Our Story

ኢትዮጵያዊነት — wherever we are.

Adulis was the great port of the Aksumite kingdom on the Red Sea, where goods, ideas and people from the Horn of Africa met the rest of the world. Adulis Mercantile takes its name from that crossing point.

We began in the DMV, between two time zones: the one we live in and the one we come from. Every piece is designed around something we carry with us — the +251 country code, the buna ceremony, the tilet border on our mothers' netela, the eyes of the people who raised us.

We design for the diaspora: people who grew up hearing Amharic at home and English everywhere else, who love Addis and Silver Spring in the same breath.

Made to order

Our tees are printed on demand on heavyweight, garment-dyed Comfort Colors 1717 cotton, and our crop tops on American Apparel garment-dyed heavyweight cotton, then shipped directly to you. Nothing is overproduced and nothing sits in a warehouse.

A note on our imagery

Our model photography is AI-generated so we can show every design on Habesha people. The prints shown match the actual designs.