Hand-made Zulu embroidered greetings cards

Gareth is working in the town of Jozini, KwaZulu-Natal, in South Africa, as described on this previous post.

A charity local to him, the 'Fancy Stitch Women's Group' (see this website), make embroidered greetings cards and other gifts to sell.

With HIV infection rates rising among young women in the area, against a backdrop of deeply-rooted poverty, Fancy Stitch holds five main objectives:

• create jobs for local people to alleviate poverty;
• to develop the skills of their members;
• to build the capacity of their organisation;
• to market their products;
• and to be an independent and thriving business.
  

Fancy Stitch describe themselves as "a business enterprise, with annually-audited financial statements. Equally we are a group of real people with real lives, and that's what drives us. Each day's work is powered by our aims to:

• create beautiful products to a consistently high standard
• encourage one another to have hope and a vision for the future
• actively support vulnerable persons amongst us
• and raise awareness of HIV/AIDS and encourage positive living"

Gareth is shipping some of their beautifully made cards and other gifts to a group in Bath, UK, and we have a stock of them for sale. The prices are:

• Cards (suitable for birthday's/Christmas etc) - 1 for £2.25, 3 for £5 (£1.66 each) or 5 for £8 (£1.60 each)
• Christmas decorations - 1 for £2.25 or 3 for £5
  
• Keyrings - £2.50 each
  

All of the money will go to Fancy Stitch (minus the cost of postage). We would prefer to sell them by-hand as opposed to by-post, if we can arrange to meet, to minimise postage costs and maximise Fancy Stitch's revenue from our 'venture'.

If you would like any of these excellent, individual, fairly-traded handmade cards or gifts, please just get in touch by commenting on this post, emailing us if you have our address(es), or dropping by my office at 4E 3.18 if you know where that is!

Thanks very much!