Have you gone to visit the artisans that you work with through The Bootstrap Project?
Have you gone to visit the artisans that you work with through The Bootstrap Project?
MB: Yes, actually, every single one of them!
Is there anyone you've met so far who's been particularly memorable?
MB: Every person has a really inspiring story, but one of the first women I encountered, and I think that’s why she had such an impression on me, is Rose, and we’re excited to launch a collection with her exclusive for Zady. She’s in Zambia and she lives in a one room hut, she has two children, and she’s a single mother, her husband died. It seems like a sad start but she’s actually this incredible entrepreneur and I met with her through her microfinance organization that she gets loans from. She was excited and was showing me all of her beautiful products and how she learned to sew from her mother and how the tradition was passed on from mother to daughter. When I left I said, ‘It was great to meet you, Rose, we’ll be in touch through the microfinance organization,’ and she said, ‘No. I want to speak to you!’ And I was like, Uh, OK, I don’t know how we’re going to do that, you live in the middle of Zambia and I live in New York. So I asked her if she had internet or e-mail and she said, ‘Yeah, get me that.’ So I went back and went to Gmail and made an account for her and was like, I have no idea how you’re going to find a computer. But she did! And we communicate through e-mail and text, and I’m so inspired by her entrepreneurship. She wanted to make it happen and you could be a person anywhere around the world and have that spirit and have that drive. It’s people like that who really drive us forward.
