Refugee Artisan Initiative is an organization near and dear to our heart at CURA.
Late last year, I was approached by RAI to advise on a complicated production order for a team of immigrant and refugee women artisans here in Seattle. And the rest is history, the RAI x CURA collaboration was born.
RAI was founded by the intrepid and inspiring Ming-Ming Tung-Edleman a pharmacist by day and a magician like non-profit founder and ED by night.
She's worked tirelessly to grow RAI and support her teams, always with an infectious "we can figure it out" enthusiasm. Ming-Ming reminds me to have faith in the process and the goodness of people.
Today, I've joined the board of RAI and CURA works exclusively with them for our up-cycled denim, up-cycled scrunchies (in-store only as of this writing) and are currently in product development stage for more products in our "reinvented" range.
To learn more about RAI watch the linked video below, 'Muntaha' our expert embroidery artisan can be seen here working on CURA denim patterns.
"At Refugee Artisan Initiative, our mission is to transform the lives of refugee and immigrant women by providing sustainable employment in sewing and handcrafting products".
