Fashion & Philanthropy: Rachel Roy Partners with Fairwinds Trading
We love when bridges can be built between people to help share more of their genius with the world in a whole new fashion! It’s simply a brilliant demonstration of the ‘good for the sake of good’ philosophy in practice.
Designer Rachel Roy has just announced a collaborative partnership with Fairwinds Trading to create jobs for women in Africa. This new relationship will integrate hand-crafted items that are made by African female-owned businesses into the Rachel Roy’s new collection for spring 2010!
Founder and artistic director Rachel Roy said, “My goal as a working woman and mother is to support women’s independence through employment. For the women who benefit from the Fairwinds Trading partnership, the opportunity to work is an important source of self-respect and financial freedom. I support this important organization and its ongoing collaboration with Macy’s made it a perfect fit for the Rachel Rachel Roy brand. The vast network of African artisans that Fairwinds has brought together is immensely talented and I am excited to be able to incorporate their artwork into my collection.”
This new spring line is called ‘launch collection’ and will feature handcrafted items that infuse indigenous fabrics and textiles into the essence of the collection. Some examples include earrings from Rwanda, or a woven paper bracelet that uses a ‘one-of-a-kind’ pattern and technique that hold the heritage of their culture in each creation. Definitely an example of how art is expressed through fashion, these pieces are truly LUX-worthy!
Willa Shallit, founder of Fairwinds Trading, added: “The RRR clutch represents the story of a chain of women supporting one another: A woman in rural Congo spends her days weaving Kuba cloth, she then holds out her hand to a woman in Tanzania who takes the woven cloth and adds other beautiful materials to it. That Tanzanian woman hands it to Rachel Roy who takes the Kuba cloth and makes it into a brilliantly designed clutch, which a woman then purchases in the United States. Four separate women’s lives are interconnected through this one accessory. It is a direct and powerful chain that works to fight poverty, through beauty.”
Expect this Rachel Roy collection to continue to incorporate the true essence of the brand and to offer ‘affordable, contemporary sportswear, footwear, handbags and jewelry.’ This time it also helps further the advancement of women! What could be more of a LUX-tastic collaboration than one that fuses fashion with tradition, art and culture?
You can find this new collection series at Macy’s stores and macys.com.
What do you think LUXies of this new partnership with Fairwinds Trading and Rachel Roy? Does knowing these items helps support the empowerment of women influence your buying power to support such a movement?
Tagged in: rachel roy, jobs in africa, launch collection, macys.com, fairwinds trading, women empowerment,
