iameriwa

Privacy is paramount

Don’t let the pressure of social media distract you from the reason you’re here: to fulfil your purpose.

Yes, celebrate your wins, and ask for support when you need it. But don’t feel obligated to turn your life into a performance. Not everything deserves an audience, and not everybody wishes you well.

My prayer is that we learn to move when the Spirit leads, not when people expect us to.

May God teach us when to speak, when to be silent, and when to simply let Him work.

Author & Narrator: @eriwa_

Model: @eleeonoore.b

Hair: @wetshi_

Custom Dress: @rachelmayz_

Sisterhood

Not every life-changing relationship is romantic.

Some people arrive with flowers.

Others arrive with a recommendation.

A listening ear

Plane ticket,

Prayer, or perfect timing.

May we all find people who pour into us as much as we pour into them.

Amin Ase

Words & Narration: @iameriwa

Image Courtesy Of: @neitehofficial

Forget what J.Lo says

If you live in New York, love New York, complain about New York and still choose it every morning, you’re a New Yorker.

Today, the city woke up on top.

Championship celebrations.

Parade routes.

Car horns before breakfast.

A million strangers talking like old friends.

For a moment, the city speaks with one voice.

A land of immigrants.

Different languages.

Different flavours.

Different faiths.

Different stories.

One city.

Not built by billionaires, but by the people who keep it moving.

The deli owners opening before sunrise.

The bus operators and subway drivers carrying millions across boroughs.

The cleaners, nurses, street vendors and security guards.

The people making very little stretch a very long way.

The hustlers.

The dreamers.

The baddies.

The artists.

The workers.

The ones refusing to quit.

Because if you can survive the concrete jungle, you can survive anywhere.

And to the Black women who raised those basketball kings:

The mothers, aunties and grandmothers who stretched pay cheques, worked double shifts, prayed hard and showed up anyway.

We salute you.

New York is loud, chaotic, expensive and relentless.

Yet every day, people cross oceans chasing a chance to build a life here.

Today, the city reminds the world exactly why.

Salute to every New Yorker.

This one’s for you🗽🏀🏆

Photography: @visualsbyk

Model: @d0llaz

Fashion: @shopoyemwen

Nails: @poca.thefullspecialist

Love from London

People literally risk their lives to make it here. They leave behind family, familiarity and everything they’ve ever known in search of opportunity. I don’t take that privilege for granted.

My mum arrived in London from Nigeria at 19. By 23, she had me. At that same age, I launched my first business, COCOABELLA®.

Like so many immigrants, she worked, studied and sacrificed so her children could have choices she didn’t.

I’m one of those choices.

So yes, London has its problems. Every city does.

But omo, put some respect on its name.

This city has opened doors for generations of immigrants and their descendants, including me.

And if you care about London, help fix the problems.

Don’t just moan and complain about them.

Model: Eirinie Hamil

Make-up: Alison Cameron

Photography: Antonina Dolaniecka

Smell the Roses

In the words of the hoteps, “Grand rising, Queen.” 😂

On a serious note, I was inspired to write this piece during my morning walk while stopping to photograph nature, one of God’s greatest gifts to us.

It reminded me how precious it is to wake up, step outside, breathe fresh air and experience a brand new day. So much of life is spent chasing the next thing that we forget the miracle of simply being here.

Model: @adesewwa

Speak to yourself nicely

Sis, remember to love yourself deeply

To adore your melanin

In every light

In every shade

You are art in motion

Love your ‘flaws’

Love the parts they told you to hide

Love the curves God placed on you

The way your body bends and shapes

was never by accident

Appreciate the craftsmanship

God’s hand on you is no small thing

You are a masterpiece

Self-love will always be the highest form of love

Speak life over yourself

Speak greatness into your mornings

Remind yourself that happiness belongs to you

It’s not something you have to chase

It’s already yours to claim

And when the days get heavy

When sadness wraps itself around you

Don’t give up on you

Hold on

Breathe through it

Life will get better

Peace will find you

God will never leave you behind

You are blessed

You are highly favoured

Walk with your head high

Move with grace

Guard your mind

Let light and love be your loudest thoughts

You are BeYoutiful

In every way

On every day

Amin Ase

Author @eriwa_

Model @amarairoms

Adìrẹ (Ah-dee-reh)

Adìrẹ is memory soaked in indigo.

Our grandmothers speaking through wax, thread and stained fingertips.

A language folded into fabric before some of us even had names.

Every pattern carries meaning:

Protection

Warning

Love

Fertility

Grief

The quiet pride of women who survived more than history remembers.

Even now, the cloth still speaks.

Across Lagos heat.

Across market stalls.

Across daughters trying to find themselves inside inherited softness and inherited pain.

Adire does not beg to be understood.

It simply remembers us.

Long may it continue to reign supreme

Ase

Poetry @eriwa_

Creative Direction: @thestyleinfidel for @ecobank_nigeria

Photography: @adebayophotographer

Models: @rahmandamilola @moyosooreolagunju @lauretta_nnamani

Hair: @nifemilarj

She Survived

Her face does not apologise

for what survived.

Not the marks.

Not the texture.

Not the evidence.

Because some women carry pain so long

it stops looking like suffering

& starts looking like skin.

There are griefs the mouth cannot explain.

Humiliations folded quietly into girlhood.

The kind that teach women

to make themselves smaller, softer, easier to swallow.

But the body remembers.

Oh, the body remembers.

Every abandonment.

Every silence after “I love you.”

Every prayer whispered whilst bleeding internally.

Every performance of strength

when collapse would have made more sense.

Still

she remained.

Not untouched.

Not unscarred.

Not innocent in the fairytale sense.

But alive.

And sometimes that is the miracle nobody claps for.

So if you are reading this

carrying the kind of pain

you cannot post plainly online,

please know this …

Your softness did not make you weak.

Your survival did not make you ugly.

& the parts of you shaped by suffering

are still worthy of tenderness.

Amin Ase

Poetry: @iameriwa

Model: @mahogany.amour

Lighting: @orensiddo

Makeup: @tiffanytheeartist

Never Give Up

Remember who you were before this world tried to convince you otherwise. You were not created to live in fear, shrink yourself, or spend your life doubting what God already spoke over you. Some of you are tired… Disappointed… Quietly carrying battles nobody knows about…

Still… you are chosen!

So silence the noise. Release the shame. Cast your doubt into the sea & leave it there.

What is meant for you will not miss you. What God has written over your life cannot be cancelled by confusion, delay, heartbreak or fear. Greatness is not something you chase. It is something you grow into. (Amen Ase)

Black Women’s Glow

We rise in rhythm with the ancestors’ hum, From Lagos to London, our stories drum. Sisters, remember: you are the sun and the source, Your journey is yours, walk it with force.

Lift one another, in joy or in fight, We are the dawn, we are the night. In every reflection, choose yourself first… Care is a revolution, and love is our thirst.

Across oceans, across time, we bloom… Black women, forever, let’s own every room. So we stand, hands clasped, hearts aligned… May we be guided by grace, by the divine.

Amin Ase

This Year

I’m not asking this year to be louder. Or faster, more impressive than the last. I’m asking it to be clearer.

I want to move without the constant need to prove that I’m doing enough, becoming enough, arriving on time.

God is not in a hurry. So maybe I don’t have to be either.

Clarity doesn’t always arrive as answers. Sometimes it comes as permission to stop pushing.

To trust that what is meant for me is already being shaped beyond my effort.

I want to pay attention this year. To the quiet nudges. To the unease that isn’t fear, but discernment. To the moments where peace settles even when nothing is resolved.

I want to choose depth over noise. Faith over performance.

Obedience over urgency. One step at a time, even when the step feels small. Especially then.

God has never failed me in the unfolding. I don’t believe He will start now. Amin Ase

The Architect of Night

Not pigment, but the Creator's deep decree

Midnight, dense with star-ash and grace.

Where the Lord’s hands embraced,

Velvet that sips the light, then gives it back.

The burnish of Nile-wet mahogany,

Indigo from the Genesis well.

Each pore, a singular orbit,

Stamped by the Divine Will.

I am the Architect's initial, bold sketch;

A chroma making pallor a flimsy scrim.

This dense weight—the unblinking truth

of the world’s First Grace.

Brilliant singularity, defined by fire,

The pigment that is the cracking glory of His dawn.

Beautiful melanated power

Amin Ase ❤️🙏🏿

Poetry by @iameriwa

Black Women’s Hair

Our hair is more than hair. It’s history, it’s beauty, it’s strength.

Braids aren’t just a style, they’re protection, patience, and love.

Every parting, every plait, is a story passed down, a prayer woven in.

I think of all the hours spent, sitting on the floor, laughing, talking, bonding… those moments braid us together too.

Our hair bends but it doesn’t break. It shrinks yet holds so much fullness.

It resists, it protects, and it shines the brightest when it’s simply allowed to be.

This crown is our heritage, Our armour, our art. It’s me, it’s you, it’s us!

Amen

Hello Summer

Two butterflies danced across my path

this morning …

no noise,

no rush,

just grace.

And I stopped.

Because sometimes

God’s creation whispers

instead of roars,

and if you’re too busy,

you’ll miss the miracle.

It’s the simple things …

soft wings,

a slow breeze,

a second of stillness

that carry the most meaning.

Life is short

and more fragile than we admit.

So don’t wait for the big moments

to feel alive.

Let your joy live

in the unnoticed,

the ordinary,

the now.

Be blessed

Amen.

Poetry @iameriwa

Model - Mary Sekye 

Photographer @emilynnrose 

Metamorphosis

Imagine waking up and deciding not to hide your true identity, feelings, and beliefs anymore.

Taking the time to explore all the possibilities of what your life could be without wearing a mask.

Freeing up your mind from the distractions, stress and fear that you have been experiencing for far longer than necessary.

Well today is that day Sis!

Be encouraged, get ready for a big change,

A departure from what you’ve become accustomed to.

Just know that Ọlọrun, Olódùmarè [The ruler of Heaven and earth, our Supreme God] has an abundance of blessings in store for you.

(Amin Ase)

Embrace your new self, your new path, and believe that your future will bring you closer to your divine purpose, and that your biggest dreams will finally become fulfilled.

Stop holding yourself back, worried that you might fail, because you’re about to fly 🦋

Author @iameriwa

The Battle Is The Lord’s

There is no pain Jesus can't feel

No hurt He cannot heal

All things work according to His perfect will

No matter what you're going through

Remember God is using You

For the battle is not yours, it's the Lord's

There's no sadness Jesus can't feel

And there is no sorrow that He cannot heal

For all things work according to the Master's holy will

No matter what you're going through

Remember that God is only using you

For this battle is not yours, it's the Lord's

No matter what it is, you're going through

Hold your head up, stick your chest out

And remember He's using you

For this battle is not yours alone

This battle is not yours, no

You cannot handle it all by yourself, no, no, no, no, no, no

This battle is not yours, the Lord is the only one who can fight it

He wants to use you as His vessel so be open to Him

This battle is not yours, it's the Lord's

Remember that in the midst of it all

God only wants to use you

Hold your head up, stick your chest out

And remember He's using you

For this battle is not yours alone

This battle is not yours, it's the Lord's

(Amen Ase) ❤️🙏🏾

Lyrics by @yolandaadams

Photography by @rebecca_ii

𝘙𝘰𝘸𝘦, 𝘙𝘦𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘤𝘢. 𝘏𝘢𝘪𝘳 𝘞𝘦 𝘎𝘰. 2021

Featured:

Model 1: @saussogod

Model 2: @aalyiah_heath

Model 3: @chloe_etnn

Hairstylist: @lushbraidsbyb

Makeup artist: @claraldsmakeup