Ahead of our forthcoming collaboration with Love Welcomes, we want to share the story of the project, and take you behind the scenes in Love Welcomes' London workshop to introduce you to the people that made each scarf. This collaboration occurred through a chance meeting between Migrate Art’s and Love Welcomes’ founders Simon and Abi, who were both invited to lunch by a mutual friend at the beginning of 2022. The values of both organisations totally aligned and after visiting the Love Welcomes workshop and meeting their amazing team of refugee women, the idea for Moral Fibres came to life.
As soon as the idea had formulated we began reaching out to artists- and unsurprisingly, everyone we spoke to loved the project. We specifically chose to approach London-based, female artists, to show Love Welcome's fantastic team of refugee women that they are supported by London's creative community. We took the artists down to the Love Welcomes workshop so they could meet their team and chat about what was and wasn't possible, and which aspects of their work could work best for a scarf. Once designs had been confirmed it was over the Love Welcomes team, who rose to the challenge and created superb quality scarves, all made by hand. We have tried to ensure the project has been a collaboration at every stage of the process. The Love Welcomes team have been integral throughout the process- they not only made each scarf, but they also modelled them for our photoshoot, signed each certificate of authenticity with the artists, packed every box, and will be in attendance at our launch event to celebrate along with us.
Whilst discussing packaging, another idea began to grow. How could we ensure the packaging had as much care and consideration as the scarves themselves? After seeing a box full of discarded life jackets that had been recovered from the beaches of Greece, we knew these had to be included in some way. Alongside Love Welcomes, we designed a sleeve for each box that has been made from these very life jackets. Due to them being from a range of lifejackets, each sleeve differs in colour, and some have retained marks from the journeys they undertook across the ocean.
This is a project we are extremely proud of and have hugely enjoyed working with Love Welcomes and their entire team. We have worked hard to ensure we are making a positive contribution at every stage of the journey, and feel it is one of our most accomplished projects to date. We hope you enjoy it- these scarves will make the perfect Christmas present for a loved one, and every purchase will support the incredible Love Welcomes team to keep doing what they do.
A special thanks to Tashi and Siobhán for all their hard work on this project too.