Long time no see
It’s been a pretty busy couple of months, hence being so quiet on my blog. Not only have we moved house in Japan, with summer holidays the kids are back in the UK visiting grandparents and I’ve been based in the London office. It’s been a great opportunity to really catch up with the UK team, to do some face-to-face media interviews (look out for one in The Times this Saturday in the Body & Soul section) and a chance to catch up with friends in London too, which with my usual flying visits, I just don’t get a chance to do.
Over the last couple of weeks I’ve had regular meetings with our designers to plan out the Autumn/Winter collection for 2007 – when this year’s Autumn/Winter collection hasn’t even gone on sale yet! It’s always so exciting to see the beginnings of a whole new collection take shape, and imagine how the pieces will be brought to life by our different producer groups around the world.
Another fascinating meeting that I’ve had this week was with the incredible John Bird, the man who set up The Big Issue. It’s a big birthday for The Big Issue this year as well for People Tree, so we had lots of plans for joint birthday celebrations later in the year.
I’m off to Kenya on Sunday, to visit producers there, including running some quality control workshops at Bombolulu, the group who make the beautiful handbeaten metal jewellery in the People Tree collection. It’s a really inspiring project, set up to give job opportunities to people with physical disabilities, who in Kenya are often totally excluded from society and find it nearly impossible to secure work. Watch this space next week for the latest news from Bombolulu.