Haku Handmade was founded in 2016 by Alejandra Calvache. After a trip to a city in the Ecuadorian Andes, she realized there were very skilled leather artisans that were just lacking a little guidance to improve their designs to increase their sales. Therefore, she decided to create a line of leather accessories, born of the artisans’ extensive crafting knowledge and of her desire to create high quality and innovative products that would help them “revive” this industry and preserve their jobs. They succeeded and by 2021 Haku Handmade incorporated new communities with other crafting skills and natural materials to follow their mission: create sustainable contemporary accessories that celebrate and preserve heritage craftsmanship while empowering artisans with fair living wages.

Haku means “let’s go” in Kichwa language, the mother tongue of the people who live in the Andean Mountains, and the language some of their artisans speak. They wanted to connect the Ecuadorian culture to the world and found an empowering word to do so. Haku seeks to create unique products honoring crafters and materials through collaborative design and knowledge exchange.