Carol Cassidy Studio in Vientienne, Laos

Pictured here are some of Carol Cassidy's weavers making the thread that will next be dyed. Carol, as mentioned before is a world reknown weaver of fine and very expensive fabric. She works with designers from all over the world and is the primary source of special design fabrics for major designers in New York.

While the work we saw was, indeed, very beautiful what impressed me the most about Carol is her industry with and compassion for women of the area who otherwise have little or no opportunities to make a living.

Further, she had recently, at the time we visited, begun flying once a month on a hold your breath plane and flight to a small village in Cambodia. The village like so many in Cambodia* has a good number of women who are victims of land mines. There Carol is teaching those women to weave with the intention of employing them in the studio she has set up there in the village. When we spoke with her she was spoke of being fatigued by these trips but detirmined to continue as long as energy permitted.

It must be said here that she pays the women well and maintains excellent working conditions and hours for them all.

Tom and I both parted Carol's studio thinking that, in addition to the awards she must surely receive for design, she should be awarded a major humanitarian award. It is not often that we are priviledged to see someone changing so many lives in such significant ways.

* Cambodia is the most heart wrenching place any of us had ever been. I will post pictures from there shortly.