Retailer Raven + Lily’s downtown HQ is nearly empty; the day after their successful Austin Fashion Week appearance, the walls—usually draped with the metallic necklaces and bracelets that the business commissions from female artisans in Ethiopia and India—are bare. Samples of their forthcoming lines are packed in cloth and scattered across tabletops, tangles of woven leather, handcrafted beads and vintage recreations glowing bronze and silver in the office lights.

“We really want to create modern, relevant designs that reflect the beauty and the culture of the women who make them,” explains Raven + Lily CEO and co-founder, Kirsten Dickerson. “We never want to lose that artisan feel but we want the pieces to be modern, something that nobody has seen.”

The company’s lines feature locally-sourced materials, from the discarded gun shells that are melted down to create tiny, intricate beading in Ethiopia, to the notebooks crafted from textile industry cotton waste in India. Raven + Lily’s designers create original, high-end looks and work with the artisans themselves to finalize each piece.

Raven + Lily’s products are all created by women who have faced seemingly inconceivable obstacles in their lives; girls rescued from brothels in Ethiopia, AIDS patients in Burundi, impoverished families in India. The socially responsible business seeks to empower women through fair employment.

“There’s no greater way for someone to feel dignity in what they do than if they know that it’s desirable, that what they do is valued, that their story is being shared.”

Katy, Texas native Dickerson (who recently relocated to Austin after a decade and a half on the West Coast) has always had a passion for ethically conscious living.

“There was a year that our family took a challenge of not buying anything new; when we lived in the heart of Hollywood—on the Walk of Fame, surrounded by materialism, beauty, fashion, all that—we decided to try it out. It was a really creative year of only buying things that were secondhand, or just being creative, making it ourselves. And, incidentally, Raven + Lily was born that year.”

The business was founded by Dickerson and her best friend, graphic designer Sophia Hirokawa Lin.

“For Sophia and I, this whole thing started because both of us care deeply about knowing how things are made,” she explains. “Learning about fashion, it becomes paralyzing when you realize there’s so much slave labor and child labor being used. And you can’t really solve the problem—but you can start somewhere.”

Raven + Lily is making great strides in exploring ways businesses can create and sustain ethical production. “We can advocate and be a voice for the voiceless and try to be a positive influence,” says Dickerson. “And hopefully, that inspires other people, and more people will want to know how things are made.”

Dickerson previously worked as an art director and costume designer alongside her husband, filmmaker Brandon Dickerson (whose 2008 documentary Call + Response features explorations of human trafficking and slavery).

“It was on a trip to India visiting three friends—one in Mumbai, who works with young girls rescued out of brothels; one in the Himalayan mountains, that works with village women; and one in a slum community in Northern India—that this idea occurred to me,” she says. “I had taken ten people from Hollywood with me to go and visit, for us to assess ways we could support this charitable work. And on that trip, we learned all three of my friends had started training women in design skills. I came home and thought, there has to be a way we can partner with them.”

Dickerson immediately began planning, getting some start-up help from couture designer Cynthia Vincent, who donated fabric remnants to the fledgling non-profit. Dickerson, Lin and friends used the castoffs to create original pieces, raising seed money for their first trip to India. Raven + Lily has been fielding partnership requests from around the globe ever since.

“For the past three years, we’ve been playing around with design ideas, selling things in smaller amounts to see what works and helping our partners learn to export, to get the quality right,” explains Dickerson. “We were, up until earlier this summer, in partnership with a much bigger non-profit, and we were able to bring in investors so we could move to a social business model—which means, really, that the heart of things doesn’t change at all, but it gives us a lot more freedom to grow, and to help as many women as possible, and then pour all the profit back into our social cause, which is empowering impoverished women.”

The number of women involved with Raven + Lily has nearly doubled in the past year and, based on the size of the latest jewelry orders, the Ethiopian workshop they’re partnered with recently brought on 50 new employees for training.

“To really do it right, it’s better to have a healthy business relationship, a mutual respect relationship, with the artisans that we’re working with versus a charity model. Our goal is to be sustainable on both sides.”

That means not only working with local, sustainable materials, but creating a work environment that truly helps women become more confident as they earn money and an artisan skill set.

“Every partnership is very holistic,” says Dickerson of the company’s business model. “That’s what I look for; are the women being cared for, are they loved and supported and honored when they come to the workplace.”

Raven + Lily doesn’t directly run their workshops; they partner with local groups and leaders who oversee production and distribution of benefits, which include educational opportunities for workers’ children, literacy programs for the artisans themselves, healthcare and even microloans.

Dickerson, Lin and their designers generally visit each group two or three times a year, and they’re currently working towards launching a new line with workers in Cambodia.

“It starts with us doing that initial trip, like Sophia and I are doing in Cambodia; we ask them to send us samples of what they’re already doing, what they have access to. It’s really different with each partnership. In Cambodia, a lot of them are skilled patternmakers already, and we can just send them ideas and ask them to come up with multiple sample versions.”

Designers and artisans work together to finalize the “blueprints,” and many women have even started creating their own personal designs.

“Our ideas have triggered creativity, and some of the women are starting to develop their own pieces. Recently, Michelle Obama went to South Africa and the director of our partnership was asked to attend an event for young African leaders with her—and she gave her one of the necklaces that the women designed.”

Eventually, Dickerson hopes, it might be possible for Raven + Lily to market these original designs, introducing more indigenous lines as the individual workshops grow.

And they’ll be doing it all from their downtown Austin offices. “My husband and I really love Austin, we’re making it our home and our kids love it,” she says. “It seems much more collaborative here, in that if one person does well everyone rejoices.”

Raven + Lily’s online store launches later this month, but you’ll also be able to find their lines at local retailer Eliza Page (who will also host their launch party this fall). And a dedicated storefront isn’t out of the question.

“I love the idea of maybe one day having the kind of store where you go in and behind every single item in the store, there’s the story of a woman. Where it’s filled with beautiful things that in and of themselves are inspiring, then there’s this whole layer of story attached to them: where it’s made, who makes it.”

Until then, Dickerson’s got plenty on her plate; with the launch of their Cambodian line, they’ll be introducing natural dyed, organic cotton tees alongside clutches and bags. They’re evaluating partners in Burundi, and are considering adding home goods and a baby collection to their roster.

While they’re dedicated to creating unique, original accessories, what Raven + Lily really want to do is show you how your fashion choices can impact the world around you.

“We want you to know that you have power to make a difference, so when you have the ability to choose something local, to choose something ethically made, to choose something handmade, we highly encourage you to do that. And it’s ok to ask questions or try to find out about it—just like people are trying to do with food—we should be doing that with fashion as well. “

For Dickerson, the bottom line is this: “Only buy what you love, and when you buy something you love, try to know the story behind it.”

---

Take a look at the Raven + Lily blog for updates from Kirsten and her team, and subscribe to their newsletter for an exclusive alert as soon as their online shop launches.