About The Textile Treasury
You can now purchase from my Facebook page
My name is Charlotte Burroughs and I live in a small village on the outskirts of Portishead.
As a single parent I needed to find a way of working around my son. I trained as a homeopath and counsellor, but needed another income stream. It was important to me to ensure I could attend all his school engagements and celebrations, but be able to earn a living.
My Textile Treasury journey began - as all my important professional decisions seem to have been - in Cornwall. I came across a stall holder at a market who was selling beautiful, handcrafted, felt goods that were Fairtrade and ethical. I then discovered her connection with Nepal, and how she became involved leading to the initiation of my business.
In a nut shell - her son went to Nepal, where he hired a guide to help him with language barriers and tour routes. However, on one of their excursions they gained an additional participant. A small Nepalise boy determinedly followed them for 3 hours. They noticed he had no water, food or belongings.
They discovered his parents had nothing to give him, leading to their insistence that he leave to find his own destiny in life. Subsequently the boy walked to Kathmandu, where he saw and followed our travellers. They returned the boy to his parents, but the parents verified the story; that they could not provide for the boy, that they were heart broken but resigned that the boy had a better chance on his own. The guide agreed that he would care for, help and train the boy to enable him to become a guide.
Sadly this case is far from isolated. Many parents are forced to part with their children and some into tragic situations. In some larger towns parents learn that there are designated points, where children can be safely collected and cared for by orphanages.
Single women due to bereavement or abuse etc are often shunned and isolated as inferior members of society. Women’s cooperatives have subsequently been created to provide support, education, Fairtrade income and friendships. This provides women with the ability to gain self respect and worth, learn a trade and earn the ability to feed themselves and their families. The income also gives the orphanages with an income stream, to ensure the children are safely cared for, fed and educated.
Nepal is far from alone in creating women’s cooperatives and Fairtrade organisations and they are in fact in many countries. I support them in a small way by buying some of my stock from women’s cooperatives, and publicising their existence and wonderful products.
I started The Textile Treasury in 2015, after leaning some poignant life lessons after having my credit card abused by someone I “trusted”. Subsequently I was engulfed by stock from different countries, and discovered the stark reality that this stock was in fact my property and financial liability.
The “trust” was broken, but I was forced to create a means of reverting the mass of stock into cash. I started attending markets and events and discovered my son and I really enjoyed them, I met great people and the reversion of stock into cash began.
The business name was created:
The Textile Treasury. I designed the logo and the rest is history.
During the past 5 years I have discovered the richness and diversity of product lines from different countries, enriched our lives by turning adversity into positivity and made some great friends.
I am now a regular trader at Tobacco Factory Sunday Market, Clevedon Sunday Market and Shirehampton Monthly Market and many annual events, fetes and Christmas markets. The events list is constantly evolving as I learn about different events from other traders.
I am doing my best to educate myself with technology, so hope to participate more widely imminently.
I hope you like the products in my product photos. If you like anything, or require any further information - please do not hesitate to contact me.
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Email:
I look forward to hearing from you or to meeting you at some point.
