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Meet Josepha: weaver, mother, entrepreneur, and one of our newest artisan partners in Rwanda! Josepha is the amazing talent behind several woven items on our line, including our mini raffia tassel peace baskets, back-to-basics peace basket collection, and more. Before partnering with Indego, Josepha used to work by herself. Struggling to earn enough income to support herself and her seven children, she often resorted to peddling her products on the street—something which, on more than one occasion, got her into trouble with the police.
Josepha began partnering with Indego Africa in late 2015 in the hopes of getting consistent orders for her products and building her own artisan cooperative.
Today, she employs 10 other women and is thrilled about the direction her business is taking. She feels happy walking into work every morning knowing that she is earning a steady income and that people around the world are interested in her products! For many of our artisan partners, it is a source of immense pride to be able to sell their products internationally and to create truly beautiful pieces for a global audience. Josepha said:I like making Indego Africa products very much because the products are so nice, and I love the designs. Making those products allows me to learn new skills and means I earn more money, which was not easy for me in the past. Indego has allowed me to stop selling goods on the streets and open my own business.Josepha and her co-workers are happy to be able to earn consistent, dependable income from Indego Africa orders—to be able to look towards and plan for the future, rather than living day-to-day. Being able to provide and care for their families gives many of our artisan partners a feeling of empowerment, both in their households and in their everyday lives. Josepha said:Being empowered to me means having the ability to provide for my family and myself without having to ask my husband. I earn an income and can pay for my children’s school fees—I can feed them, clothe them and even afford health insurance.We are thrilled to be able to work with talented, determined artisans like Josepha who are using their new opportunities to uplift their families and provide opportunities for other women to work and earn income as well. We can’t wait to see what she’ll do next! To shop Josepha’s beautiful, handwoven
products, click here.
At Indego Africa, we are all about living colorfully! We love to celebrate happiness and positivity in the communities of women we work with (and around the world!) and to design products whose bright colors and whimsical designs reflect our spirit of fun and creativity.As a brand, and as a global team, we are endlessly inspired by the amazing women we partner with in Rwanda & Ghana. They are proud mamas, talented makers, creative entrepreneurs, and so much more. Despite what they may have been through in their lives, they live every day with hope and determination to create brighter futures for themselves and their families.
While these are some of the reasons we love working with women in Rwanda & Ghana, we also wanted to know what they like about working with us. So we chatted with them to hear their thoughts on our partnership and find out what makes them feel happy and inspired every day too.
Our #livecolorfully photoshoot (shown below) celebrates what living colorfully means to all of us, featuring bright colors, beaming smiles, and lots of glitter, of course!
Scroll down to see the full shoot and read the beautiful words of our artisan partners below—we hope they inspire you to #livecolorfully too!
What makes me smile everyday? Working with other women! I love to laugh and make them laugh too. – Jaqueline, Twiyubake Cooperative
Indego Africa is a happy organization because it helps women in Rwanda become confident and independent. Before, I used to have to ask for everything from my husband. Now, I can do everything by myself (I even support my husband!) and that makes me proud. – Jacqueline, Twiyubake Cooperative.
I love to weave and I love to sew, because to me, they are an art and they help me care for my children. – Claudine, Imirasire Cooperative
I love making Indego Africa products! The products have great designs, lovely colors, and are different from the ones I’m used to making. Every time I’m working on an Indego Africa order, I’m building new skills, and that makes me happy. – Josepha
I love weaving because, to my children, it is the way their mom supports them and I am so proud to be able to do that. – Felicite, Imirasire Cooperative
I love coming into work everyday because it allows me to provide for my family and create brighter futures my children. I smile thinking about the lives they will have. – Aisha, Covanya Cooperative
I love the color blue. It makes me happy whenever I see it. - Aisha, Covanya Cooperative
My favorite color is green! I painted my whole house green. I always want to see green. It makes me happy. – Domithille, IKU Cooperative
The story of Abasangiye is a story with a sad beginning. A sewing cooperative based in Kayonza, Rwanda, Abasangiye was founded in 2010 to provide economic opportunities for women who were raped during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
For years, the 24 seamstresses of Abasangiye worked hard to earn income and provide for their families, sewing wine bags, coasters, and yoga bags for Indego Africa’s early product collections. However, they struggled to advance their skill sets enough to produce more complex items (like apparel) that would have enabled them to diversify their product offerings and earn more income. This, in turn, made it difficult for them to grow their business and support themselves and their families.
When
we came up with the idea to start an artisan Vocational Training program for youth in Rwanda, we knew right away that we wanted to include Abasangiye. As a little refresher, our Vocational Training program matches young, unemployed women in Rwanda with artisan cooperatives where they receive technical training and mentorship. The trainees also participate in a Basic Business Training course to help them build the skills to succeed in the workforce (check out this blog post for the full scoop). This program not only helps young people in Rwanda gain a career path, but also helps artisan cooperatives themselves recruit new, young members; build their production capacity; and improve their business management.
However,
at the time we were planning the program, Abasangiye’s artisans weren’t able to sew at the level needed to effectively train younger women in their craft, nor did they have enough orders to sustain the addition of new cooperative members.
That’s where Daniel Nshiyime came in. Daniel is our new Production Assistant—a master sewer, tailor, and teacher who spent seven years working at a sewing factory in Rwanda before he started his own tailoring business. We brought Daniel on board to help cooperatives like Abasangiye (and their vocational trainees!) improve their skill sets and sew with higher quality and complexity.
Since February, Daniel has spent three days per week at Abasangiye, conducting intensive training with the cooperative members and their nine vocational
trainees on the ins and outs of sewing. Starting with equipment care, Daniel has led the group through a progression of skills and techniques. The most game-changing? Learning how to work with patterns to sew clothing!
Today, the artisans of Abasangiye and their trainees are able to sew dresses and skirts—including ones with zippers!—on their own, and while there is still
further to go, their final products are miles away from the wine bags and coasters with which they began. As Gaudance, the president of Abasangiye
Cooperative said (with a beaming smile on her face): “I am so excited about how good our products have become. Before, we didn’t know how to make skirts or dresses. Now we’ve learned how to work with patterns and are keeping our quality control strong.”
Having young women working and learning onsite with them has also been deeply valuable for the artisans of Abasangiye. Gaudance added: “We have wanted to recruit younger women for a long time, but we didn’t know how to do it. They are learning quickly and are helping us understand what we didn’t know before. Even when the teacher [Daniel] is gone, the young girls are helping us master what we learned about in previous classes. They can also help us find new markets. For example, they can go back to their secondary schools and help us get orders for uniforms.”
We
could not be more impressed with Abasangiye’s nine vocational trainees ourselves! Within a short period of time, they have not only become good seamstresses but have also risen up as leaders at their cooperative. Baraka, one of the trainees, has developed such remarkable skills that, when the program ends in July, she will be assisting Gaudance, the President, as a leader of the cooperative.
When speaking about what our Vocational Training program has meant to her, Baraka said: “this program is helpful because it is giving young people practical
skills and teaching us how to start our own businesses. It is giving us an orientation—a platform. What we learned in high school was more theoretical. We
didn’t learn anything that could help us work or start a business. This program has helped me to become self-sufficient and independent. It has also taught me
the importance of working in groups and with others from different backgrounds.”
We
couldn’t be more pleased (and inspired!) by the progress that the artisans of Abasangiye and our vocational trainees have made this year. Working together, these two generations of women are sewing a brighter future, with a happy ending.
To support our Vocational Training program and provide life-changing opportunities for women in Rwanda, click here.
In Rwanda, only 8 percent of young adults go to college. College tuition fees are high and, for many struggling families and individuals, the need for immediate income often outweighs the potential long-term benefits of higher education. Many of Rwanda’s youth go straight from high school and into the workforce. Some go even earlier.
When they do, they find themselves without job skills, searching for employment in an economy with few wage-earning jobs on the market. Where does this all lead? A debilitating 63 percent youth under-employment rate throughout the country.
originally posted on one.org
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These challenges are not unique to Rwanda. Countries across Sub-Saharan Africa are struggling to combat high youth un- and under-employment rates, with more than 70 percent of the region’s population under the age of 30.
Given the economic landscape for youth in Rwanda, and across Africa, there is a pressing need to equip young people—and especially young women, as they are less likely to be formally employed than men—with marketable skills to help them achieve sustainable livelihoods. So we at Indego Africa put our heads together and came up with an idea: to create a vocational training program designed to address this exact need!
How does it all work? Here’s the scoop: The program runs on six-month semesters with 45 participants per semester. Three days per week, these young people receive artisan vocational training at Indego Africa partner cooperatives—the artisan businesses responsible for the bright baskets, accessories and apparel you see on our website. There, they learn artisan craft-making techniques from sweetgrass basket weaving to sewing, beading, banana-leaf weaving and more.
The other two days out of the week, the program participants gather at a central space in Kigali (Rwanda’s capital) to take our Basic Business Training course, where they learn fundamental business skills such as bookkeeping, budgeting, quality control, marketing, and technology use for the workplace.
Programs like this, which empower youth to earn their own livelihoods, are critically needed in the communities we work with in Rwanda. While all of the participants in our Vocational Training program graduated from high school, none of them were able to continue on to college because their families could not afford the tuition. The majority now live with their parents (most of whom are also not formally employed) and scrape by on subsistence agriculture.
These circumstances leave young people in precarious and vulnerable situations, without means to provide for themselves or secure their own futures. As Clarisse, a program participant from the Kayonza Province of Eastern Rwanda, said: “[The Vocational Training] program is very important. Right now, it is very difficult for people who finish high school to find jobs—there are no wage-paying jobs, no office jobs. People who don’t get these opportunities are left behind. This program is helping us learn skills so that right after high school, we can earn income and start working.”
Clarisse’s enthusiasm for learning and working is echoed by all of our Vocational Training students. From day one of the program, they have hit the ground running, quickly mastering artisan skills and diving into the business training coursework. Some trainees have even begun to sell their own handmade products locally!
While access to vocational and business training can be life-changing for young people in Rwanda, it also has a wider impact on their cooperatives and communities. For example, most of the artisan cooperatives that we partner with are comprised of survivors of the 1994 genocide. As their members grow older, some cooperatives are starting to face challenges with their production capacity and are eager to train and incorporate younger women.
As Jacqueline, the president of Twiyubake Cooperative in Rwanda, said: “We’re struggling because some of our members are getting older and aren’t able to work as quickly. We are really excited to train these young women and bring a new generation into our cooperative. We believe that this will improve the way our business is run and keep it going far into the future.”
By training and employing young people, artisan cooperatives across Rwanda are able to ensure the longevity and sustainability of their businesses in the long-run. This, in turn, creates opportunities for younger women to rise up as leaders, grow their cooperatives, and help generate economic activity and employment opportunities in their communities.
Through hard work and determination, we have no doubt that these talented young women will, with time, begin to chip away at Rwanda’s youth underemployment problem.
On a sunny Friday morning, we took a break from busy city life to spend a day at the beach in Asbury Park—the quirky New Jersey surf town known for its good food, live music, and A+ shoreline. We brought some of our favorite warm-weather products with us—from pom pom hats to handwoven bags, patterned summer prints and more—and snapped pictures along the way, making stops at classic Asbury haunts like the Wonder Bar and Stone Pony (a favorite of New Jersey native, Bruce Springsteen.)
Check out the sun-kissed pictures from our day at the beach below and get inspired for your own summer of color, style, and fun!
Four years ago, husband-and-wife duo Courtney Rose & Laren Fitzgerald moved from California to Uganda, where they began the creative adventure that has since become known as…Rose & Fitzgerald! Inspired by the beautiful raw materials and craftsmanship of Uganda and East Africa, Rose & Fitzgerald sells simple, elegant home décor & jewelry, which is handmade from start to finish by local artisans in their Kampala-based design studio. We love Rose & Fitzgerald’s gorgeous products—from geometric wooden candle holders, to brass jewelry, woven baskets & more—that artfully blend the founders’ sense of coastal living with their love for the indigenous materials, beautiful landscapes, and master craftspeople of Uganda.
Now back in California, Courtney & Laren continue to design their rare goods from afar, with the intention of surrounding themselves and the world with beauty that makes us all feel more alive. We chatted with Rose & Fitzgerald co-founder, Courtney, to hear more about her journey and the amazing artisans that R & F is partnering with. Check out our interview below! (Spoiler alert: it’s super inspiring and may incite wanderlust.)
So, you’re from California and spent three years living in Uganda, where you started Rose & Fitzgerald. Tell us more about that: how did the adventure that is R&F begin?
Starting Rose & Fitzgerald was an adventure, indeed! My husband Laren and I moved to Uganda in 2012 for his career with Bridgeway Foundation, which had several projects happening in Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo. We chose to move to Uganda’s bustling capital, Kampala, as it was central, stable and rapidly developing. Almost instantly after moving there, I fell in love with the richness of the colors and textures of handmade goods found at markets, and was really impressed with the methodologies for crafting them. I began working with local artisans to decorate our big, empty house – designing items mixing my coastal, modern design perspective with the timeless methods of these master craftsmen. All of the goods that came back as a result of our collaborations were stunning, and I knew this was the beginning of something much bigger. Starting a business that would sustainably employ these talented artisans to practice their craft became a dream. Rose & Fitzgerald is that dream realized.
We love the way your jewelry & homewares truly showcase the beauty of Ugandan craftsmanship and raw materials through simple, elegant designs. What is your design process like and where do you get your inspiration?
My goal since day one has been to design products drawing inspiration from their African origins, while still being relevant to a modern home. We want each of our products to hold deeper meaning than what meets the eye. This means that every aspect of how the products are made, what materials are used and where the materials come from, is of great importance to us. We limit our collection to the use of local materials, like Teak and Mugavu hardwoods, indigenous Ankole horn, pure brass, and raffia and bukedo (a type of palm leaf). Working with natural colors (shades of tan, brown, black, ivory and gold) and textures is endlessly inspiring to me, and when I design new goods, I always focus on cohesion among our offering, which usually results in clean lines, and geometric shapes and patterns. I am purposeful about creating goods that will add warmth, contrast and character to a space; goods that are completely unique, imperfect and one of a kind. Typically, I create a mood board for a new collection and then sketch out my own design concepts, which my husband patiently turns into digital spec sheets (alongside his own designs), which we then pass on to our artisan team for sampling. The artisans almost always add their own unique touch to each design, and we love that their artistry and talent shines through in the end result. All that said, our designs are certainly a team process.We’d love to hear more about your design studio and the artisans you work with. What kinds of changes do you see taking place in their lives?
Our design studio in Kampala is a space we poured a great deal of love and energy into. We wanted this workshop to feel unlike any in Uganda, so we focused on making the space feel creative and energetic. More than anything, we wanted our studio to give these incredibly talented artists a space to master a craft they have practiced for years. Many of the techniques they use are sadly dying out, due to large craft factories, so we’re doing everything we can to preserve their traditional artistry. In a world where many artisanal goods are produced in factories and sold through mass marketing campaigns, the Rose & Fitzgerald studio was created in hopes of giving people something truly unique. Currently, we have a team of 9 full-time Ugandan staff working there each weekday, which includes a metal smith team, a cow horn team and a production/quality control manager. Tea is taken each morning before starting work, and a healthy lunch is provided in the beautiful, large yard everyday. We introduced the “Friday happy hour” tradition, which of course, has been received very well. I think the stability our artisans have within their well-paid roles, along with working each day in such a creative, free environment, gives the artisans a great deal of joy and allows them to focus on perfecting their art.
Your motto, “seek the rare,” is awesome. Can you tell us what that means to you?
Living in Uganda together was perhaps the greatest adventure of our lives. It opened our eyes to a completely new part of the world, allowed us to travel to far away places in Africa that we’d never even heard of, and discover so much unique talent, skill and beauty among many cultures. Simply put, we felt like we were always seeking out rare experiences, and we really wanted this to become the motto for our lives and our company. We made it our passionate commitment to look toward the forgotten places—shedding light on over-looked talent and designing and creating rare goods from far away places. And now, we invite everyone else to seek the rare in their own lives, however that may look for them.
Do you have any favorite Indego products? If so, which ones & why?
Yes! I love the Double Pin Shade Hat and the Cutout Beach Tote. We moved from Uganda back to California about nine months ago, and spend so many of our evenings and weekends at the beach with our Rhodesian Ridgeback. The hat feels so fresh for summer and protects me from the sun, and the tote is the perfect carryall for things like sunscreen, a soft blanket and a good book. I know it will come in handy in a few months when our baby boy is here, and we have lots of baby gear to tote down to the beach as well! Both of these items feel so natural and simple while still being feminine and stylish. And of course, I absolutely love that they are handcrafted in Africa, empowering women to care for themselves and their families.
To learn more about Rose & Fitzgerald, visit http://www.roseandfitzgerald.com/.
Our favorite illustrator, paper artist, prop stylist & mama of two, Chloe Fleury, did the cutest (and most colorful!) photoshoot featuring our print-happy baby clothes and her whimsical paper art collections. We love the way Chloe creates bright, magical worlds out of paper, creating inspiring spaces for kids and grown-ups alike.
It’s almost Father’s Day in the U.S., and we’re excited to give a special shout-out to some of our newest artisan partners: the 65 men of the Ahwiaa Woodcarvers Association in Ghana! While Indego Africa is known for working with women in Africa, some of our newest artisan partner groups in Ghana are made up of men (more on that here). While supporting women remains the core of our mission, we are also excited to work with these talented male artisans and to help them grow their own businesses and better provide for themselves and their families. So for Father’s Day this year, we thought we’d introduce you to some of these rad dads and the awesome artisan techniques they’re working with.
Woodcarving is a time-honored craft in Ghana with a rich cultural history. Legend has it that in olden times a man named Akwasi Yoyo traveled to the Ashanti kingdom of Denkyira, where he learned the craft of woodcarving. After mastering these skills, he brought his finished carvings back to his hometown (which today is called “Ahwiaa”) and showed them to the King. The King was so impressed that he instructed the entire village to learn and practice the art form. Since then, this beautiful craft has been passed down from family to family, generation to generation.
The Ahwiaa Wood Carvers Association carries on this legacy by continuing the practice of traditional wood-carving today, creating beautiful handmade products ranging from Ashanti warrior masks, to traditional fertility dolls, beaded stools, and more.
The handmade process all starts with—you guessed it!—wood. The carvers source wood from a nearby forest and work with a range of locally-grown trees, including cedar, tweneboa, mahogany, teak, and pawpaw. To create the intricately detailed wooden objects you see on our site, the artisans start by sketching their designs directly onto the wood and then carving out the desired shape with a hacking knife. They then switch to a smaller, more refined knife to shave the piece down and carve out fine details.
After sanding and polishing, the artisans add finishing touches and design elements to each product ranging from wood stains, to brightly colored paint, delicate beads, cowrie shells and more! The final results? Unique, handcrafted products that showcase Ghana’s beautiful raw materials, rich cultural histories, and impeccable craftsmanship.
For the artisans of the Ahwiaa Woodcarvers Association, woodcarving is not only a lifelong art form, but also a source of livelihood. As many of these craftsmen are dads, we chatted a few of them to hear more about what fatherhood means to them and why they come into work everyday. Here’s what they shared with us:
“Being a father is a difficult but important task. Sometimes when we wake up in the morning, I have nothing in my pocket. All I want is to be able to provide for my family. I want to be able to give my children what they need in life to help them be successful and become good leaders in the future. It’s what every father wants.” – Adom Gyamfi
“I love it when my children welcome me and come to meet me when I return from work. It makes me happy to answer all their curious questions. I feel so proud when I hear good reports about my daughter from school. She is well known and applauded for her good conduct and her passion for keeping the school clean.” – Yaw Antwi.
We are so excited to support these artisans as they seek to support and enrich their families! To all the rad dads in Ghana and around the world, we wish you a very happy Father’s Day!
To shop products handmade by the artisans of the Ahwiaa Wood Carvers Association, click here.
