Wetalu Henry is Nimíipuu (Nez Perce) and Warm Springs Paiute.
She is an accomplished business owner and artist of many forms—a cultural keeper, seamstress, beadworker, basketweaver, educated scholar, graphic artist, dance teacher, and mother of 2. She descends from the Nimíipuu of the Chief Joseph Band.
In October 2020, Wetalu certified her talents and skills by founding her online business called ‘Nchi.wana X Lulu Henry, an ecommerce business focusing on fostering cultural resilience through purpose and beauty. Not to mention, she actively integrates traditional arts and dance as a cultural instructor teaching adults and youth basic skills and practices of both traditional and contemporary elements of the Plateau tribes.
Wetalu was given the name, ‘alíwtalaliktnacan’ which means ‘Winter Sunset’. It is her honor to carry this name passed down to her from her Qaaca (maternal Grandma) the late Priscilla Pinkham—a true steward of the people and the matriarch of her young adolescences. There are many reasons why Wetalu first started learning how to preserve her traditional practices and why she continues today—as a child, these practices were expectations upheld by those before her and today it’s transpired into therapeutic healing for she and her children. Some of her most inspirational and loving memories as a child are from her watching her namesake make items consumed not only by beauty but with utilitarian function. Wetalu’s mother, and grandmothers, and great grandmothers all carried these teachings as stewards and were creative geniuses in basket weaving, beadworking, seamstressing, and storytelling.