IMPACT
WOOGLY WOO- The Manipur Story
During violence in Manipur, countless families have lost their homes, shops, and livelihoods to violence. Now living in camps, women—once shopkeepers’ wives, builders, and entrepreneurs—are fighting to rebuild their lives with dignity.
Women turned to Crochet and made them into a lifeline. Under the guidance of Padmashri M Muktamani Devi, women of Kakching learnt the art of crochet. Team at Woogly Woo modernized the craft, from a color and form factor point of view. Women, who used to make crochet shoes, were now making crochet dolls, which were sold across India – via B2B relationships, websites and exhibitions. With 85% of the profits going to the women, support of the district administration, what started as a 3 women initiative grew to a 30 women initiative in 9 months. This initiative has been started under the guidance of Justice Gita Mittal Committee and supported by the Manipur Administration.
The craft is bringing dignity back, along with economic freedom.
Craft Maestros & Naayaab Vision
Building trust with customers, providing consistent incomes to artisans and changing the narrative around the heritage art forms of India - Craft Maestros and Naayaab have been the game changers of the space.
Emerging from a place of passion to preserve the heritage crafts of India, Craft Maestros and Naayaab created India's first network of master artisans - the maestros awarded by the President of India (Padma Shri/Shilp Guru/National Awards). This unique network of around 150 maestros, with an associated impact network of around 5000 artisans, is spread across 20 states of India covering 50+ craft forms.
Building a digital platform as well as positioning the handcrafted products for corporate gifting, Craft Maestros has established strong channels of market access and consistent income for these artisans, over last 7 years. Naayaab on the other hand has created the most path-breaking platform for the masterpieces of these heritage crafts, exposing the world to the richness and storytelling of these legacy art forms in a unique way. Creating content, hundreds of videos and running showcases, Naayaab is not just changing the definition of art itself, but also taking them global and inspiring the next generations like never before.
Sinhayana Foundation- Arts for Community Good
Initiated in 2016, Sinhayana Foundation is a non-profit organization that strongly believes in a ‘community-first approach.’
Built on the principles of social justice, equity, and empathy, Sinhayana Foundation believes in creating deep impact within communities that are systematically marginalized.
Sinhaya specifically works with urban slum-dwelling communities that largely comprise families of migrant workers who are employed in the informal sector and have extremely limited access to basic resources for survival.
The flagship initiative 'dance out of poverty' is an initiative, around training the children from the slum areas, to form dance groups that participate in national and global talent hunts, and can potentially become a part of the creative economy.
The initiative is supported by maestros of Bollywood like Hritik Roshan, Amitabh Bachchan, and more.