For the fashionistas, Okiki Marinho is a name synonymous with fashion and the exquisite Talking Drum bags. But beyond that are many years of emotional battles with infertility; starting with ectopic pregnancies, loss of her fallopian tubes and series of IVFs, before finally having her twins. She shared her moving story with Yetunde Oladeinde.
NOTHING prepared Okiki Marinho for the numerous battles she was to face in life. Childhood was great. Doing a quick flashback, she recalled the good old days, a childhood full of love and parents who really cared. Her father was a banker while her mother worked with the now defunct Nigeria Airways. Somehow, she desired to be a banker like her father; and went on to study Economics with Business and European Studies at the University College, London. For her Master’s, she studied Organisational Studies at the Warwick Business School.
A good work life soon followed; and it was time to balance it all with marriage. The lucky man emerged and they signed the dotted lines. When Okiki got married, her dream was to have children who would make her desire of motherhood a reality. Honeymoon and early months of marriage were filled with fun but gradually a health challenge set. Miscarriages and more miscarriages. What could be wrong? She wondered. Her doctors stepped in and discovered that she was suffering from Ectopic pregnancy.
This was a big shock and a dilemma. Was her dreams and expectation of marriage and motherhood disappearing into thin air? Nevertheless, she resolved never to give up. The struggle continued and in the process, she had a close shave with death, losing her fallopian tubes.
Again, rather than stay down, Marinho, like a cat with nine lives, switched her energy and attention to her passion, and it gave her succour.
Said Marinho: “The Okiki Marinho brand was birthed from a brand that I initially called Liberal Designs. It was a brand I started in 2010, which focused mainly on making clothes. You bring your fabrics and we make your clothes for you. At the time, it was a side business that I was doing because I actually had a full time job; I was working with Pan Ocean Oil and Gas; so, I had to employ a manager because I couldn’t really be hands-on.”
After work in the evening and on weekends, she would go there. “It was a passion and after being with Pan Ocean for just two years, I made a decision to push that line of work further. Just before I went full time with the Liberal Designs, I had toyed with an online platform and started doing ready-to-wear. That means that we were now offering both made-to-measure and ready to wear.”
By the time Marinho left Pan Ocean Oil and Gas, she had decided to focus on the two, since they were both doing well. “But the made-to-measure arm was the one that was very busy. You know there is always a wedding, party and other functions to attend, so aso-ebi was always in vogue. That was also the time they always want to buy from your ready-to-wear collection. So, the online bit of that wasn’t doing too well but in-store, when they come to drop their fabrics, they pick out something else.”
That was how she started managing the two line of business, but around 2012, Marinho noticed that she was having some fertility issues. “Interestingly, the birth of a number of my bag designs came from me looking for a deeper creativity in myself to take away attention from the sadness that I was facing on fertility. I even had a bag dedicated to fertility issues. I nearly passed away in the process. My issue is what they call ectopic pregnancy. You get pregnant but the baby is lodging in the wrong place. You always have to terminate it but the issue is that, if it is not cut in time, it can kill you.”
In her case, pregnancy was growing in the fallopian and the fallopian tube is not a flexible tube; it is stagnant and something growing in there, means that it is going to burst. “That was pretty much my story and it would have burst out of negligence or the unfortunate scenarios people have with Nigerian hospitals. But we thank God; I survived it, surgery and all.”
Marinho survived three Ectopic pregnancies. This, certainly, is a great price to pay for motherhood. “The situation led to both my fallopian tubes being removed. Left to me, I didn’t think I would be able to have children again. A lot was going on with me medically and I couldn’t see myself sitting in a 9am to 5pm job anymore. I noticed that any time I threw myself into what I was passionate about, which at that time was making clothes and later bags, I felt better.”
Moving on to the next phase of her life, Marinho resigned from her job at the oil and gas company. “It was my birthday and we were to travel but I told my husband that since I didn’t have children to go with us, I would just design a handbag for myself. My husband then replied, ‘Do what you need to do but we are going on this holiday.’”
Determined to take her mind away from her sad reality, Marinho sketched a bag design and met this Senegalese guy, who is now late. “He used to make bags and I was put in touch with him. I told him what I had in mind. He showed me so many other designs but I am a very simple and artistic person; I like things that can last a lifetime, not just for fashion sake.”
After working on it, he brought her first bag design to life. “It was a red bag, with black fur on it. When I made it, it was for me. Then we travelled and when we got to the airport, someone asked me about the bag. At that point, I had never thought of introducing bags, but right on the spot, I thought of the business side and asked what colour she would like to have. On that trip, we also went to Turkey and I met another lady, who also liked and wanted the bag. I had to start making up prices and I remember under-pricing myself because I didn’t really know how much people would be willing to pay that point.”
The two ladies stayed in touch and Marinho did bags for them within two weeks. “One ordered for purple and black and the other wanted orange and black. And that was it. So, my going into bags was birthed out of me wanting to do something just for myself; I never thought of it as a business. Along the years, we have been tweaking the designs a little bit. We have also made them way more structured. The first bags were softer bags and then I started falling in love with the structured bags. I realised that they could last longer. The durability factor in it is fantastic. So, I kept growing and when I noticed that they liked my bag, I started designing other bags. I did a variety in 2016 and a friend cautioned me that it was better to focus on one bag first and push it. Once people know about it, then you can start introducing others.”
The energetic lady also talked about some of the things that made the creation of the bags significant to her life and business. “What used to happen was that people copied the designs. You do six or seven bags and people are replicating your designs. One fateful year, it was when my third ectopic happened. It was unarguably one of the most depressing time of my life. I kept wondering why it was a reoccurring thing and I was really down. I didn’t even feel like going back to work and business wasn’t really good.”
Frustration and depression took over and she had to travel to the UK for the surgery and then came back to Nigeria. “At that point, I was alone, didn’t have anyone to talk to apart from my family who were sympathetic, saying ‘Don’t worry, you would have a child someday.’ They just wanted you to toughen up, which was good. But I felt it was time to speak out.”
Marinho went back to the drawing board and that was when she created the bag that gave her the sobriquet, the Talking Drum Lady. “It is the Ola Talking Drum bag, and like the name implies, it is a bag that would make you ask questions. It even drums on the side. That was the majestic part of it. I wanted to create something that is different, something that would make people speak or ask questions. The Talking Drum bag speaks and it comes in different colours, as long as we can get leather in that colour.”
The message it connotes is for women to talk about their lives, especially the areas that they are not comfortable. “That is the inspiration and each time someone wants to buy, I tell them the story behind it. I always want them to carry it with pride. It is for strength and we are not afraid to speak. If I talk about my fertility issue, it should not scare you. It should make you want to connect and see how we can help each other and be there for each other. I would say that the bag opened so many cans of worms and Pandora boxes. From the minute the bag came on the market, all sorts started happening.”
At this point, so many people started contacting her. Then she met the Tanzanian supermodel, Millen Magese on instagram. “Her condition was endometriosis and her stage was so bad. Then it was about both of us looking at our lives and wondering whether we would ever have children. I created a yellow talking drum which I dedicated to her. In 2014, I gifted her the yellow drum bag and that now became the must-have bag because she is a super model.”
With joy in her voice, Marinho announced that “Millen has also given birth to a boy now.”
The bag started doing what Marinho wanted it to do and later on, she went on to do IVF in search of a baby that would call her mummy. “I did it four times; it was the fourth occasion that finally worked. I had travelled abroad the first three times and it didn’t work. It was the fourth one, which I did at Nordica Fertility Clinic in Lagos that finally worked. Since then, I’ve made it a point of duty to always promote them; not because anyone is God, but because they took care and I liked the service I got from them. And of course, the fact that I got pregnant with twins, a boy and a girl.”
Now you can’t mistake the joy and fulfillment in her voice. Her story changed and it was a beautiful turning point in her life. It was also time to consolidate on her business and she put on her thinking cap again. “Once the twins were born, I now wanted to find a more affordable price for the bags. They weren’t cheap. The leather we use is expensive, and the fact that we buy a lot of brands abroad that are actually not leather. Nobody is hitting on the fact that you want to buy an established brands, all well and good. But do not confuse it with leather. Real leather anywhere in the world is not cheap. If you are using the technique we use, no threadwork and the finishing are impeccable. The first ever bag had threadwork by the sides and by the time I started evolving, I limited it to very minimal, sometimes. These were the things that we migrated to and I am glad things turned out this way.”