I got the chance to virtually chat with Ryan Wright, the creator of the magical clothing brand Anye. Peep our email convo to find out how you can contribute to their animal liberation fund if you're an animal lover, how you can connect if you're an artist who wants to make a difference, and then check their website to find out how their creative pricing strategy looks out for you, too.
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"Anye (the Sanskrit for “others”) is an innovative social enterprise promoting altruism, compassion, and loving-kindness. The basic premise of Anye is to encourage and promote cherishing others, which is rooted in the belief that this is what leads to human happiness"
1. From your website, its clear that your inspiration came from your spiritual journey while you were in India. Was there a specific moment you can tell us about that directly inspired Anye?
I was doing a 4 month meditation retreat in India, in Bodh, Gaya, which is the place where Buddha became enlightened in fact! The Tara Children's Project is there. It is run by an amazing dharma centre called Root Institute. Anyway, during this retreat I really just became full of a deep desire to use my life to improve the lives of others. As I write that, it sounds a bit hokey but that is what happened. I really just felt a lot of love and compassion for all living beings and wanted to alleviate suffering any way that I could. TCP is an orphanage for children with HIV and having HIV in a place like India, where there is a lot of stigma, is pretty tough. India is huge and people often get left by the wayside there especially if they have a disability, are poor, have no familial support, or have a chronic illness. So being an orphan with HIV is a pretty tough spot to be in, anywhere, but especially in India! So the idea just popped into my head one day on a break from practicing, to use my creative energy to try and help these kiddos. Medication is free in India, which is amazing but getting an education is really the most important chance they have to overcome the stigma they face. And so that's where we are trying to help. Later we added the Pundarika Humanitarian Foundation because of the amazing education programs they provide for young girls from Nepal and Tibet, girls who wouldn't otherwise maybe get a chance to go to school.
To be honest, I'd likely still be in India and Nepal had I not got ill over there. I got really sick at the end of those 4 months and was forced to return to Canada. So, once home, I found amazing designers to get involved with me and we just started coming up with ideas. As a side note, Animal liberation is one of my favourite practices to do in Asia and so, after coming home, we just formalized that project as part of what we do here too! You can learn more about it at www.anye.org if you are interested.
2. I love that your clothing is sweatshop free! Can you tell us where it's made, and by whom?
To be honest, I'd likely still be in India and Nepal had I not got ill over there. I got really sick at the end of those 4 months and was forced to return to Canada. So, once home, I found amazing designers to get involved with me and we just started coming up with ideas. As a side note, Animal liberation is one of my favourite practices to do in Asia and so, after coming home, we just formalized that project as part of what we do here too! You can learn more about it at www.anye.org if you are interested.
2. I love that your clothing is sweatshop free! Can you tell us where it's made, and by whom?
For our clothes, most of our stuff is printed locally in Saskatoon, Canada on Jerico blanks. Jerico is a socially conscious apparel supplier here in Canada. They are a really great company! We have also looked into using Me to We style blanks but haven't solidified anything with them yet. We used to print on Anvil Organic as well, especially for our mens stuff as they were really great to us when we first started out just printing for local customers.. We seem to equate sweatshop-free with Canadian made or US made, etc. So as of now Jerico is the company we like the best!
3. Your monthly animal liberations are so cool! How can us animal lovers help you?
3. Your monthly animal liberations are so cool! How can us animal lovers help you?
The best way to help us is to donate to the monthly liberation project via our website. This is a way for people to directly contribute, save the lives of animals, and get a whole bunch of sweet, virtue karma!
Importantly, our animal liberation efforts are peaceful, meaning we purchase the animals. They involve a lot of prayers as well, prayers for the animals and their long lives, prayers for the upliftment of all life on this planet, prayers for the environment, etc. We also try to never buy from the same store/seller more than once so as not to create more of a market for the buying and selling of animals and insects and we always return the animals back to the same eco-system they came from. This is really important. As an example, if liberating fish or lobsters we make sure to put them back in the ocean or lake they came out of. Hopefully that all makes sense.
Importantly, our animal liberation efforts are peaceful, meaning we purchase the animals. They involve a lot of prayers as well, prayers for the animals and their long lives, prayers for the upliftment of all life on this planet, prayers for the environment, etc. We also try to never buy from the same store/seller more than once so as not to create more of a market for the buying and selling of animals and insects and we always return the animals back to the same eco-system they came from. This is really important. As an example, if liberating fish or lobsters we make sure to put them back in the ocean or lake they came out of. Hopefully that all makes sense.
4. I'm from New York City, and I know there are heaps of great artists who would love the opportunity to work with a brand like yours. How can they get in touch with you, and are there any qualifications?
Anye is always looking for new artists to work with. So if you know of people we would love to hear from them. We don't have any set qualifications we are looking for really, just people who would like to collaborate for social good. Giulio Rossi is our main designer right now, and he has been so amazing to work with, but we are always looking to collaborate with new people as every artist has their own amazing talents and style! Our hope is to grow to a point where we can have numerous talented designers creating for the education programs and then Anye can, in turn, highlight these artist in every way possible! Kind of like one big community of altruism! This way we would be able to highlight the social and eco practices as well as promoting the work of each artist. You can see on our site that we have a call out for new artists that might want to work with us. We are always excited to connect with new people. http://www.anye.org/artists/
Photos taken from Anye website. Thanks, Ryan!
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