The job is not an easy job.
03:49Back at his workshop, Kalada is preparing to make a new crown.
03:54First, he has to cut the patterns from burlap.
03:56Each part is glued with fabric and left to dry in the sun for three to four hours.
04:01Other crowns get their shape by using a capformer.
04:05Making crowns requires patience and commitment.
04:09I've been on this work for over 25 years now.
04:14And we work with a lot of kings.
04:17Even through my dad, when my dad was even alive.
04:20And presently there are some kings that I'm still working with.
04:23One of the kings to rely on Kalada's designs is Obamayoa Adesiyan.
04:28What is the significance of a skilled crownmaker for a king?
04:32Those people making adi, I mean the beaded crown,
04:35that are inheriting the thing,
04:37they know much more than those who are learning about it.
04:42Because when you are with the art of making beaded crowns,
04:48you must know how to do it.
04:50Each crown is studded with colourful beads.
04:53Each colour stands for a different Yoruba god.
04:56As the king is protected by all the gods,
04:59the colours symbolise his divinity.
05:02Made entirely by hand, a piece takes weeks or even months to make,
05:07depending on the type and style.
05:10The crown is made by hand.
05:13The crown is made by hand.
05:16The crown is made by hand.
05:19With passion and patience, Kalada creates symbolic crowns
05:23and ensures the preservation of a truly royal craft.