From sawdust
to green rugs.
Building in Chaos: From Sawdust to Green Rugs is the story of Adedayo Amzat's journey from a childhood shaped by scarcity, duty, and the sharp inequalities of Nigeria, to building one of the country's notable financial services groups. It begins in the first Nigeria he knew: sawdust stoves, face-me-I-face-you compounds, rationed meals, crowded classrooms, and the early awareness that opportunity is not evenly distributed.
At ten, Dayo glimpsed another Nigeria: green rugs, video games, full plates, and children who could take comfort for granted. That encounter awakened his ambition and created a lifelong question: how does a child cross from one world into another, and what should he do once he gets there?
The book follows that crossing through schools, NYSC, Access Bank, the founding of Zedcrest, the painful early years of Zedvance, regulatory battles, investment mistakes, personal reckoning, and the long work of turning all that hustle into an institution. It is a story of grit, luck, judgment, failure, recovery, and the emotional cost of becoming the person everyone expects to succeed.
More than a memoir, Building in Chaos is a reflection on Nigeria itself: its disorder, its talent, its invisible class lines, and the bridges that must be built between them. It is a personal story, but also a quiet argument that no country can afford to waste children simply because they were born too far from the bright lights.
Some of the most important bridges in life are built by people who had no reason to build them. This book is one of those bridges.