OBO, the baddest, 001, or Grammy-nominated artist–whatever you know him as, Davido has been the hot topic on everyone’s lips as he recently received three Grammy Nominations including: Global Music Album for his album Timeless, Global Music Performance for his song FEEL, and Best African Music Performance for his viral hit UNAVAILABLE.

I know, I know. It’s only January and we’re only halfway through the month but hear me out…

You know that breath of fresh air that comes with the new year. That wow-I-think-I-can-actually-do-this-life-thing feeling. Yeah, that’s where I’m at right now, and I think it may have something to do with the Afrobeats bangers that I’ve been blasting on non-stop repeat in the past week.

Creps, boogs, trainers, kicks, soles, sneakers—whatever you want to call them, Black women love and wear them, too. Originally an American phenomenon, sneakerhead culture has spread across the world since its emergence in the 1980s. The success of the culture can specifically be attributed to American hip-hop and basketball; from Run DMC and their song “My Adidas” catapulting the popularity of Adidas Superstars to Mr. Jumpman himself, Michael Jordan taking it to new levels with his Jordan x Nike collab, sneaker culture has left a colossal jumping man imprint on not only popular culture but the entire world. 

Unless you’ve been under a rock, I’m pretty sure that at some point in the past 2-3 years you have definitely heard something about the Windrush Scandal. Even though I’ve heard many stories about the victims, I had never really seen their real-life experiences portrayed in extensive detail on screen. That was until the launch night of Create Jobs: Meet a Mentor Round Eight when we were given the privilege to view and discuss the incredible BBC drama ‘Sitting in Limbo’ with its writer Stephen S Thompson.

Meet the four boys from a small town named Glossop who are shaking up the music industry. Forming a group called Larkins, the alternative/indie group have already sold out shows in Manchester’s Albert Hall without even releasing a full album yet!

To be honest, I have been lost for words over the past couple of days. My emotions have been all over the place. I have felt sad, empowered, angry and frustrated and that’s just within the past hour. The pain I have felt is indescribable, watching all the videos and reading all the posts about black people being MURDERED by those who are SUPPOSED TO protect them. The complex mixture of feeling enraged yet empowered has been so difficult to navigate during the past couple of days. I have been trying to find the best way to express myself and my feelings towards everything that’s happening right now and it wasn’t until I re-visited one of my favourite quotes that I realised what I was trying to say.

Inhale… Exhale… You know that millisecond of peace and clarity that you feel once you finally exhale and let go of the tension that has been eating away at your shoulders? That’s the same feeling of peace and lucidity that Swedish rising-star Nápoles leaves us with whilst taking in her latest single, Circulate.

As a young woman living in London, it can be quite difficult to exist. Let alone, as a young woman who is trying to navigate the crazy world that is also known as the “creative industry”. Getting that foot in the door can be difficult enough, so having to break through those barriers whilst simultaneously trying to break through the barriers faced when gender, race, class, and sexuality are brought into play is a crazy task that takes resilience, strength, patience and dedication.

On the brink of shutting down their company, the universe threw them a life jack of $250,000! Based on this viral twitter thread, CEO Darren shows us that resilience is key when it comes to fundraising.

Meet Carmen Bocanegra, a first-generation, Peruvian-American Senior UX Designer. In this interview, Carmen talks about her journey, explains why UX is so much more about the people than it is about the technology, how using twitter helped her career, and why working in UX can mean so many different things.

At 10, she was coding. Now, at 19 Betelhem Dessie has been dubbed “the youngest pioneer in Ethiopia’s fast emerging tech scene” by CNN. Working at Ethiopia’s first Artificial Intelligence Lab [iCog], she was involved in the development of the world-famous Sophia the robot.

Five entrepreneurs. One mission; building a business with ‘community’ in the centre. If there is one lesson that can be taken away from the stories of these five founders, it is that a community first approach can be the key to success for a ‘start-up’.

On “Being Black, Going Crazy?” it was revealed that as a young black male you are 17 times more likely to be diagnosed with a serious mental health issue. As black people we are also 6 times more likely to be an inpatient or sectioned in a mental health hospital. In fact, 56% of black inpatients in mental health hospitals have been sectioned! Now I am not naïve to the fact that the colour of our skin may affect the way we are treated by the police, at work and within education. But to find out that it may affect the treatment I receive in healthcare, scares me!

Just when you think America has made a huge amount of progress, the clasp of it’s giant hands drags you back in time. If I’m being completely honest with you, I feel as though I was one of the naïve individuals who actually believed America had completely changed because they had just elected their first Black President! (Shout out to Obama). How wrong was I ?

My first piece is one which I created a while back when the outbreak of Ebola tore West Africa apart. The outbreak hit very close to home as one of the countries that became most affected by the outbreak was Sierra Leone.