This Fall/Winter, Vivienne Westwood is celebrating ten years of working with the Ethical Fashion Initiative of the International Trade Centre, a joint agency of the United Nations and the World Trade Organization. Vivienne Westwood’s collaboration with EFI through Artisan.Fashion, the first of its kind and a groundbreaking social organization, has facilitated collaborations with local artisans, first in the Kibera slum, and now in Kenya, Nepal, Burkina Faso and Mali, to provide a steady and sustainable workflow in addition to charity.

Over the past ten years, Artisan.Fashion in Kenya has hired 28 artisan groups and employed more than 2,600 artisans, offering them interesting work and fair wages, 78% of whom are women. In Kenya, Vivienne Westwood has worked with a variety of skills and materials such as metalworking from scrap metal, screen printing, recycled dhows sails, and many others. Through Artisan.Fashion, artisan communities in Nepal (cashmere weaving), Burkina Faso (cotton weaving) and Mali (natural dyes) have also been able to obtain dignified work that directly impacts their livelihoods. The project has also enabled many rural people, hired by EFI, who previously depended on the sale of charcoal and firewood, which has a direct impact on the environment, to support themselves and their loved ones through the program without having to deplete their natural resources.

To mark this special milestone of a decade, a limited edition tote bag and bob were made by Kenyan artisans, each piece hand silkscreened with Westwood’s art and culture manifesto, ‘Mirror the World’. The graphic depicts doves and hearts in white on a bright red 100% East African cotton canvas and is complemented by a special Westwood 10th anniversary postage stamp.