lending an ear for better mental health
with small, meaningful moments of creativity and connection
purpose driven jewellery, handmade in Aotearoa New Zealand
Arias Design Co donates 20% of proceeds to the Mental Health Foundation under our Lend an Ear campaign.
Find out more about the Mental Health Foundation and their work here:
the cause:
With estimates that 47% of us will experience mental illness in our lifetime - according to Statistics NZ - it's paramount that everyone in Aotearoa New Zealand has decent access to mental health care, support and services.
When people are struggling with mental distress or mental illness, it often takes a lot to reach out for help. When they do, we believe they need to be met with a mental health system that provides robust and effective care. They need to be able to access services, support and care that are affordable and available, and to be confident that asking for help means they'll receive it.
On a wider scale, we want better education on mental health and wellbeing. We'd love to see a deeper understanding on how we can manage our mental health on a day-to-day basis, and a greater awareness around the steps to take when we have concerns.
With your support allowing us to donate 20% of proceeds to the Mental Health Foundation, we hope to help make it happen.
the reason:
There is, of course, some context as to why this is a cause particularly close to my heart. As well as handling my own challenges with mental illness over the years, I've seen the issues surrounding it devastate lives of family and friends, ending in too many losses.
In 2020, a few months into a particularly rough spiral I was struggling to get on top of, I lost my youngest brother too. He was 22.
I couldn't go home to the UK because of my visa status & pandemic restrictions, and didn't know when that would change. The grief and stress threw me into a crisis that I almost didn't come back from.
To cut a long story short, I was fortunate enough to be able to get help. I started medication alongside seeing different kinds of therapists. At one point, one of them made an off hand comment about "trying something creative, with your hands" when we were talking about dissociation. At another point not long after, I made my first pair of polymer clay earrings.
I found making jewellery brought me back to my immediate surroundings, and I was noticing colours and textures more again. To my surprise, this new sense of creativity was making me want to reconnect with the world again. After a while, determined to seek out new shades of green, I did.
As I got out and about more, so did Arias Design Co. Supportive words from happy customers let me build up my self esteem again. Watching people light up when talking about the person they were buying jewellery for gave me that sense of human connection back. I found community when setting up my jewellery stall at local markets, both in customers and my supposed 'competition'. I saw the happy irony in how the jewellery business I started to make an impact on mental health, had made such an impact on mine.
When Arias Design Co launched, the Lend an Ear campaign launched with it, in memory of my brother. It was my way of honouring him. Something good I could do with what I was making. A way I could channel this newfound creativity to raise funds and awareness for better mental health.
Originally, making jewellery came from a need to cope. It began to stem from a desire to create instead, before turning into a tool to connect. Now, because of you, it's how we contribute.
