Welcome to The Vault, a series from MUNDIAL where we celebrate the artefacts, objects, iconic global products, and little bits of tat that make football history fizz with wonder. It could be anything from Predators to Kings, an exceptionally rare Inter Milan kit from the 80s or a football stamp from Guinea-Bissau. Balls, film posters, statues, fan memorabilia, bootleg shirts—anything that we think should be cherished.
Each week, we’ll interview someone connected to an object that we believe deserves to go into The Vault: forever enshrined and immortalised in an archive of joy. When we saw the launch of Jefferson Osei’s new Ghana shirts last Friday, we knew we had to speak to him. As co-founder of Daily Paper, his work has fused fashion, shared African heritage, and a deep love of football for more than a decade. It’s work we loved so much that we collaborated on a kit together ahead of the Euros last summer. Here he is talking about the Black Stars, Adinkra symbols, and uniting the tribes of his homeland through design. Enjoy.
“The kit designs are heavily influenced and inspired by conversations with the players of the Black Stars, my family, the local people, and the current political climate—highlighting their desire to see a unified Ghana. The Ghana Black Stars have been underperforming, and the love for the team and what it represents for Ghanaians globally started to fade away over the years since the 2010 World Cup quarterfinal success. Simultaneously, the country's unity within and outside the team faded as well due to unresolved cultural tribalism debates and generalising discussions. And therefore my ultimate goal was to connect people from all Ghanaian ethnic tribes domestically and in the diaspora, to bring back the love and unite the tribes as one.