Meet Kathy
When she is sewing, Kathy feels that she is being creative, making something that requires care and attention. She loves seeing how things develop from the pattern to the finished cushion. She is one of 20 women who make the IKEA ÅTERSTÄLLA cushion collection in the Ellas lo bordan workshop.
What I like most about the workshop is that it makes me and my son feel safe”
Kathy is the latest to join the workshop. Until then, she had been working as a carer for the elderly. At the beginning, it was difficult for her to keep up with the pace that the others had already established after their training, but she was given a warm welcome and felt highly motivated.
“I like so many things about the workshop! But what I like best is that it makes me and my son feel safe“, says Kathy.
A few years ago, before all this, she was studying Administrative Management. She loves numbers! “I couldn’t finish my studies at the time, because I had a lot of problems... I was alone with my son, and I had nowhere to go,” she explains.
A full and calm life
But those problems belong in a past that is now becoming a distant memory among fabric and sewing machines. Here and now, what Kathy enjoys most is when production is in full swing. She doesn’t even notice the time passing. The concentration in the workshop is almost palpable. You can really sense the enthusiasm in this place.
Kathy is happy here. She is happy knowing that she and her son are safe now: she could never have imagined that such support and such an opportunity existed.
“Ellas lo bordan is the best thing that could ever have happened to me.”
“Now I am happy in my work, and I feel that I’ve been very fortunate to have joined this project. This is the best thing that could ever have happened to me,” she declares happily.
Now, Kathy is in charge of the storage system simply because she is good at working with numbers: inventories, stock, etc. She is also going to help out in Administration and Finance.
She thought her life was only about just surviving. Now she realises that it is so much more than that. Kathy is a woman who has been empowered, and who is now sewing herself a great future, full of possibilities.
