creative gifts for her

The prosperous Colombian lands offer artisan Omaira Manrique natural materials to bring her creations to life. As an expert in ancient weaving techniques, the artisan follows a long process that allows her to handcraft this decorative vase from fique and reed grass fibers, adding vibrant hues to enhance the design's natural colours, which makes it perfect for a tropical ambiance.

A set of four stars is ready to brighten up your holiday tree. Costa Rican artisan Blanca Padilla handcrafts these stars out of the fiber extracted from cabuya, a succulent that looks like agave. The artisan works with the cabuya's natural texture to form the stars, each bordered in a different color.

The art and skill of creating handicrafts from cabuya has been handed down through Blanca Padilla's family for generations. The artisan sources her material herself, growing and harvesting the cabuya, extracting the fiber, and preparing it for use in the handicrafts. Blanca Padilla hopes to help revitalize the cabuya craft industry with the success of her designs.

Brighten up any room with this gorgeous mirror by Tamara Pereira. She frames it in thick pine needle ropes and creates a colourful pattern with yarn in bright blue tones. A dainty hand-stitched design made with fine threads adds a delicate touch.

The sturdy needles of the Moctezuma pine have been used for millennia to craft baskets and other wares by the people of Mexico and Central America. Tamara's background as an architect has helped her bring a breath of freshness into this centuries-old tradition.

Maria Isabel Montoya grew up in the post-war crises of Nicaragua from 1979 to 1990, which taught her the value of using everything at hand. This tote bag is an example of this, as she weaves palm fiber into two disks to create something simple, beautiful and practical.

Ghanaian artisan Robert Ayine Anaba hand weaves this unique natural fiber tote bag. The bag is created from dyed raffia and features two leather straps. A striped motif in yellow, green and violet is featured on the front.

Resembling a hedge maze, each journal in this set of five is decorated with natural agel grass that creates a spiraling shape. Designed by Balinese artisan Komang Sulaksana, these journals are colored green, red, yellow, black, and blue, lined in black polyester with cinnamon stick accents at the spines. Each journal opens to 80 pages of rice paper.