BARCELONA, Dec 11 (Reuters) – In a sunlit Barcelona studio, models pose in garments stitched and screen-printed by migrants who once played cat-and-mouse with police to sell counterfeit goods on the Spanish city’s streets.
Behind the scenes, a dozen workers at Top Manta – a cooperative of former street vendors – cut, stitch and print a 10-piece upcycled capsule collection designed by local creative Tania Marcial.
Sign up here.
Senegalese tailor Djibi Gabigag, 28, arrived in Barcelona as an undocumented migrant and initially survived by selling goods from the sidewalk. Joining Top Manta gave him purpose, he said.
“Before, I didn’t have a degree or studies. I was always selling,” he said.
Item 1 of 5 Former street vendor and tailor immigrants sew clothes to sell their collections in a Top Manta shop in Barcelona’s Raval district, Spain December 5, 2025. “Top Manta” is the name given to street vendors in Spain, where mantas (blankets) are used to display goods. REUTERS/Nacho Doce
Lamine Sarr and Aziz Faye migrated from Senegal to the Canary Islands in 2006 and also worked as street hawkers. They founded Top Manta with its origins in a street vendors’ union set up after a migrant hawker died in a 2015 police raid.
The pair say they have now helped more than 200 people leave street vending and apply for formal residency in Spain.
Top Manta’s work contracts offer a foothold in formal life. Its garments are stitched with slogans such as “Migration is not a crime” and “Legal clothing, illegal people”.
In the studio, a beaming Gabigag posed in his own creation. “When I wear Top Manta I feel good, normal, cool, happy. It’s a brand like any other,” he said.
Reporting by Horaci Garcia, Writing by Jesus Calero; Editing by Aislinn Laing and Ros Russell
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
