Lucid Lemons, Lemon Curd – Do these mean anything to you? Well if you’re a creative living in Nigeria, most especially Lagos and these names don’t ring a bell, then you must be sleeping on a bicycle.
After seeing many wet days in Lagos, it seemed Mother Nature herself was in support of this interview as she beckoned the sun to come out of hiding, so even he could bear witness to what was being said in the dingy room where this interview took place. A first glance at Tomisin Akinwunmi, with her slender frame and glasses, clad in a top and jeans, one might easily dismiss her as just some unassuming young girl, but Tomisin Akinwumi, the brain behind Lucid Lemons and an entrepreneur is definitely much more than what’s on the surface. As she sat with me to discuss a whole range of topics –entrepreneurship, feminism, women empowerment, and a whole lot of other things in between. She also dished out some wise words for entrepreneurs, including telling them to ‘stay away from twitter’. Describing her as a superwoman would be apt as this twenty-one-year-old juggles schooling, event planning, graphic designing and very soon to come, film editing. From sharing her plans for the future with me, it’s evident that this power woman is definitely here to stay and has only just started her journey.
Have you faced any form of discrimination based on your gender as an entrepreneur?
Tomisin Akins: Well, yeah. First of all, people always tend to think that I’m a guy. I don’t know if it’s because my name is unisex, or maybe they just kind of assume that I’m a guy because on my twitter bio, it states ‘founder’. That ‘founder’ already makes them think that I’m a guy.
What inspires you to keep pushing forward in spite of all the odds or challenges that come your way?
Tomisin Akins: I just know that what I’m doing is for a greater purpose. I’m not doing it because it’s fun or anything. I could be doing so many other things with my money, my time, my life, but I know that what we are doing at Lucid Lemons is for a greater purpose. We are trying to empower a generation that needs to be empowered in order for the current system to be abolished. That’s how I see it. That’s the whole idea of what we do.
You see content from creatives every day. Creatives that are inventing and reinventing the culture. Would you say that what is being produced can be termed as world-class or do you think we still have a long way to go?
Tomisin Akins: I think there are some bits that are. I wouldn’t say ‘world-class’ but, they are unique to us. I really don’t know how to decide if something is world-class or not. I’m not the best person to judge that. There are things to me, that I’ve seen in Nigeria that are better than the stuff I’ve seen coming out of the UK. Everyone has their own element that makes it unique to them, but most that I like or enjoy are in terms of poetry, music, writing, spoken word, etc. There is always something to me that is unique to the artist or writer or whatever. I would rather go and see that than see something that imitates.
What advice would you give to a growing entrepreneur?
Tomisin Akins: People will come for you. People will try to swindle you, they will try to derail you from achieving your goals. You have to, first of all, keep going back to the things that are your initial goals. For example, at Lucid Lemons; for every month, we have our goals, so we know what we plan to achieve. But sometimes during the course of events, you might just find yourself on a completely different thing and you ask yourself, what am I even doing? It’s probably because people have made you lose focus, or you’ve made yourself lose focus. Also, talk to people not just everybody but find mentors. It’s so important to have people that you can ask questions. I mean, when planning Lemon Curd, the people that I spoke to had done events over and over again. These are people who have done major events and they really guided me. Just by taking their advice, I allowed myself to get past certain hurdles. But like I keep saying, don’t forget your own goals because their goals might not be yours. Some of these big companies just want to make money from young people. My goal is not to make money from young people, my goal is to push young people. So, even though I want to charge a certain amount for doing something, it’s still not money-driven. I might say to you, you know what, just pay this small percent and I’ll cover the rest. Have your goals. For me, that’s the most important thing.
I am a whole different entity from my brand. My brand consists of twenty two other like-minded human beings who have joined together to come up with ideas that make Lucid Lemons what it is. So, I don’t do things as Tomisin.
What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned so far?
Tomisin Akins: Don’t yarn on Twitter (laughs). That’s the biggest lesson I’ve learned. Don’t be yarning about what you want to do or have done. Don’t be yarning when someone upsets you or even when you’re happy. Somebody on twitter would always be a hater or try to make you feel bad or they would praise you, wash you –even when you’re fucking up. Like Twitter is a bad place. Don’t go there. There are people that actually want to see your downfall.
Also, don’t go on Twitter when you’re sad or angry cause you would chat stuff and people would come for you. Testimony (points at herself). So as an entrepreneur, just retweet and like and be going your way.
Would you say that as a female you have had to work twice as hard to prove that you actually earned your achievements?
Tomisin Akins: At this stage in my life? Not really; because Lucid Lemons is Lucid Lemons, It is not Tomisin Akinwunmi, there is no gender per se, behind Lucid Lemons. I am a whole different entity from my brand. My brand consists of twenty-two other like-minded human beings who have joined together to come up with ideas that make Lucid Lemons what it is. So, I don’t do things as Tomisin. For instance, if I sign an email off, I sign it as ‘Regards, Lucid Lemons Team.’ Same goes for anyone in my team. We don’t sign as our individual names. We don’t want there to be an opportunity for discrimination or anything like that. So I haven’t really faced any setbacks because I’m a girl and it hasn’t really made me work ‘twice as hard‘, maybe it’s made me work like a little bit more than most guys, because as a female talking to all these people in person, and they are wondering, what exactly is this girl saying? So, I know for a fact that my words don’t mean much to them. Some people would make me talk to them about my idea and they either just stare at me or my boobs, and that’s all they see, this physical me. I have to ensure that whatever I do at the end of the day, shows them that I am more than just this girl that they are looking at. But there’s definitely a difference between older generation men and older generation women. The men are like this small girl and they just patronize you and be like ‘Oya talk finish and go‘ The women, on the other hand, would be like ‘see this small girl, after I’ve come this far, you too, you want to come and compete‘. There’s so much I don’t know, and sometimes, Nigerian behavior is weird to me. So, I wouldn’t say I’ve worked twice as hard, maybe I’ve just pushed a little bit more, but I definitely do not see it as working twice as hard. For me, I’m still just starting out. It’s been four years but I’m still just starting out.
What are your plans for the future? Can we expect a Lemon Curd 3.0?
Tomisin Akins: Well, I’m trying to do more frequent shows in order to get more upcoming artists out there, to get proper managerial companies to come and watch these artists, but like in smaller groups. Instead of having like a long-ass Lemon Curd list, it becomes something you aspire to be on. This year we had the ‘Waves‘ and then we had the big performances. The ‘Waves‘ would be broken down into smaller shows that I plan on doing throughout the year and your aspiration, really is to be on the Lemon Curd list because we are also going to have big artists on that list and that would be the thing that would make you aspire to be on the Lemon Curd show, after going through the waves and all that.
We are definitely having a Lemon Curd 3.0. This is going to be an annual thing. I’m also trying to incorporate a lot more other things for other people. I am very passionate about supporting the youth, supporting the youth doesn’t just mean the musicians, it means the writers, sound engineers, etc. So, I’m looking at doing workshops for young people to get involved in so they can understand finance, understand the different areas pertaining to what they do. We want to do a Master Class on sound engineering, writing, and also give like once in a month or a couple of days a week that people get to basically come out and learn but not learn from like my aunty. Like, learn from someone younger, with fresher ideas but slightly older than these young people. Someone slightly advanced that can teach me, but who I can also relate to.
What inspired you to start Lucid Lemons?
Tomisin Akins: So when I was in A-level school, I started running a website, with two other friends of mine, that was very similar to Lucid Lemons. It was a platform where you could share your creative writing and other things, then I realized looking around me that many of my friends weren’t in a position as good as I was, because I left high school to go to a performing arts school because I wasn’t very good in maths and stuff like that. So my parents were able to give me that opportunity that I could go to the university and study whatever I wanted to study. Even though we did have the issue of them wanting me to study law, they eventually allowed me to study what I wanted which is Product Design. A lot of my friends were forced into doing Law or Medicine or Engineering that kind of thing, when really they wanted to be DJs or do Poetry which is all well and good, but they didn’t have anywhere they could share or even put up their work. That’s what actually inspired me to go on and do my own, I went and set up Lucid Lemons and I got my friend to send me her mixes from her DJing, my friends who wrote to send their works to me and helped them post it, that’s how it started. It just started as an outlet for my friends, then other people started sending me their stuff to post for them and I’m like ‘oh, okay, alright. This is something.’ and it just became bigger and bigger. I actually didn’t foresee Lucid Lemons growing to this point, like I had no idea. I mean, we only came properly online two years ago.
Yes I would, I mean I know that whenever someone talks about feminism, there’s always this ‘oh you want to bash men or whatever’. I’m a big fan fan of men (laughs) I just believe in empowering women. I believe that women should have the same rights as men.
Tell me about graphic design?
Tomisin Akins: I study Product Design and I went to a performing arts school and was more into the Fine Arts section when I was there. Till now, I don’t know when exactly I started doing Photoshop like I have no recollection whatsoever. But Photoshop was just like second nature to me and I made the flyers and graphics for Lucid Lemons. Well, not all of them, I have a few graphic designers on my team. Sometimes I just give them the work to do also. Then my friends also started asking me to do the cover art for their songs and mixes, and I kind of enjoy doing it. I’m also starting to go into film editing, yeah, so watch out for that. It’s a new thing.
We will definitely be looking forward to that. As a woman who is pushing boundaries and challenging society’s definition of the ‘role of a woman’ would you describe yourself as a feminist?
Tomisin Akins: Yes I would, I mean I know that whenever someone talks about feminism, there’s always this ‘oh you want to bash men or whatever’. I’m a big fan of men (laughs) I just believe in empowering women. I believe that women should have the same rights as men. I mean, I want equality in certain places but not in the sense of a man taking months off work because a woman would do so as pregnancy allows –like is the man carrying a baby also? So, the feminism that I support is one that empowers women. I just want women to be seen as the human beings that they are, legit that’s all I want. Men are cool but not as cool as women, obviously (chuckles). Men have things that they are physically able to do and so do women. We have to be fair to each other and realize that a man can’t do all of this and a woman can’t do all of this either.
60% of out of school children in Nigeria are girls. Can you say event planning can be used as a tool for empowering women –educated or not?
Tomisin Akins: I’m gonna tell you something. After the third Lemon Curd, this one that’s coming up, I don’t want to plan an event again. I would rather just hire someone to do it because the things I’ve learned since Radr to this last Lemon Curd, my knowledge on how to plan an event has literally gone from absolute nothing to at least I can host a show without thinking too much as I know exactly what to do. Event planning teaches you to be orderly, how to plan properly, how to think about back up –something that I am so bad at, how to make sure that in your mind you have a structure. It helps you with organization, helps you with marketing, business, haggling, etcetera. It helps you with every single thing, event planning is definitely something that can be used to empower women. But I can’t lie, I don’t ever want to do it in my life again. Like seriously, I have so much respect for event planners now because on the outside it looks so easy and seamless but it isn’t. Like while planning the last Lemon Curd, I passed out three times in three different places out of not eating and just stress. I was just working continuously and I would forget so many things.
Have your parents supported you so far?
Tomisin Akins: My parents have supported me O. Like I mean initially, they didn’t cause like I’m the kind of child that is very quick to do something then fall out of it. I usually had a lot of ideas when I was younger and then I would do like halfway, and be like nahh abeg and just give up. My parents were always like this babe is not serious, when it came to Lucid Lemons, they saw what I went through with the people I had worked with in the past and how I had to leave because their values didn’t coincide with mine. I had put in a lot of time into it, my A-level grades and it didn’t work out at the end of the day, that really upset me. I started doing Lucid Lemons, it took a while for me to get my head out of the whole ‘I can’t do it again, these people have ruined me forever blah blah blah and all that’. Once I managed to get out of that my parents were just watching me at first, they didn’t want to put in a lot just for me not to follow through with it again. But once they saw the first event, they realized that this was actually for real and they started supporting me. Like right now they are like my biggest supporters. My dad is my best friend. That’s my guy.
Who are your role models?
Tomisin Akins: My role models are myself and I. I inspire myself. Every day I wake up, I see myself and I’m like damn. But yeah, my mum and my aunty, I’ve seen the two of them go through shit, come out of that shit, still go through shit again and still stay strong. I don’t really have role models in people that I’ve seen that are famous. I literally look up to my mum, my aunty and myself.
