As Mothers’ Day approaches, we thought we’d feature Famjoy Sehli from the Luang Prabang Fund for Culture and Conservation in Lao PDR –  one of the first-time artists who’ll be attending the Market this year.

This year, you can give a gift in honor of one of the women in your life and celebrate with this personalized Mother’s Day e-card featuring embroidery by Famjoy. Click here to make your donation and send a heartfelt Mother’s Day message supporting women around the wold.

We know mothers around the world work hard to make the world a better place for their families and communities, and Famjoy exemplifies this. The special hats and carriers Famjoy and her artisans make for their babies are just one sign of how much they value and honor their children.

Famjoy was born in Sai Lek village in Luang Namtha province, and is a member of the Yao Mien ethnic group.

Laos is home to 49 officially recognized ethnic minority groups, making up 55% of the population, and is one of the world’s least developed nations.

Ethnic minority people living in rural areas (and women in particular) are the poorest sector of the country.

Famjoy learned to embroider from her grandmother as a child, and she has now become a leader in her community in handicrafts, producing work of the highest quality.

With the help of training from NGOs, she uses her business sense and organizational skills to help women artisans to sell across the border in Thailand and in other parts of Laos.

“Doing embroidery is an important part of my life,” she says. “It is important for Mien women in general, and I’ve been lucky that I can sell a lot and support my family. Now we hire people to help work in our rice fields so I can do more embroidery… I think I have been able to sell my embroidery well because I pay attention to the designs, and what colors go together, and try to do careful work.”

Famjoy’s work includes baby hats with pom poms, bridal head scarves, hanging ornaments, money purses, men’s shirts, necklaces and pillow cases.

She and the other artisans buy undyed white cloth, which they dye for two to three weeks using indigo to get a dark blue-black color.

Working without a frame, they use three main stitches for the embroidery, and they also braid thread or yarn into cord as designs for baby carriers and hats and to use for edging on shirts, sash ends and bridal head cloths.

The artisans pride themselves on the fine stitches they produce, the complexity of their design and artistic use of color.

Fewer Yao Mien women are now practicing embroidery as they are going to school or working outside the home or village.

Embroidery requires a large time commitment, with one set of clothes taking months to complete, as a woman balances household chores, farming, raising children and cooking.

Mien women find small breaks in the day to embroider, usually outside, where the light is better.

Traditionally, Mien men and women would wear embroidered clothes every day, but now only older women do this and other members of the community wear embroidered pieces for special occasions, such as the New Year, weddings, funerals and Taoist ceremonies.

The Luang Prabang Fund for Culture and Conservation was founded in 2011 and has the mission to celebrate cultural and natural diversity in Luang Prabang and Laos through education, research, exhibition and dissemination.

Famjoy is also working with The Traditional Arts and Ethnology Center, an independent non-profit museum located in Luang Prabang.

It is the first cultural organization in Laos dedicated to the appreciation and understanding of its diverse ethnic cultures and arts.

Donate now to sponsor this first-time artist and help change a life.

Preview the Mother’s Day e-card.