For Cindy Reese-Mitchell, pairing emerging Canberra designers with refugees looking for work is not a "refugee issue" but a "social and community issue".
"This is a win-win. We've got these designers who can do great things but they can't necessarily sew, and we've got these people who can sew but who can't get jobs," she said.
The CEO and founder of No Sweat Fashions (NSF), a not-for-profit enterprise specialising in sample making, says the conversation surrounding refugees focuses too much on how many people arrive in Australia or the difficult journey they have taken, but not on how they will rebuild their lives.
Instead, the enterprise hopes to provide new Australians with creatively stimulating jobs, which lets participants use "old skills to build a new life", while receiving certified training and wages at above-award rates.
But the journey of NSF itself has been 18 months in the making, with the label's settlement just beginning with its first commercial launch.
NSF's products are all of a collaborative design, meaning refugee participants have also provided input into the final result.
Bala and his wife Suba arrived in Australia from Sri Lanka four years ago and have been associated with NSF from the very beginning in 2011.
Suba was closely involved with creating the newly launched products and while Bala does not attend sewing classes, he proudly supports the group at their launch.
"When we arrived here [we] were no where. We had no-where to go. No Sweat Fashions has accommodated us since it started," Bala told SBS.
He says the enterprise has provided the couple with many friends and is pleased his wife is gaining work experience and training.
A donation in the form of scholarships from the Canberra Institute of Technology means many NSF participants are enrolled in a Certificate III in Clothing Production, including Suba.
"Because of the English she finds [the classes] a little difficult, but stitching-wise she is fine," Bala said.
Finding funds to keep the enterprise afloat has been an uphill battle with Federal Government unable to help.
"We don't fit into any one box. The Department of Immigration deal with refugee settlement, they don't deal with employment. And the Department of Employment don't deal with settlement, but we straddle both," Cindy explains.
And while the group understands the nature of politics, they feel the community conversation of how refugee groups are seen can be patronizing.
NSF Chair, Veronica Wensing, lamented at how one funding opportunity was lost because the donor did not deal with employment.
"Basically they got back to us and said: 'Well we don't do employment but if you can get them together to do quilting, we'll support that,'" she recounted.
"To be told that you would have got the money if it was just women sitting around quilting in a circle was just offensive. What good does that do?"
Veronica concedes there is a social place for such community groups, but says NSF provides broader education including teaching the refugees about their rights and responsibilities at work.
"Some of them do casual work and it's come up that they're being under-paid, or [are receiving] no penalty rates, no awareness of safety. And we're able to say: 'Oh hang on, that's not right,' and give advice."
There are 23 refugee participants involved in NSF, with members coming from Burma, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan and Ghana.
While language can be a barrier, it has not stopped the group from achieving any of its goals. Cindy, a former US-resident compares the chatter of the group to a "New York kitchen".
"It's this weird English that's coming out, but to me that's the greatest success of all what we're doing. Those divisions don't even exist."
Creative Director, Penina Huho, says the constant contact has helped many women gain confidence in themselves, their language and their skills.
"People with the lowest ability in English had the lowest ability to communicate,"
"But that's changed dramatically because they have a community who understands a fashion language, or a design language and visual communication."
Penina and Cindy say it's the integrity and the narrative of NSF's products which makes them so unique.
"When it's something that has a story attached to it, you grow to cherish it," says Cindy.
"You might buy it because it's beautiful but you value it because of the story of how these women came to Australia."
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