We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Laura Grier. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Laura below.
Laura, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?
Determined to share the energy of the Inca culture with the world and to help bring awareness and find income opportunities for female Quechua artisans and their cultural practices, my business partner Pats and I came up with the concept of Andeana Hats. We are combining the hat styles of the Andes with their traditional weavings to create apparel that captures the energy and culture of the Andean people and infuses it into the everyday life of those who wear them.
We partnered with Awamaki, a non-profit organization based in Ollantaytambo in the Sacred Valley, who work closely together with multiple indigenous communities in the remote mountains of Peru. Together we invest in women’s skills, connect them to global marketplaces, and create sustainable income opportunities to help lead their communities out of poverty.
Every Andeana Hat and Intention Band is hand shaped or woven out of alpaca wool by Quechua artisans living in the Andes Mountains of Peru. So people who buy our hats can LOOK GOOD, FEEL GOOD, and DO GOOD!
Laura, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I am an Adventure travel photographer and writer and I have been shooting all over the world for the past 23 years. My most notable work has been shooting for National Geographic’s artisan catalog that represents global artisans practicing “Vanishing Arts” around the world. Through my photography work I have been able to meet and have access to incredible artisans around the world in remote places. I specifically fell in love with the Quechua artisans in the Andes of Peru.
Thus the concept for “Andeana Hats” was born, because of the shared affinity for the Sacred Valley, Peru, its culture, energy and people by myself and my co-founder Pats Krysiak. While trekking together on the infamous Ausangate trek across the Rainbow Mountains four years ago, we came across many amazing Andean women and were captivated with their unique hats and weavings. Determined to share the energy of the Sacred Valley with the world and to help bring awareness to these female artisans and their cultural practices, we came up with the concept of a hat company that combines their traditional hat styles and weavings.
We are proud to say that Andeana Hats is female owned, Latina-owned, and also supports Latina women throughout Central and South America. All of our hats are sustainably made and we work with female Quechua Artisans, the descendants of the Inca people in rural communities in the Sacred Valley Peru and K’iche artisans in Guatemala, the descendants of the Maya who are still using ancient weaving techniques and hat-making processes that have been passed down in their families for centuries.
What makes our hats so unique are the subtle imperfections of the Quechua artisan’s work. Due to the traditional nature of our craft, no two hats or bands will ever be exactly alike. We are very committed to not disrupting the flow of their village life and allowing them the freedom to weave and work at their own pace that allows for their farming and families’ schedules. Because of this, each hat takes about 3 weeks to complete and we produce limited quantities of Andeana Hats every month.
The Quechua language is an oral or woven language; not written, so by keeping these weaving designs alive we are essentially keeping their language and history alive. Each woven “Intention band” has a different Quechua meaning and can be changed on any hat allowing the wearer to choose the intention they want to wear. We wanted to pay homage to Pachamama, or Mother Earth, by acknowledging the energy and spirituality of the Andean people through each woven design on our hats.
Our mission is to help our consumers understand quality and sustainability when they are buying a handmade product vs. a factory made mass-produced product. By supporting women in underserved communities, you are helping to not only lift them but their families out of poverty, preserve an ancient craft, create a quality all natural product that doesn’t hurt the environment, and shift the world out of the mindset of “fast fashion” which has contributed to many environmental issues.
Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?
When we first came up with the idea of our hat company, we did not have any start-up capital. I used $5,000 of my own money to fly down to Peru, meet with the artisans with my business partner, and have 5 sample hats made with various woven bands. Once we had those made I photographed them on my business partner as a model and then put up a website to start taking “pre-orders” for our hats. We did a launch event in LA when we only had 5 hats created, and gave discounts to people that pre-ordered hats. We used that event to share our story and images and get people excited about the product. Due to the handmade nature of our product, people understood and were willing to wait 2 months to get their pre-oredered hat. From that event we raised enough money to place our first large order of hats and to get our business off the ground.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
We were leading our first Andeana Hats women’s retreat to meet our artisans in March of 2020 right as the world was shutting down. On the last 2 days of our journey, we got word that the president of Peru was going to shut down the borders in 24 hours either trapping us in or out and also shutting down all shipping in and out of the country. We knew this was a major crisis not only for the people on the retreat, but for our artisans who depend on tourism dollars and selling our hats to survive. We quickly went into “crisis mode” and packed up every hat into boxes that we had in Peru within hours and asked each person on the trip to carry a box back to help get them out of the country so we could continue to sell them during the pandemic. We all barely made it out on the last flights before they shut the borders and it was the most intense travel day of my life, but that quick thinking was what saved our business and also helped the women to have income during an almost 2 year period where they were cut off from the world and unable to make income.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.andeanahats.com
- Instagram: @andeanahats
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/andeanahats/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/andeana-hats/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZ00qeYo3PQ
Image Credits
All Peru images photo credit is Laura Grier Photo of Laura holding a camera was shot by Jessica Sterling