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Mantua Sewing Studio Ltd
This charity receives a significant portion of its funding (specifically, more than 30% of its total revenue) directly from donations and bequests. This indicates that public contributions are a crucial financial lifeline for their mission.
This charity relies heavily on the incredible dedication of volunteers. It means their operations are significantly powered by volunteer efforts, where the collective contribution of volunteers is either substantial compared to paid staff, or their work is entirely run by volunteers. Your time and skills could make a huge difference here!We were able to achieve our overall mission and aims of providing a supportive working environment for our makers from refugee and migrant backgrounds that was dedicated to utilising their skills while also assisting them in overcoming barriers such as transportation, reducing social isolation, and building financial independence, while allowing them to be connected and contributing members of society.Mantua Sewing Studio was able to secure a training partnership with Tafe Qld, who created a machinist training programme for our makers, providing them with a solid foundation for learning all of the different technical sewing techniques on Industrial sewing machines. As a result, we were able to hire them while still supporting them to practise and improve their accuracy first, then their speed. We were able to hire a team of 7 4 trainees and 3 highly skilled support staff who provided the additional wraparound support. We were also able to assist them with transportation. All profits were reinvested into the training and employment support assistance.During this time we have also secured a partnership with a company that uses fabric made from recycled plastic bottles and fishing nets. Mantua will produce their tshirts for them from clients such as De Lorenzo and other high profile companies from a range of industries such as retail, hospitality, corporate and construction. An outcome from completing a run of Shirts for De Lorenzo was that we were able to solve another waste issue in the textile industry, by turning the smaller offcuts from the factory floor that would otherwise be discarded into another tshirt design. Using a panelling technique, the smaller offcuts are resewn and are able to be turned into more shirts.In fact, for every 5000 tees made, at least 500 additional tees can be made by repurposing the fabric scraps off the factory floor. This has helped us to achieve our secondary focus of our organisation which is to provide a local manufacturing centre for brands that want to produce in Australia, minimising the carbon miles travelled by clothing and producing long lasting garments that reduce excess waste. Partnerships like these allow us to grow our capacity to support, train and provide for more women, while helping to clean up our planet and raise manufacturing standards, one tshirt at a time.