Coastal Contenders West: Raven + Lily

From coast to coast, regular Americans are fighting human trafficking in creative and exceptional ways. Each month, your East and West Coast correspondents give you the play-by-play as contenders from both coasts battle the returning nemesis, modern-day slavery. Join us ringside for our East Coast/West Coast matchup and help these contenders become anti-slavery champions!

Pound-for-Pound Analysis

In This Corner: Raven + Lily
Hailing from: Los Angeles, CA
Division: Fashion/Accessories and retail
Reach: Empowering impoverished women through design partnerships and micro-enterprise opportunities
Matchup: Autonomie Project

Raven + Lily, founded in 2008 by Kirsten Dickerson and Sophia Hirokawa Lin along with a great team of designers, advisers, and volunteers, is a non-profit studio dedicated to empowering impoverished women through design partnerships and micro-enterprise opportunities. The team helps women in Africa, India, and Los Angeles through design-focused, micro-enterprise training in areas like home décor, accessories, jewelry, and stationary and the subsequent sale of those products.

Through fair trade practices, Raven + Lily ensures that these women are valued and rewarded for their work with fair compensation. Because women make up 80% of human trafficking victims worldwide, and are often the poorest and most uneducated people in many countries, R+L focuses on those who are most at risk for exploitation and abuse.

I’ve met some of the Massai women, one of the poorest tribes in Kenya, who create beautiful bracelets using traditional beading, leather, and modern design twists, thanks to R+L training. These amazing, talented, loving women will walk for days, barefoot, to sell their work to tourists and others in Kenya, making very little profit, trying to provide for their families. Through R+L, their expertly crafted work can now reach conscientious consumers worldwide. Likewise in Burundi and Ethiopia. And as with all R+L artisans, net proceeds are returned for use in community development.

In India, where artisans create gorgeous textiles, R+L has provided scholarships to girls, prenatal care for young mothers, and funding to provide sanitation and toilets in the slum, along with design training in sewing, embroidery, and block printing.

While all of Raven + Lily’s products are available for purchase online, they now have their very first real world storefront in Los Angeles, opening on August 7^th, 2010! Kirsten would often walk past shops for sale along Hollywood Blvd. or in Silverlake’s art community and think, “Some day…” Now, that day is here! If you live in the area, be sure to stop by the shop for their grand opening at 1568 sunset blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90026. If you can’t, be sure to check out their online store and the EXCLUSIVE deal they’re offering to Change.org readers: free shipping on orders of $50 or more at Raven + Lily! Enter code "freeshipping50" at check-out! (valid thru 9/10/10)

If you know of a contender in this division, please tell us about them in the comments below! If you know of a business, group, or individual fighting against trafficking and would like to see them profiled here, please e-mail us.

Photo credit: bfurnace