00:00My name is Rita Bonetal and I make...
00:06Hi, I'm Jess. I'm an editor at Refinery29.
00:08At RT9, we really love talking to female entrepreneurs,
00:11but we also know that the real world can get in the way.
00:13Today, we're meeting Rita Bonetal.
00:15She's the founder of Malaika Apparel.
00:16By day, she works in marketing on Long Island,
00:18and at night, she's working out of her basement apartment in Brooklyn.
00:22So we're gonna go check out her workspace.
00:23Come on.
00:27Hi!
00:28Hi, nice to meet you.
00:30This is my workplace.
00:31I'm gonna show you around a little bit and get you familiar.
00:33Alright, let's get started.
00:34Awesome.
00:35This is my desk area.
00:37This is where a lot of the office stuff,
00:40the processing of the orders, the writing down, the planning,
00:43all of that takes place.
00:44The boring stuff, but actually really annoying stuff that has to get done.
00:48It needs to get done.
00:50My name is Rita Bonetal.
00:51I am the CEO and founder of Malaika Apparel.
00:53I was born in Dallas, Texas, and then moved to Ghana when I was 14.
00:57I did not want to go literally because of what I saw on TV about Africans, Africa,
01:03just general stereotypes.
01:05And so when I moved to Ghana, obviously a lot of the stereotypes were shattered.
01:09And when I came back to the U.S., I found myself to be pretty frustrated with the ways
01:14in which people, my colleagues, my professors spoke about Africa.
01:17And I knew that there was something that I needed to do.
01:21So tell me about what's going on here.
01:22So this is sort of my wall of she did that.
01:26The work that I did in college can't be forgotten.
01:29The work that I do outside of college also can't be forgotten.
01:31So I think this is just something that keeps me definitely going.
01:35For me, I'm brainstorming, I'm brain dumping.
01:38I kind of like to have that here when I turn around, like when I'm thinking,
01:42like when I see something, I sort of write it down.
01:44I grab a sticky note from there and I paste it on here.
01:47I'm going to work.
01:48I'm getting up like 7, leaving the house around 7.30, catch the train, pretty much work.
01:54Come back.
01:55I get back home on a good day, 6.30, 7.
01:58After I get back from work, I see what I need to print, see what needs to get done.
02:01And then on a good day, I would like to end at like midnight so that I can get a
02:06good few hours of sleep.
02:07It varies week to week.
02:09Sometimes I don't get a weekend, but honestly, that's fine if I'm pushing it towards my dream.
02:15Move on to actually look at the designs.
02:18Absolutely.
02:19Here we have multiple designs.
02:22Each of them have their own meanings.
02:24This is the baby.
02:25This was born first.
02:27Black gold.
02:28The reason why this is gold, Ghana, where my mom is from, part of the origin of this brand, was
02:35formerly known as the Gold Coast.
02:36And the fist of solidarity, of course, which is definitely known as just a symbol of solidarity.
02:42So that's what this is.
02:43And so this pride edition is for our LGBT folks, our trans folks that want to wear their pride on
02:50their chest.
02:50So this is Strange Fruit.
02:52Strange Fruit, and I'm also wearing multiple different iterations of it.
02:56But this design is an ode to Nina Simone.
02:58Nina Simone was an activist in her own right, a musician and icon.
03:02Someone I look up to for all the work that she really did.
03:07This was created after the Charleston massacre.
03:11So for me, this was sort of a way to sort of really show how I feel.
03:15Like Black pain matters.
03:16You know, you got to talk about Black pain.
03:17You got to talk about Black voices.
03:18And honestly, like every single one of these items here is a form of protest.
03:23It's a form of telling your story, telling a story.
03:26And you're willing to put yourself on the line to tell that story, to repeat that story and to tell
03:31it so that it lives forever.
03:32Literally, there are moments, like once every three weeks, that I really was like, oh, do I want to do
03:40this?
03:41But honestly, literally, my teammates, they really tell me, Rita, you need to keep doing this.
03:47And they remind me literally why I need to keep doing this.
03:50And I need that.
03:55I need that.
03:56All right.
03:56So let's see how these are made.
03:58All right.
03:59So this is the heat press.
04:01I'm very careful because this top plate is 350 degrees and I'm not trying to burn myself.
04:07So this is the plain transfer that I have of the fist.
04:11So I just press it.
04:14Ah, and then I'll just wipe it down real quick so that the transfer gets on there.
04:19And then I peel this off literally like carefully, but like pretty quickly when it's warm.
04:26I usually cut them into little rectangles.
04:29So after that, I make sure it covers all the design.
04:33You're here for a few minutes, a few hours.
04:35Yeah.
04:36Yeah.
04:36When there's huge orders, got to get them out.
04:39So like three hours at a time.
04:40Oh.
04:41Yeah.
04:42And then she tells you that she's done.
04:44So when I'm wiping it down, you can kind of see the imprint.
04:51So once that happens, then you reveal literally a fresh Malaika apparel design.
04:58When you got music playing, when you got like everyone here, it becomes a fun, like a real bonding activity.
05:04And you kind of forget that like it's work, but like it's meaningful work.
05:08Yeah.
05:09Before I started, I thought this was going to be a lot cheaper.
05:11I thought this was going to be easier.
05:13I thought, you know, this was going to be a lot more easier than what it is.
05:18Right now I'm learning that it's very, very expensive and that you need to plan.
05:23So over here, a lot of content is made.
05:27So we like to have impromptu photo shoots or more planned out photo shoots.
05:31Different backgrounds, switch it out and sort of take this, quickly edit it on the computer and then upload it
05:37onto the website.
05:38Here is our packaging area.
05:41We have boxes.
05:43And then sometimes we throw in a little bit of crinkle paper, black and gold, of course, to keep them
05:48with a bean.
05:50My name is Rita Bonatal and I make statements.
05:53I make clothing for the diaspora.
05:55I make us loud and proud.
05:58I make Malaika apparel.
