Ivory Coast company brings black dolls to African children

Sara Coulibaly, an Ivorian designer and creator of Naima Dolls brand of dark-skinned dolls, works at her workshop in Abidjan, Ivory Coast December 15, 2020. Picture taken December 15, 2020. REUTERS/Luc Gnago.

Five years on, Coulibaly's company Naima Dolls employs around 20 young women who were scrambling on a recent afternoon to package 32 models of dolls with dark skin in time for Christmas.

Aremou Karima, 3, holds a doll named Lola of Naima Dolls brand in Abidjan.

"Our hope today is to give children the means to make good decisions," Coulibaly (above) said in her office in Abidjan, decorated with African masks and colourful wax prints.

"I want them to be conscious of the fact that they are beautiful, that their culture is beautiful and their culture is rich," she said, ruing the widespread use of skin-lightening creams across Africa.

Coulibaly holds a new model named Aissa at her office in Abidjan.

The names of Coulibaly's dolls all come from different regions of Ivory Coast. The most popular is Adjoba - or "Born on Tuesday" in the Akan language of the southeast - a two-year-old girl with plump features.

Naima brand dolls are seen in a toy department at the Carrefour supermarket in Abidjan.

An architect by training, Coulibaly says she draws inspiration for her designs from ideas and people she has met.

The dolls are manufactured in China and Spain, although she hopes to open a factory in Ivory Coast in the next few years to satisfy rising demand. She currently produces 150,000 dolls per year.

Aissa, a new model of doll, is pictured in front of a computer screen at the office of Sarah Coulibaly.

At a supermarket in Abidjan last week, Coulibaly's dolls caught the eye of many holiday shoppers.

Workers prepare to pack dolls at Naima Dolls' workshop in Abidjan.

Sara Coulibaly works at her office in Abidjan.

Workers prepare to pack dolls at Naima Dolls' workshop in Abidjan.

A doll named Adjoba. "We got used to white people's dolls and now we can see Black skin, the African woman," said Aude Koffi as she surveyed the selection. "That is what I liked and that is why I came to have a look."