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As we celebrate International Women’s Day, we cannot help but reflect on our work with women worldwide and the incredible impact that your orders have internationally.
Globally, the handcraft sector is composed largely of women who work in small, community workshops. Similar to how their mothers' nimble hands engaged in craft, these women weave baskets, string bracelets, and mold clay to provide for their families and sustain important cultural traditions.
Today, and every day, we acknowledge the contributions and accomplishments of the women in our network. Our marketplace is only as vibrant as the stories living in their homes and the products their hands shape.
In 2022 alone, Ethik worked with 480 women. To honor this day, we want to highlight some handcraft groups that made this possible.
Mabira Collective
Handcrafted Products from Uganda.
Mabira Collective is a team of over 300 women in Lugazi, Uganda, who handcraft beautiful jewelry and accessories using locally sourced materials, including clay, seeds, and tree bark. Mabira believes the most effective method to alleviate poverty is providing consistent work and fair payment in a safe environment. Mabira Collective offers paid maternal leave, on-site child care, ongoing education and skills training, healthcare, children’s education benefits, the opportunity to advance into management positions, and work-from-home opportunities.
To shop Mabira’s products, click here.
Support Ugandan handcrafters by shopping here.
Starfish Project
Starfish Project provides a support system where survivors of human trafficking can experience freedom, establish independence and develop careers. Starfish Project has launched the only safe house and training facility for women escaping exploitation in their city of over 20 million, and has employed over 160 women. With each purchase, companies partner with Starfish Project to visit brothels in Asia and invite women to begin a new life as jewelry-makers, accountants, photographers, leaders, and entrepreneurs.
Shop jewelry made by human trafficking survivors.
Free Women
Free Women was started by Hanifa Javadi, who came to the United States as a refugee from Afghanistan. Even while facing abuse and discrimination in her home country, she dreamed of one day starting her own sewing business where she could enable women to gain social power through economic security. Today, she has fulfilled that dream by employing 26 refugee women including widows, minority groups, those with disabled children, and women in abusive situations, to become “free women” through their own earned income.
Support Hanifa and her team by shopping her collection.
Azizi Life
Woven Baskets Handcrafted by Rwandan Women.
Azizi Life partners with artisans across Rwanda to create beautiful products that bring hope to those who craft them. Rising from the horrors of genocide, women from various backgrounds joined together to build and maintain peace through handcrafting groups. With the knowledge of Rwanda's history woven into each product, every order placed sustains livelihoods while contributing to peace-building efforts.
Visit Azizi Life’s shop to see more products from Rwandan women.