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WE?
PURA UTZ means PURE QUALITY — PURE GOOD — AMAZING — It is a mix of spanish and the ancient Mayan dialect quiché. It is also used as an expression of happiness, goodness and quality. Our products are handmade and handcrafted by Mayan women from the rural Highlands of Guatemala. Our products are made to honor and create a sustainable income for the incredible women we work with. We never compromise when it comes to fair wages and good working conditions – and we are devoted to creating value in the lives of the people we work with. PURA UTZ is the love for unique, indigenous and colorful products. It is the compassion for people, tribal traditions and meaningful shopping. Founded by a young Danish woman, Anna, who has lived, worked and travelled in Guatemala since she was a young girl. The business values come from a place of belonging and loving this country.
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ARE
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WHO
OUR DNA
WE ARE MADE OF PEOPLE. We want to create value in the lives of the women we work with! All our products are produced to honor and to create a sustainable income for the incredible women and their families. The obvious value is the income, as one weaving will generate one month worth of salary. But we also want to create value in the form of acknowledgement — showing the women that people all over the world value their weaving skills. We work with individual women, cooperatives and Non-profit organizations in different parts of Guatemala.
WE ARE UNIQUE. The different regions of Guatemala are characterized by a certain weaving style, to tell a story of where you belong and where you were born. Each textile will always be unique as it is hand woven by individual women, who each add their own style and skills to the work. You will never find two textiles that are the same.
WE ARE HANDMADE. All our styles have been carefully selected and designed by us. We both redesign vintage hand woven textiles into unique accessories — and create new unique patterns and color combinations for our interior line of products. All our products are handmade which allows perfect imperfections that no machine will ever be able to replicate. With PURA UTZ you will ALWAYS buy a unique and handmade product! We put great attention into the details and we never compromise when it comes to quality and style.
WE ARE COLORFUL. We want to add colors to your simplistic style to put bubbles of joy in your mind, to make you smile on a grey day and to add uniqueness and edge to your style. We have given in to the addiction of colors — and we want you to do the same. It is a chemical reaction!
WE EMPOWER WOMEN. By creating new designs with an ancient craft, the women are enabled to create an income for themselves and their families — creating a space of self-sufficiency and confidence. Because it is not just about the money, it is about acknowledging existence and worth. Every time you buy one of our products, you are impacting and empowering women from Guatemala.
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“When I founded PURA UTZ it was a dream of working for the empowerment of the Mayan women through their crafts and skills. For many years I have considered Guatemala my second home. Visiting the country for the first time when I was around eleven years old, proved to create a certain path for me in life so far. Since then I have undertaken numerous travels to Guatemala, working as a volunteer teacher, nurse and eventually doing my thesis on the reproductive health of the Mayan women. l feel a profound compassion and love for Guatemala — the amazing people, the diverse culture, the endless colors, shapes and forms, the tremendous mountains and volcanoes, the lush forest and jungles, the Mayan religion, the ancient dialects and everything in between the old school buses and corn tortillas. PURA UTZ is to me a dream of living a life in close relation to Guatemala. It’s a dream of connecting worlds, it’s a dream of being creative, it’s a dream of making a difference in someone else’s life, it’s a dream of adding warmth and color to Scandinavian homes through sustainable quality design and, furthermore, it’s a dream of honoring ancient weaving craft and traditions”
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Anna founded PURA UTZ in September 2013, where she set off on a journey to create both a meaningful business and path in life. She packed her backpack with the vision of working for the empowerment of Mayan women through design and trade.
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ANNA
O F W E AV I N G
Our products are loomed and embroidered on the back strap loom. Usually each woman will spend between three to four weeks to weave a panel of 40x80 cm. If you do the math, this means that one pillow creates a month worth of income for one woman and her family — and one floor pillow creates to months worth of income.
WE LOVE THAT!
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PROCESS
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THE
THE M AYA N D R E S S ‘TRAJE’
SHIRT. The top part is called a ‘Güipil/Huipil’. It is hand woven and embroidered on a back strap loom — and one of these can take up to a year to create. It is an art that the women have mastered for more than 2000 years and generally is passed on from generation to generation. Each region and village of Guatemala has its significant design and pattern — this particular one is from the region Nahualá.
BELT. The belt is called a ‘Faja’. It is also loomed on a back strap loom — the color combinations, size and pattern is more freely made, meaning that it is not limited to the area where you live.
SKIRT. The skirt is called a ‘Córte’, which interestingly is always loomed by the men on a large foot loom. The process is very different, as you will be able to create several meters and widths of the same pattern fabric. What the women do to differentiate their cortés is to embroider a small ‘ranta’, which is a line of colorful threads that can take the form of diamonds, spiders or other animals like cats.
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PURA UTZ STYLE
If style could actually talk — the Mayan textiles would enthrall you in a magical tale of living connected with nature and earth. Each color represents an element of the earthly living. Blue is the sky, red is the blood running in the human being, yellow and orange represent rays of light from the sun and brown and black is the soil in which they grow vegetables and flowers. Everything has significance! They embroider diamond shapes as symbols of all the hundreds of communities in the Highlands, the triangle peaks honor the thirty three majestic volcanoes and the animal heads have two sides — one that represents the present and the opposite that tells the story of each persons past.
We find this so beautiful — and beautiful never goes out of style!
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JACKETS
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CLUTCHES
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BAGS
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PURA UTZ LIVING
Welcome the Highlands of Guatemala inside your living room. Embrace the weavings as the adventure they are! Having been brought to life by the hands that threaded them, the hands that loomed them, the hands that gave them life and the hands that master an art that is more than 2000 years old. Embrace a product that took its first steps in a wooden house high up in the mountains between clouds, volcanoes, cornfields and small open pit fires to reach a new world — a world so distinct from where it came.
Connecting worlds through trade of ancient and unique craftsmanship!
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PILLOWS
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TEXTILES & SIZES Customize your pillow Available in: 80x80cm, 30x60cm, 50x70cm & 45x45cm
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— Lookbook 2015
THANKS TO TAP1 Old Kbh
ART DIRECTION and GRAPHIC DESIGN WDV STUDIO