Brooklyn, USA: Diane Ruengsorn's ideas were born from her experiences in the furniture industry. While apprenticing for a furniture designer/manufacturer, she witnessed the chemicals and materials that workers were exposed to on a daily basis. Many of these substances are known to cause cancer or other chronic health conditions. This led her to believe that products could be produced with people-friendly materials and methods that didn't harm anyone in the process. "Live well, live right" is her philosophy; that you can have products that enhance your life while taking into account people and our planet. Her mission is to offer consumers affordable home products that adhere to environmentally and socially responsible standards.
Special Designer Offer: Receive 20% off Diane's Spice Block!
Use Code NL0111 at checkout!
Designer Spotlight: Rhea Alexander
New York City, USA: Rhea studied at Parsons School of Design. Her career followed an organic yet logical progression. She practiced architecture and industrial design while making art furniture from found objects, showing them in local NY galleries. Early on, what intrigued her was how the role of the designer can play in sustainability both from an environmental position as well as from a human perspective. She opened DIGS in 1991, determined to bridge the gap between design, handicraft, and fair-trade, using sustainable materials in an attempt to preserve artisanal handicraft. She has been consulting for the private sector and NGO's such as Aid to Artisans and USAID with the similar mission.
Special Designer Offer: Receive 20% off Rhea's Wood Product!
Use Code NL0104 at checkout!
Designer Spotlight: Patricia Naves
Bello Horizonte, Brazil: Patricia Naves started Oiti Designs in 2004, but attributes her passion for design to her small apartment growing up. Her mother thinks that her small bedroom made her aware of space from an early age. When she was 18, she moved to Australia for a year. There, she was impressed with the wide open spaces and large sidewalks. She returned to Brazil then enrolled in University at the School of Architecture, UFMG. In her second year, she spend a semester in Finlan where she became enamored with Scandinavian architecture and design. The aesthetic resonated with her so much, she fused the two styles from Scandinavia and Brazil. Patricia is currently studying design in Finland.
| Special Designer Offer: Receive 20% off Patricia's TOAST IT! COASTERS Use Code NL1221 at checkout! |
| Happy Holidays, From your friends at DIGS |
Designer Spotlight: Patricia Juana Caceres
Patricia Juana Caceres 
has been connected to textiles since she was very young because both her parents are artisans. She studied at The University Mayor de San Andres in La Paz in Communications and later studied tendencies and quality control through the mayor's office of La Paz. She attended USAID program BCCN focus on designs, then a 2 year course on design and use of colours through COPROCA. Later she worked with international designer Brigitte Landawer.
Her main inspiration as a designer is "when you design you play with the imagination, forms and techniques of weaving".
Five years ago, she build her own workshop together with her husband (Carlos Soliz).
For Patricia working with Awayu means she can help in a direct way the community and especially the people of El Alto since they (Awayu) can give work to many artisans and at the same time she can help the artisans to improve their techniques and teach them them about tendencies and ways to improve the products that they produce.
See Patricias AMAZING handknit, superfine Alpaca products on DIGS.com
Francine LeFrak - Founder of Same Sky
Award-winning producer, accomplished entrepreneur, and respected philanthropist, Francine LeFrak is an unusual blend of creativity, smarts, and soul. Where most of Hollywood’s elite will lend their name or face, Ms. LeFrak applies a “hands-on” approach to all of her business and charitable endeavors, offering her time and expertise.
After a decade-long career in show business as a Producer, she dove into film, focusing on social issues and taboo topics. “My aim is to shed light and put a human face on important social issues,” she says. “I want to explore ways to connect people so together we can find solutions to global problems.” Her work has illuminated sensitive issues including AIDS, racial intolerance, war, the injustices of our prison system, substance abuse, the peril of neo-Nazism, and the quest for identity and self-knowledge. A familiar face on the New York social scene, Ms. LeFrak and her husband Rick Freidberg inspire real change through their infectious energy and highly regarded expertise. She has served as a board member for the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation, for which she has raised millions of dollars, and has often hosted their annual Gala.
SAME SKY: In 2008, Francine founded SAME SKY, a fair-trade company whose mission is to empower women worldwide and inspire a movement of women empowering women. During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, women in Rwanda were subjected to sexual violence on a massive scale. According to the International Criminal Tribunal, more than 250,000 women were raped and, of the survivors, approximately 70% were infected with HIV/AIDS. In addition, they were left impoverished after their husbands, fathers, and brothers were murdered. SAME SKY was born with the goal of empowering these women to rebuild their lives and communities by giving them the tools to become entrepreneurs and lead self-sustaining lives.
How do they do it? SAME SKY’s trade-not-aid initiative uses jewelry to effect change in Rwanda – one woman at a time. SAME SKY works with Gahaya Links a company that employs HIV+ women, all of whom are survivors of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. These women artisans have been trained to crochet and make bracelets using our unique hand-blown glass beads. They are given a marketable skill and consistent employment, the two essential factors needed to rebuild their lives and those of their families.
These fabulous glass-beaded bracelets are ALL over Hollywood! Halle Berry, Donna Karen, Alicia Keys, and Jessica Alba (just to name a few) love Same Sky’s bracelets, and support Ms. LeFrak in her mission to help Genocide survivors.
YOU can own your own! Adorn your wrist and feel GOOD about it! So many gorgeous colors to choose from, find them all at DIGS.com