El Refugio, Colombia

A young silversmith learns his craft.

Fundación El Refugio/jovenesorfebres has been developing projects to prevent social problems for the past 15 years in different zones of Bogotá.

The target population has mostly been young teenagers and their families who participate in the foundation’s holistic care project. This project has won the recognition of its community and has seen clear results whose proof is in the successful life projects achieved by many of the young people and the favourable impact generated in its zones of influence.

The foundation’s proposal is to run basic and specialised jewellery workshops for young people. These workshops would also provide training in the design of the jewels and would back up this technical training with training in entrepreneurship, human development and social skills.

El Refugio is training around 100 young people and adults, particularly women.

Over the past two years, the foundation has developed important alliances with state entities such as the Subsecretariat for Youth in the Mártires neighbourhood where it is training around 100 young people and adults (particularly women) free of charge. Besides this, the foundation has participated in different youth leadership and youth participation programmes.

It has participated in a United Nations competition for training and youth production by contributing the establishment of a small sales outlet in Usaquén, a very important zone in the City of Bogotá.

With the sale of jewellery and training workshops for people with the means to pay, the foundation is self-financing. This enables it to afford the training of groups of young people, the payment of teachers, materials for jewellery-making, rent and other expenses.

This kind of exercise, while allowing El Refugio/ jovenesorfebres to exist and to do its work, does not allow it any logistical change, growth or improvement. The foundation has worked in the centre of Bogotá for fifteen years, receiving families and young people, so it knows its target population well, and is well-known by the people of the neighbourhood. Now the foundations sees it as very important to widen its project to other young people in Bogotá, to find clients for the productive business (shops, retailers etc.), and so to give the foundation continuity.

The aim is also to participate in international fairs and become members of organizations which promote fair trade and responsible consumption. First however, the foundation must be able to make the required changes in production and in sales.

The foundation has never had its own premises, something which would allow it to project in time and grow towards other domains of intervention. For this reason, it has decided to focus its work in the locality of Usaquén. At the moment it believes that it is possible and important to do this, given the diagnosis of Usaquén’s authorities on the opportunity of working with young people and the few free cultural opportunities there are in the neighbourhood. At the same time, focusing work on the zone of Usaquén would help widen the influence of the sales outlet thanks to the purchasing power of the other, wealthier, segment of the population.

Silversmithing at El Refugio

To achieve these objectives the foundation would like to rent a house with a big living room and several smaller rooms which would serve as school, workshops and living quarters at the same time.

You can find out more about the project and its work here: www.jovenesorfebres.redtienda.net / www.jovenesorfebres.blogspot.com.