Merle Payne - Eclectic Emissaries

Merle Payne's delicately embroidered bags are inspired by the tribes of Southern Africa. As a storyteller, she ensures that each piece has a tale to tell. The items are steadily making their way across the globe. Proud ambassadors of local style and talent, they share local stories with the world.

Merle Payne creates exquisite bags: brightly coloured and painstakingly embroidered. This morning I have seven adorning my arms. As a mobile bag stand I attract  a fair amount of interest – it’s impossible
not to. The vivid shades catch the attention of passers-by; while the intricate embroidery keeps it. A guard on Ninth Street stops me and compliments my accessories.  A suited businessman enquires if the bags are for sale.

I am heading to the Bamboo Centre, to return the handbags to their creator. The upstairs gallery is the temporary abode of Merle and her family of bags during their stay in Joburg. As I approach the centre I notice a slender woman looking out from on top of the roof. Her snow-white hair and a delicately embellished skirt stand out against the pale morning. She waves, recognising her creations that fill my arms.

Inside, neat rows of bags decorate the walls. The fabric is adorned with original designs that pay tribute to the aesthetic traditions of various people of South Africa, and some influences from further abroad. As Merle puts it, these unique bags “are a celebration of colour and diversity.” Each one has a story carefully stitched into it. Presented in their stationary parade across the room, the bags make an asserted claim on their status as art. Art of the fabulous, functional, 3-dimensional kind. Each creation whispers, “Oh, I have so much to tell you”.

But today I’m here for Merle’s story and we settle down for coffee and a chat.

“Five years ago I went back to the farm where I was born. I was 55, I am now 60,” Merle begins.
“I had been working in Jo’burg for my company Pearl’s where I had spent 20 years making vintage clothing. The challenge was to create clothing that was so authentic it was thought to be second hand. When I decided I’d had enough, some friends said ‘Come and work in film, it’s very rewarding’. I worked as a props master and a wardrobe mistress. I quite liked it, dressing a set, it felt like theatre.”

But after a while, it was time for another change. “I didn’t really know what to do,” Merle says. “So I returned home to a farm in the misty mountains of Magoebaskloof.”

“The farm is a timber estate. I noticed a lot of the women were sitting around and doing nothing. The labour required on the farm is too physical. I decided I wanted to bring employment to the farm. They needed to do something with their hands. I took ladies who didn’t know how to embroider and taught them.”

Merle has a special technique to excite fingers new to sewing. “When I was a little girl my mother would order moskonfyt, which would come all the way from Cape Town. My mother would sit at the kitchen table and really savour every bite she took. The performance was to make me think that the moskonfyt was delicious, because I really didn’t like it. Now when a new woman is introduced to embroidery I make it seems so yummy”.

Merle has the woman sit with her and watch her work. Merle slips the thread into the eye of the needle and undertakes the endeavour with such enjoyment. The needle moves through the fabric and is pulled out with a long stroke, each and every stitch is relished. The lady is not allowed to touch a needle or thread; she may only watch Merle delighting in the embroidery. The second day is the same, and the third. Merle makes very neat, very fine embroidery. She makes it feel like it’s the most delicious thing. “When it’s time for the woman’s turn to sew she is excited to sew, and eager to gain as much pleasure form the technique as I did.” The ladies now enjoy employment, spending hours creating an original item. “I’d like to give something back,” explains Merle.

The style varies from piece to piece. “Sometimes it’s mainly African… It depends on my inspirations,” notes Merle. Various elements are collected and assembled into a single creation, which might display the studs of the Zulus, the bright colours of the Shangaan or the rows of braid and ribbon of the Venda. Each item is embellished by embroidered motifs, and sweet touches such as ribbons or buttons.

Their signature is the “fusion of all decorative techniques onto one,” says Merle to explain how the bags can get away with a variety of influences coming together in one space. “I control the use wanted to bring employment to the farm… I took ladies of colour so it’s “not an explosion in a jam factory,” Merle notes. “I’m a dictator as far as design and colour goes – I decide what to work on and what to play with.”

“I have been collecting vintage fabrics – Japanese and Shangaan. It’s very folkloric – peasants take plain fabric and work inch by inch; they take something simple and base and embellish and embellish. The item becomes the property of the poor people because they have the time on hand to make something over 20 years.

“I love what I do and I’m passionate about it,” Merle explains. Her one-of-a-kind creations have included wall panels and skirts with bits of decoration: Xhosa, Venda, Zulu, Ndebele and Shangaan have been featured. Now the focus is on the handbags. “The bags are currently exported to Germany, I am also looking at London at the moment.”

“Every single item is documented and photographed and numbered. If I think about a piece, I can always go and look at a photo. With Pearl’s I lost the creations. They are like children I loose. Now I write down the name of everyone who has purchased. I can keep track of them.”

One bag spends time in the company of the editor of UK Vogue. Another one hides under the seat of a friend as she zips around Jo’burg. More and more bags are making there way across the borders and over the seas. What bright ambassadors of Africa’s creative spirit, what proud representatives of our continent’s unique style and talent. Various elements are collected and assembled into a single creation: the studs of the Zulus, the bright colours of the Shangaan or the rows of braid and ribbon of the Venda.