Following is an interview with Robin Collier, the inspiration behind One World Threads. One World Threads was established to provide a swing outlet for refugees here in Buffalo.
How did you first get in involved with this refugee sewing collective? Did you start it?
Yes and no. I first started teaching refugee sewing classes on a volunteer basis about 2 and a half years ago and continue to do so, in a new location.
My story goes, that after a year of teaching I began to realize that many of my students wanted to try and make a living through sewing, but there obviously aren’t a lot of sewing positions around these days. So, the idea to start a sewing business/cooperative was born and became my goal – alongside teaching. A little over a year ago I found out that a team of students and a faculty advisor – Professor Patricia Hutton, were running a sewing program in Buffalo as well. I discontinued the sewing/ESL program that I had begun at Journey’s End and had run for about a year and joined forces with the Canisius crew who had been looking for someone to start a refugee sewing business. They’re known as Sew-Redi and are an Enactus organization. They didn’t have a sewing teacher at the time, and didn’t have many volunteers, so I brought my volunteers with me, and we began to teach with the Sew-Redi individuals from Canisius.
At this point (around a year ago) the program began to really explode (in a good way). They went from serving about 5-8 refugee individuals a week to up to 40, in a few months time. Catholic Charities has provided the space for us in one of their classrooms, and we continue to teach sewing classes and offer a community sewing environment for refugees every Saturday. I have also begun to work with 5 individuals on a more formal/business arrangement – which we call One World Threads. Currently I own the business, but the goal is to empower and provide income for refugees, and will hopefully one day become a worker cooperative. For now we sell these individuals’ products – mostly purses, and other personal and home accessories – at the West Side Bazaar, The Foundry, and at a number of community events each month, with the help of the Canisius Crew.
For a number of years, the Canisius Enactus group provided sewing machines for every refugee who came through the program, but because the numbers have jumped so much, in terms of attendance, we’ve had to stop doing that in the last month. Yet, still, any refugee individual who is serious about sewing will get a sewing machine, through community donations of older machines that get fixed by one of our volunteers, Bob Blake. (I’d like to add here that Bob and his wife Sandy, who are both in their 70s, drive over an hour each way to volunteer and teach every Saturday).
So, at this time, there is the business, One World Threads, and there is also the sewing school, which works alongside One World Threads but only operates on Saturdays and relies completely on volunteers for teaching, and donations for materials and machines. We need a larger production and teaching space, and are currently deciding on the direction we will go – given the large amount of interest from the refugee community, but the current lack of funding and the difficulty of finding enough volunteers to teach.
What are the primary goals of the collective?
The goal of the business is to provide refugees with some income, while they learn about the importance of creating high quality products that are in line with market demand. It also provides the opportunity for refugees to learn about the retail side of things, if they have an interest in that.
How has the collective grown since its formation?
As I mentioned earlier it has grown tremendously in numbers. So much so, that we have had to turn many interested individuals away, and have had to recently reorganize the structure of our classes, breaking them up into different times and skill levels. We are trying to figure out ways to meet the demand. At the same time, I am trying to figure out how to have a successful for-profit refugee sewing business – One World Threads – in Buffalo.
Where does most of the sewing occur?
Is this based on classes? Or projects? Or a way to bring communities together?
It’s all of the above. It’s people from all over the world learning how to sew, honing their sewing skills, as well as teaching others how to sew. We love to see refugees teaching other refugees!
It’s volunteers from all different age groups and demographics coming together to serve the growing refugee population in Buffalo. We work on small and large instructional projects, as well as teaching the refugees how to sew products for money.
Why sewing?
Sewing has become a bit of a lost art, and we’ve lost so much sewing production to overseas labor. It’s exciting to bring back something so fundamental to humanity – textiles are everywhere – and to try and do it in a way that is useful and empowering for the individual.
What have you learned since this all started?
I’ve learned about starting a business and all that goes into that – the business planning, the marketing, the retail side, and how it gets it even more complex when you’re starting a business with individuals who don’t speak the same language and are trying to adjust to life in a new country.
I’ve also learned that no matter how much I think I’m teaching them, the refugees are teaching me just as much, about myself, about the privilege I am bringing to the table and the power dynamics that are there whether or not we want them to be. I have sat down with the individuals from One World Threads, and talked to them about some of these larger issues – around capitalism, around the marketing of their refugee status to sell products, and around power and privilege, and I’m amazed at how well they can see some of these forces and structures playing out, or at least to how open they are to discussing them.
Lastly, I’ve learned that these individuals are not that different from me: We are struggling to make a living; we would love to make a living doing something that is meaningful to us and brings us joy, and although we have had our struggles, we keep going and often believe there is still great possibility out there for us.
What are the goals for 2015?
But, for me the most important thing is to continue to provide a space, the materials, and the machinery for refugees from all over the world to come and sew, socialize, work together and possibly forget some of their troubles for a few hours (or more!) every week.
One World Threads | The Foundry | 298 Northampton Street | Buffalo, New York | (716) 980-5451 | Website | Facebook
Thanks to Doug Collier for providing some of the photos for this article