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by dianna | Aug 14, 2012 | Dianna B Designs Jewelry, Made By Survivors
One of things I find so rewarding about working with Made By Survivors is the opportunity to witness the many wonderful attributes of the human spirit. Not only do I see unbelievable changes in the exploited women who create our handmade jewelry, but I get to see incredible acts of generosity from people who support our fair trade jewelry programs.
Examples of cut metal from the blanking dies.
Recently, I just returned from Jayne Redman’s beautiful new studio in Portland, Maine. A few months back, she put forward an amazing opportunity for me to come to Maine and learn a jewelry technique that will help drastically improve our production of artisan jewelry in India. Jayne put forth this amazing offer immediately upon hearing about our programs, I’m talking somewhere around minute two; a truly selfless act as the offer was a donation not only of her time and precious knowledge but also materials.
This low-tech technique, making blanking dies from tool steel, is one of Jayne’s teaching specialties and the cornerstone of her current line. For Made By Survivors, the technique will allow us to hand cut a pattern and punch the design rather than hand saw each, individual design which is laborious. Making blanking dies requires only basic hand tools and no electricity, a major boon for working effectively in India with the constant power outages that can last for hours at a time. This is a huge improvement when making multiples of same jewelry component. Another upside is the jewelry remains completely handmade because the pattern is hand sawed and hand punched using a vise.
For survivors of human trafficking and slavery in our programs, the implications of this new technique are vast. The survivors will be able to move through orders much more rapidly and punching the designs is simple enough for a newbie to do while really feeling they are making contribution. The time-saving aspect will not only allow our metalsmiths to practice new techniques, but most importantly, it will have a direct, positive affect on their salaries as our metalsmiths can produce our handcrafted jewelry more quickly.
I can’t wait to teach the women in our studios how to make dies so we can implement them immediately. Through the generosity, support and love of others, we can continue to improve the lives and empower the survivors we work with, even if it is just a little bit at a time.
Jayne giving me a demonstration
Jayne’s site: www.jayneredmanjewelry.com for her current line and workshop schedule
by dianna | Jul 29, 2011 | Made By Survivors
In February 2009, my life changed forever. After opening my small jewelry business, I received an email from a old friend saying a not-for-profit organization whose work she followed on Facebook, was looking for a metalsmith to teach a metalsmithing class to survivors of human trafficking in Kolkata, India. I contacted the organization, Made By Survivors (MBS), to learn more about the opportunity and in a month shipped out to Kolkata, India, for two weeks in April to teach survivors at a shelter named Child Care Home operated by our partner Women’s Interlink Foundation.
Although April 2009 was the hottest April on record (and not a dry heat), the survivors and the MBS Team in India persevered through blackouts, labor strikes, stifling pollution, the survivors’ own psychological (and sometimes physical) trauma, to teach the survivors basic metalsmithing skills. My originally scheduled two weeks, quickly turned into a month long stay. The survivor girls were so incredibly inspirational and dedicated, I felt I couldn’t leave until I was done instructing through a certain level of metalsmithing.
Upon my return to the USA, I constantly stayed involved with MBS consulting on everything jewelry and managing jewelry tool drives. Then, I decided to return to India to get a new jewelry studio open and ready for production at a new partner shelter home at Rescue Foundation (RF) near Mumbai. This trip included check-ins with the Kolkata program which was wonderful because you could see the progress, the love, the happiness and the positive evolution of attitude in just a couple of months.
While at RF I lived at the shelter home and really had an opportunity to spend quality time with the survivors: teach volleyball, learn some Hindi, Bengali and Gujrati, explore Mumbai’s jewelry district (which recently was the location of a horrible terrorist attack) and purchase tools for the program, as well as get to know the Rescue Foundation staff and learn about the amazing work they do rescuing and providing shelter for young women freed from brothels all over India.
By the end of the trip, over 50 survivors were trained in classical metalsmithing techniques. When I wasn’t teaching metalsmithing, I taught beading to another five survivors suffering from HIV/AIDS in the hospital Rescue Foundation location on-site. About ten percent of the girls rescued by Rescue Foundation suffer from HIV/AIDS. In the evenings, I couldn’t resist coaching volleyball on the rocky court out during the athletics program. I played in high school and a little in college and never really thought it would come in handy but it truly did. It taught teamwork, healthy competition (something the girls really never experienced) amongst other things.
Ultimately, the most amazing part of the whole experience is to watch a teenage girl in survival mode, firing on all primal notions for shelter, for food, completely transform into a hopeful girl playing in the garden and picking flowers. It is inspirational to see how learning to metalsmith plays a part in their therapy, in addition to, being their employment, the key to their future. Lastly, it feels great being a part of a compassionate organization that helps offset the heinous wrong that is “human trafficking“, and the name for it doesn’t come close to saying enough about this tragic human rights violation.
MBS’ philosophy is to overcome slavery and empower slavery survivors through education, opportunity, employment and compassion. Their programs are located in such places like Cambodia, India and Nepal and are very successful. All proceeds from the products made by the survivors go right back to supporting the survivors. MBS also sponsors children for school, helps improve conditions for the survivors at the homes and organizes bi-annual trips for volunteers to spend two weeks in Kolkata paying visits to WIF’s homes and hosting activities for the survivors.
We conduct Tool Drives annually for jewelers, teaching institutions and metalsmiths to get involved and donate. If you’d like to like to donate jewelry tools to the drive there is more information located here. We hope to supply the tools for our third studio, opening within the next six months to train survivors at a shelter home in northern West Bengal.
At this point, I can’t wait to go back and see the survivors from the CCH and RF Studios (amongst other great girls at the shelter, not in our program AND the great staff in India working for Made By Survivors whom I adore). I also look forward to meeting and training the new survivors and getting more young women in to the therapeutic fold. Lastly, I find it comforting that every survivor trained chips away at the global blight of slavery.
by dianna | Jun 4, 2010 | Made By Survivors
The start of the Made By Survivors jewelry program at the Women’s Interlink Foundation’s Child Care Home (CCH), brought a small degree of anxiety for me with regards to teaching. I was a little concerned about the fragility of the slavery survivors and if they would like learning to metalsmith. After a week of being with the average 17 year old (there were a smattering of ages from 15 to 24 years old and all the girls ages are just a guess), I was very pleased with their interest, kindness and vibrancy.
When we came to the end of the first project: a brass domed, initial or name-stamped, circle pendant, the room was really starting to have the happy buzz of busyness. As added incentive, I thought it would be cool for the girls to stamp their names, and then, to keep their first piece of jewelry, hopefully, connecting them with the art of metalsmithing. The girls were sanding, sawing, doing layout work, using stamps, using doming blocks, polishing, and, even learning some basic metallurgy. Upon completion of the project, the pendants were lined up to take photos, and as promised, returned to the girls.
After a week, I knew everyone’s name and looking at the survivors’ pendants, I couldn’t match an initialed pendant with the right girl. This occurred to much giggling at my struggle to find some of the pendant’s rightful owners, and, one pendant had gone totally unclaimed. Had I made a mistake and really had everyone’s name wrong? CCH’s House Mother came at the end of the day and told me I couldn’t figure out the initials because almost all the girls stamped their boyfriends’ initials! The unclaimed one was already dated as it had an ex-boyfriend’s initials on it. Right…I am not only teaching survivors of slavery and human trafficking, but, it’s good to remember I am also teaching the garden-variety teenage girl. So, I suppose it is time to invoke my inner teenager and revisit angst, crushes and primping.
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by dianna | Apr 9, 2010 | Made By Survivors
After 4 days in Kolkata I am already keeping time to a different tune. Kolkata’s music is almost deafening; like speed heavy metal; incessant honking as all vehicles from cars to rickshaws to bicycles have horns, Hindu temple bells, the security guard who announces his presence to all potential thugs at 2 a.m. Throw out everything you learned in Driver’s Education here because there are no lanes, driver’s don’t use indicators and there are few roads with lanes and pedestrians never have the right of way. The noise is a constant backdrop but you need to go with the flow here or else Kolkata’s intensity will break you. Of course it’s not just the noise; the smell of stinking garbage everywhere, the poor and down trodden then collecting said garbage to sleep on, the unrelenting heat and humidity and sitting all day in sweat soaked clothes, the emaciated stray cats and dogs, the flying cockroaches the size of hummingbirds, the decrepit sidewalks and building facades, the insanely aggressive salespeople, the daily multi-hour power outages, the constant staring eyes that follow you everywhere and not to mention the faces of the survivors of human trafficking with whom we are working.
Survival in the city makes me more impressed and awe-struck with the Indian people, how do they deal with this full on sensory assault every day? Most just flash warm smiles and go about their day, make a comment about that heat, (yes, they think it’s really hot, too) and go with the flow because here you just need to think of yourself as rubber rather than glass as the City smacks you around, or else you will crack. Dealing with the issues of the Jewelry Program is a similar battle. That is why the accomplishment of the Made By Survivor’s Jewelry Program is all the more sweet. Malleability, to use a jewelry term, is essential to survival and maintaining your composure. It is imperative to go with the grain rather than against, or else Kolkata will work you over.
