Blog-series: No Step Wasted, Gratitude for the Journey #2 | The Jewelry Activist: Crafting Socioeconomic Resilience with Caleb’s Hope
A reflection on wearable solidarity, social design, and the deeper meaning of beautiful things…
In 2008, I donated jewelry, not just pieces of metal and stone, but the hours of my hands, the language of my imagination, and a deep belief that beauty can build bridges. It wasn’t just for fashion. It was for women and children in Northern Uganda, whose lives had been torn apart by war, gender-based violence, HIV/AIDS, and displacement.
This was part of my volunteer work with Caleb’s Hope, a Canadian charity doing transformative work in post-conflict Northern Uganda. Their mission? Bold and disarmingly simple: Rebuilding the Region. Rehabilitating the People. Their philosophy? Even bolder: To go out of business.
Unlike many traditional NGOs, Caleb’s Hope was built with the intention of making itself obsolete (and they did!). They did not seek to be a permanent crutch for the communities they served. They saw the women and children of Uganda not as passive recipients of aid, but as active agents of their own restoration. The projects were co-designed with the women they served, projects like NYARA, which generated income through locally-made goods and village banking, with a focus on sustainability, dignity, and autonomy.
And that was the beating heart of their approach: No one needs a saviour. No one needs pity. What they needed—and what we all need—are practical and compassionate solutions with tangible results.
Designing for Justice
I volunteered as a fashion and jewelry designer for two benefit fundraising events hosted in Vancouver BC:
Be! Here! Now! Benefit Gala (2008)
ART 4 GULU (2009)
At both, I donated my custom handcrafted jewelry pieces to raise funds and awareness for the NYARA Project. All of the pieces incorporated paper-bead materials sourced through the women of NYARA, an intentional collaboration between my (then) design practice in Vancouver and the resilient makers in Uganda. It was a symbolic loop: connecting hearts across continents, through art and craft.
But this was more than charity, it was a statement. That adornment could be activism. That storytelling could be crafted into recycled paper made into beads. That the hands that make beauty are the same hands that heal.
For these two events, I also designed for and styled Holly Elissa Dignard, the founder of Caleb’s Hope - an actor, activist, and visionary. You might recognize and remember her from shows like Battlestar Galactica, Whistler, Stargate SG-1, or Hellcats. We worked together to embody values through style, dressing her for the events, where I incorporated the paper-beads from the NYARA Project into the designs.
Featured in Hello! Magazine Canada, where my work was credited alongside other creatives contributing to the movement of "stars raising hope" in Vancouver.
The last event I did with Caleb’s Hope would also become the last major event I attended before moving back to Norway in 2009. After seven transformative years in Vancouver, studying, working, growing, life took a sharp turn: my mother was diagnosed with stage 5 cancer.
Everything I had built in Canada; my networks, my career beginnings, the designs that were just starting to gain attention, were suddenly paused. Or so I thought then. Looking back, it was not a pause, but a pivot. A redirection toward purpose.
And I realize now, not a single step was wasted.
This chapter, like so many in my life, seemed isolated at first. A detour, perhaps. But it is now clear to me that these experiences - volunteering, designing with intention, co-creating across borders, helped shape the values that underpin Sumati Group, my work today as a multidisciplinary founder, researcher, creative and storyteller.
Caleb’s Hope wasn’t just about helping others. It was a mirror reflecting what was possible when people built with, not for, a lesson I carry with me today.
We often think of jewelry as decorative. But that season taught me it can be declarative. A symbol of who we stand with. Of how we choose to show up. Of what we choose to heal.
We never know how one bead, one choice, one project, or one goodbye might fit into the greater mosaic of our lives. But in time, the pattern always emerges. And when it does, it often reveals a purpose deeper than we imagined.
I’m grateful to Caleb’s Hope, for the honor of co-creating, for the women of Uganda whose strength still echoes in my work, and for the unexpected clarity that comes from designing, not just with materials, but with meaning.
Here’s to every seemingly small step that was never wasted.
Here’s to designing hope.
No Step Wasted, Gratitude for the Journey is a blog series of reflections from my interdisciplinary life. Each post is a love letter to the generalist’s path, to trusting that every chapter, even the ones we don’t yet understand, may one day reveal their place in our deepest calling.
