Estrella Embroidery Workshop

Los Ranchos, Chalatenango

Estrella Embroidery Workshop, the project of a small group of women, began in 1981 as a way to finance the necessities of their families and encourage solidarity. The project started out as a collaboration between a group of Salvadoran women who relocated to Honduras during the war in El Salvador. Eventually, the women returned to Chalatenango where they set up shop once more. The women who have sewn and embroidered at Estrella Embroidery Workshop have not remained constant. Instead, members of the co-operative come and go depending on their availability to work.

Currently there is relatively little business for Estrella Embroidery Workshop but the women are hopeful about internationalizing sales and seeing their enterprise grow to become a certified Salvadoran business. The conditions of daily living are fairly low for the community that this workshop is a part of. For the artisans of Estrella Embroidery Workshop, the ability to market their products has meant a facilitation of financing their subsistence.

Estrella Embroidery Workshop sews an array of products - skirts, pants, shirts, tableware, purses and stoles (liturgical vestments) are all produced at the workshop. Upon these products, the women embroider a variety of colorful, traditional designs. The finished products are beautiful and undeniably one of a kind.