Introducing VOZ
January 21, 2011
And after much debate and deliberation, we are thrilled to announce that we’ve named the company we are starting to produce these designs. The project has been named VOZ which means voice in Spanish, because our mission is to empower the voice of indigenous artisans we serve while helping women worldwide express their values through their style.
VOZ is committed to using design and marketing innovation to aid indigenous artisans out of poverty by connecting them to the fashion industry. “Project Chol Chol” has come a long ways since 2009, and today finally emerges as it’s own international fashion brand – with a team in the U.S. and Chile – that will work in collaboration with the Chol-Chol Foundation.
This month we are forming the company, setting up an office and design studio near Temuco, setting up production alliances with weaving cooperatives, and fundraising in Chile and California. Next month we’ll begin sourcing parts and making the 2011 products! To keep track of our progress you can check our website: www.madebyvoz.com, fan us on Facebook, or follow us on twitter (@madebyvoz).
Thank you for your continued support and feeback, we look forward to bringing these designs to market this year!
Designing with the Chol Chol Foundation;
January 15, 2010
A Contemporary Fair Trade Mapuche Product Line
double wrap belt in textile and leather
thick belt in textile and leather
textile purses
textile purse on form
black and white quartered cowl
large-buttoned cowl with fringe
wrapped scarf with button and fringe
looped shawl with fringe
crocheted sweater
dress with floral pattern
*Ruana designed in 2006 by Fundacíon Fundesarte (Fundacíon para la innovacíon de la artesanía)
These designs are in production and will be available to the public in 2011. (Except the ruana, which is available now.) For wholesale or retail inquiries, please contact the Chol Chol Foundation at info@cholchol.org.
Collaborative Design Innovation
January 15, 2010
An inclusive creative design method for poverty relief;
design collaboration at the Chol Chol Foundation
first design workshop with the Mapuche ladies
including the artisans we represent is fundamental to our process
we explored designs through both drawing and prototyping
Through iterative prototyping, final designs were created between the Mapuche ladies and the Chol Chol Foundation's designer.
Fundacíon Chol Chol;
January 9, 2010
Hand Crafted Mapuche Textiles
Fair trade indigenous art: preserving culture and relieving poverty.
The Foundation specializes in traditional, completely natural, Mapuche textiles and knits ranging from wall hangings, rugs, blankets, and table cloths to ponchos, shawls, scarves, hats, and gloves.
Chol Chol Foundation's exclusive fair trade store
All patterns and symbols are uniquely Mapuche, and represent cosmological stories of their religion as well as elements of the natural world.
Folded textiles woven by Mapuche artisans
The yarn used for each piece is hand-spun, and every color is dyed from natural brews of native plants and fruits.
Mural Trarikan: ceremonial Mapuche wall art
As with this Trarikan, some textiles are still made with ancient techniques involving dying with mud that is knotted with reeds. Mapuche textile art is still intimately connected with spirituality of the Mapuche people.
Artesanía Mapuche; Textile
October 27, 2009
Traditional Mapuche Loom
Weaving knowledge has been passed down in the Mapuche communities of Chile from mother to daughter for countless generations, and even today most women report having learned from their families. Tapestries, blankets, and clothes are woven from traditional rectangular looms built of wooden frames. This weaving technique allows for the weavers to blend symbols, patterns and textures.
Mapuche ladies weaving in their kitchen
Mapuche weaving is made completely sustainably using traditional techniques on home-built frame looms. Weaving is liberating to women of the Araucanía region because it can be done from home, meaning they can raise their families in their communities. Women can make an income without having to leave for cities to find employment, presenting an alternative to rural flight.
Diagram of a Mapuche Loom
Weaving is key to environmental and cultural preservation in the Aracaunía region. As opposed to deforestation seen often in struggling indigenous communities, when a craft uses only easily replenishable materials, no plants or animals are destroyed in the process. Furthermore, the Mapuche weaving technique relies solely on hand-spun yarn and natural dyes crafted from 100% sustainably harvested vegetation: no pollution results from machines or harmful chemicals. Mapuche weaving is a productive livelihood that results in a net-positive affect on the environment (as it encourages bio-diversity in the plants used and the dye pulp can be used as fertilizer).
More importantly, weaving helps preserve the culture of the Mapuche people. The more weaving is practiced, the more Mapuche craft techniques and styles are shared. The symbols in the textiles refer to images from Mapuche history and cosmological beliefs, and are often used to tell graphic stories. When women can make a living from weaving, they are able to practice and teach their culture as a part of their profession. In the process, much of this knowledge is imparted upon the younger generation. Furthermore, when those textiles are created and circulated, the Mapuche story is also celebrated beyond the rural communities of their creators.
Mapuche Lady Weaving
Artesanía Mapuche; Hand Made Yarn
September 21, 2009
Textiles at the Chol Chol Foundation
The weaving from the 38 Mapuche communities we work with is beautiful, with earthy tones and graphic symbolic patterns representing different visual elements of Mapuche spirituality. All wool is carded from sheep in the Aracaunía region, and shipped locally.
raw wool drying before being spun
The women spin the wool by hand into variety of different textures of yarn: thin, thick, smooth, textured, with single or double fibers twisted.
Mapuche mother spinning wool in her kitchen
The yarn is then dyed naturally with plant or mud brews from materials harvested sustainably in their communities. Read the rest of this entry »
Artesanía Mapuche; Palacio de la Moneda
September 7, 2009
Palacio de la Moneda, Artasania de Chile Mapuche exhibit, Santiago
The Mapuche are best known for their craft traditions in textiles, silver jewelry, wood, and basket weaving. Many of the patterns, symbols, and techniques still used date back to pre-colonial times.
Here are some examples from Artasanía de Chile’s gallery at la Palacio de la Meneda in downtown Santiago.
Plata
(Silver)
silver and beaded traditional Mapuche jewelry
head pieces, worn in a circle around the top of the the head.
These are clothing pins, used to hold wrapping sweaters together as you wear them.
Design in Santiago: the time is now.
August 30, 2009
Azul advertisement, Providencia bus stop, Santiago, Chile
a contemporary design, Galeria Del Mundo, Santiago, Chile
When exploring the streets of Santiago one sees throes of elegantly clad Latins rushing to their destinations and stores which explode with colors and shapes. You cannot help but feel you are witnessing an exciting new design era take root in Chile’s capital city. Neighborhoods such as Lastarria, Bellas Artes, and Bella Vista are springing up with interesting boutiques, experimental fashions, theaters, and fancy restaurants. Fledgling creative ventures ranging from stores that only support unique Chilean designs to art collectives, seem to be flourishing in uncharted territory.
According to an interview by LAMA, Latin America in the Modern Age blog, with designers Rina and Pamela of Santiago’s Studio Grafíkk:
“The design scene in Santiago is growing and growing every day. There’s a lot of talented designers and very good manufacturers. Also it helps that there’s emerging neighborhoods with young design studios and shops. In six years, everything changed a lot, with the emerging Chilean economy (despite of the latest world economy crisis), design has found its place.” Read the rest of this entry »
Investigación Santiago
August 24, 2009
Provedencia Sculpture Garden, Santiago, Chile
Things become even more interesting when I began interviewing boutique vendors and citizens of Santiago, the design and culture capital of Chile and the Chol Chol Foundation’s priority target market. I noticed a surprising lack of Mapuche textiles or goods across all the traditional artisan shops in touristy locations. There were explicit messages from citizens and implicit messages from shop inventories that the Mapuche culture was apart from Chilean culture, and that the Mapuche faced discrimination both in social perceptions and the marketplaces. People interviewed across Santiago did not perceive the Mapuche people as educated or artistic, and did understand why I had chosen to work with them. Many explained to me that anti-Mapuche racism is deeply rooted in the Chilean culture and was one of the major obstacles the Mapuche people faced in entering the design market here.
Opinionated Chilean at a BBQ in Southern Santiago, "Why the Mapuche?"
“But their cultural history is not interesting or artistic, why do you want to design with them?” – The man pictured above.
“People don’t want to hire [Mapuche] because they are not seen as good workers, because they are angry that they are forced to be menial workers in a country that was once theirs […] I don’t mean to be racist the facts are the facts, they are at the lowest levels of society, in terms of money and education” – Philipp K.
“Here in Santiago, the women have deep pockets but how do you say it? They will not spend on Mapuche.” – Anya K.
Though many talked about discrimination, most did not feel that way. People I spoke to – most importantly shop owners – were quite interested in hearing more about the project. Read the rest of this entry »
The Fair Trade Nexus
August 19, 2009
Q: What is a fair trade product, anyways?
A: A fair trade product is one that has been cultivated, grown, or manufactured to comply to a unified set of standards regarding just treatment and payment for producers and workers. The standards are mandated and regulated by a group of organizations called “FINE”: Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International, World Fair Trade Organization, Network of European Worldshops and European Fair Trade Association.
As I delved deeper and deeper into the fair trade culture in America through talking to those ranging from figures in the movement to shop assistants, I began figuring out what exactly made something a fair trade product, how those products go from material to artisan/farmer to shelf, and the social entrepreneurship that accompanies these creative business models. Also fascinating is how webs of fair trade organizations, suppliers, vendors, and festivals all collaborate; these products are exchanged pretty differently from corporate products, and sold mostly in the “festival booth,” “Whole Foods,” “small new age,” “foreign import,” or “fair trade shop” venues. Stores don’t usually work with artisans directly, and most artisan groups are served by organizational intermediaries who “translate” their designs, marketing presentation, and/or literally language, to “contemporary markets” aka “capitalistic markets” aka “places that people have disposable income and spend it on pretty things.” Mostly these organizations are non-profit.
Fair Trade Social Action Group
But most people still equate Fair Trade with coffee and chocolate (thinking with their stomachs)(Alter Eco Fair Trade Study 2008). Even so, a new fair trade fashion and accessory design movement is well under way, growing to significant proportions. And “modern” product designers have been a secret ingredient to advancing fair trade products for at least a decade. (Aid to Artisans was the first organization to start bringing product designers to impoverished artisan communities to show them how to make more marketable products).
I assure you my research has been thorough – yet I have yet to see fair trade fashions or accessories that do much more than make me say: what a gorgeous Nepalese/Mexican/African/Colombian [thing], oh, and also a good cause. Granted, for me, and many other consumers, that is enough to convince me to buy it. But usually, if a consumer already has a traditional Indian scarf, they won’t buy another similar looking one. And if an Indian fair trade scarf looks the same as a non-fair-trade Indian scarf – neither will a shop owner: if it’s not unique they can’t afford the price difference.
All the leading fair trade fashion + accessory brands put their humanitarian message first and design second: see for yourselves: (Global Mamas, Aid to Artisans, Manos de Madres, Mama Shaman, Spiral Foundation, Maya Botanika.) Unfortunately, people don’t buy with their brains. Read the rest of this entry »
