By Catherine Craig | CPALI Director
The tickets are purchased and the creative wheels are turning!
It's a new year at SEPALI Madagscar's Artisan Training Center and we are starting out strong by designing new products that we hope to sell at the New York Gift Show this August. Docey Lewis, international design consultant and CPALI advisor, will be traveling to Madagascar in March to hold an advanced design workshop. The intensive, 10-day workshop will train senior staff and senior artisans in new dyeing techniques, processing skills and new product design. We won't tell you what they are yet, but they represent new directions for the team, the women and our marketing approach. Creativity is on the front burner!
A glance back and a look forward
We would like to extend a heartfelt THANK YOU to all of you who supported this project. Together, we raised over $8,000 on Global Giving for artisan training and it goes a long way in Madagascar. This past year, we doubled the number of workshops held from the year before, we were able to support our artisans though inflation in Madagascar, we invested in natural dyes, developed new products and increased the skills of our artisans.This year, we hope that Docey Lewis, with her extensive experience in developing products and markets with rural artisan groups, can help us get to the next level!
While the team is gathering supplies and preparing for the workshop, they also have their eyes on the future of textile production. In January, the team purchased five manual sewing machines that will be transported to village work centers. While the artisans will still travel to SEPALI House for training, they will be able to work at home on textile production where it is more convenient and can be worked into their daily schedule. That, of course, translates into more revenue returns for the community and increased access to the project for rural farmers. The artisans and SEPALI team produced 490 square meters of textile in 2015 - a record production! With women able to work at home in the future, we hope that production will exceed this amount. Anything you can do to help us reach our goals this year would be greatly appreciated!
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