From conflict to catwalk: Women ex-combatants weave reconciliation in Colombia

Peace should be sewn, sew by sew.

With this concept in thoughts, Ms. Avella set herself to work at a small stitching workshop in Catatumbo, Colombia, one of many dividends of the 2016 peace settlement between the Colombian Authorities and FARC rebels, designed to assist reintegrate former combatants, and heal the injuries of the conflict.

Like many former fighters, she was on the lookout for a manner to rebuild her life after the battle, and the workshop served as an area for coaching, care and empowerment for girls that may contribute to stopping gender-based violence – a spot the place they might be taught a commerce, assist one another and regain confidence in the midst of a territory marked by violence.

Together with a number of different ladies, Ms. Avella arrange Stitches for Peace, which started making sweatshirts, T-shirts and uniforms. However in 2021 the challenge took an sudden flip in direction of excessive vogue.

At an initiative led by the UN Verification Mission in Colombia, she met Lina Garcés, an economist skilled on the Externado College and the founding father of a second-hand clothes boutique known as Lina’s Closet, in Cúcuta. 

Ms. Garcés used to say that her store bought “second-chance garments,” a phrase that may quickly tackle a brand new that means.

Ms. Garcés agreed to take part, though not with out reservations. Her private historical past was marked by the armed conflict, and her household had been victims of a kidnapping, which left painful reminiscences.

Nonetheless, she determined to journey to Caño Indio, in the center of the Catatumbo jungle, the place she discovered a spot very completely different from the style world in which she labored: prefabricated lodging, zinc roofs, unpaved roads and communal bogs.

However she additionally discovered one thing she didn’t anticipate: expertise. “The ladies had a powerful capacity,” she remembers. “The one who sewed did it with unimaginable precision; the one who reduce had the heartbeat of knowledgeable.” Many had realized to deal with needle and thread in the course of the battle, mending uniforms or boots. Now that data wove one other story. 

The skirts of Ixora and reconciliation 

For fifteen days they labored intensely on designs, sizing and finishes. From these days was born the thought of making wraparound skirts with prints impressed by the Ixora flower, a plant that blooms all yr spherical and symbolizes resistance and perseverance in Catatumbo.

Because of all of the workshops, the model ‘Ixora, inclusive and autonomous’ was born. By the top of 2021, they already had a primary assortment, which they introduced on the Julio Pérez library in Cúcuta. The parade introduced collectively victims of the conflict and peace signatories on the identical catwalk. 

Someday later, throughout a dialogue on the Cúcuta E-book Honest, the place they had been invited to inform their story, Ms. Garcés instructed her household historical past for the primary time earlier than the general public. As she spoke, Ms. Avella listened to her in silence. Ms. Garcés stated in entrance of the viewers: “For me, as we speak they’re delicate ladies, who need to transfer ahead. In my view, there was forgiveness; now I need to assist them and let extra individuals know their work in order that we will stay in peace.”

The skirts started to be bought by means of Ms. Garcés’s retailer and shortly different designers had been in the initiative. Ixora started showing in vogue exhibits in Tibú, Ocaña and Bogotá, and in 2022 they arrived for the primary time at Colombiamoda, an important textile truthful in the nation. They did so once more in 2023 and 2024, as particular friends, on the catwalk.

Violence returns

Nonetheless, this story of reconciliation, entrepreneurship and peace was strongly affected in January final yr, when violence intensified once more in this area. There have been large displacements, murders of social leaders and ex-combatants, and hundreds of households had been pressured to go away their properties.

The stitching workshop had to shut. “The ladies did not need to return out of worry,” Ms. Avella remembers. At the moment, the precedence was to shield life.

Paradoxically, in the midst of that disaster got here information that that they had been ready for months: Ixora had been formally registered as a trademark in Colombia by the Superintendence of Business and Commerce. However they determined not to have fun. “It wasn’t the time,” Ms. Avella says. “There was an excessive amount of uncertainty.”

In the present day the challenge goes by means of a pressured pause. The stitching machines are nonetheless in Caño Indio, whereas the ladies are ready for ensures to have the ability to transfer to a brand new, safer area in a rural space of Cúcuta. 

Hope for the long run

Even so, the story of Ixora just isn’t over. The model has simply gained a challenge with the Company for Reincorporation and Normalization (ARN) to accompany different ladies in self-care and psychological assist processes. It’s a new stage for Ixora, which now seeks not solely to generate revenue, but additionally to provide an area of well-being for individuals who have lived by means of the impacts of the conflict.

“This challenge is a dream,” says Ms. Avella serenely. “Past the financial facet, it means protecting our affiliation alive and exhibiting that we will construct one thing completely different.”

Within the meantime, the ladies watch for the second to flip the machines again on. In Catatumbo, the place so many tales finish abruptly, Just like the flower that provides it its title, there may be hope that Ixora will bloom once more, even in probably the most tough circumstances.