MOSSEL Bay Tourism is helping to empower the local community by putting people to work at the Crafts Arts Workshop.
The workshop, which occupies the building next door to Mossel Bay Tourism, is run by Hein Marais who heads a group of 16 artists and craftspeople that make their living out of creating cards, bags, paintings, coasters, pot stands and many other items.
“We saw the need for local artists to manage their businesses in a more professional way and we’ve sponsored the work of a facilitator who has guided them towards this goal,” says Mossel Bay Tourism’s marketing manager, Debra Bouwer. “Tourists are the Craft Arts Workshop’s main customers and because we strongly believe that tourism is a force for positive change in South Africa we’re excited to be involved in developing a group of dedicated people literally on our doorstep.”
Locally inspired products, such as corrugated cardboard and corrugated tin spice and gift boxes, spoons made from shells and quills, tapestries, paper mache birds, African themed bowls and carrier bags with township collages (or ‘tin shack art’), are sold to domestic and international markets through the showroom on the premises and further a field to companies as corporate gifts.
