Friday, April 18, 2014

Exciting day.

2 exciting things at the same time....neither is above the other but I have to start somewhere! 2 great initiatives that support and depend on the brilliant crafts scene of India in their own ways.
 
We are represented as part of the Maahi Roj [My everyday] event in Jaipur- fostering green attitudes with workshops on composting, recycling, bugs and many good things as well as a celebration of local culture and crafts....crafts as an industry help a huge number of rural people stay gainfully employed in their villages rather than joining the urban poor.
Really feel privileged to be part of this event.
 
 Equal in excitement for us is to be featured on the Jaypore website.
This is a web shop based in India that showcases excellent craft and design....again we feel blessed to be asked to show with them... and look at all the lovely pictures and display they have put together, it does make us feel rather flash.
 
These are our first two opportunities to sell our designs in India, so exciting for us to get this type of local response....
Good opportunity for you over there to shop as well because I notice on the Indian website prices can be so much different when export duties, import duties, transportation, money exchange expenses, etc, etc, etc through a paperwork mindfield don't come into the play of pricing items.
You know having to learn about all those expenses and realize what they do to the price of an item....it makes me highly suspicious of cheap goods to be seen in bargain shops in the west.....when you work backwards many of the people producing the work would have barely been able to eat.
 
Bit inclined to stand on soap boxes at the moment.
April 24 will mark 1 year since the factory collapsed in Bangladesh killing 1133 people outright....a factory cobbled together to produce cheap work that did not earn the workers enough for a dignified life AND in the end robbed them of any life completely.
It will be a day many groups and networks will be asking
DO YOU KNOW WHO MADE YOUR CLOTHES?
Can you answer that?....Who ever they are - they are real people just like you and me, just because they live "over there" does not mean they don't deserve to earn enough to feed and educate their families, have health care etc just like you and I want and expect.

Back to excited!!
and all our designs have listed on them exactly who made them....yeh!!!
 now back to stitching, lists and more lists...little block printing and big dreams for our gang.

No comments: