Women empowered for skills by local organisation

With the hopes of assisting others, Modderfontein’s Tweak Fashion called on community members and businesses to support it.

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To help spread the festive season spirit the public benefit organisation (PBO), which focuses on empowering women, hopes to donate to the Germiston-based Ithembelihle Lsen School.

It hopes to donate 180 Mumpys, a comfortable plush toy made from recycled material and filled with virgin ball fibre to children at the school.

With the help of sponsors and the community, the PBO would also like to provide toiletry packs to the children.

To date, Tweak has provided 208 Mumpys to children in the Edenvale, Germiston, Primrose and Klopperpark areas.

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Established by Edenvale resident and fashion designer Justine Engelbrecht the idea for the PBO came to her just before the 2020 Covid-19 lockdown after she read an article about textile waste.

“As one thought led to another, I thought about how we could assist in this space and how textile waste could be used to empower women.”

Registered in August 2020, the PBO officially opened its doors in June 2021.

During this time Tweak has been collecting 1 777kg of material and secondhand clothing.

She said the PBO weighs how much material it collects to determine how many Co2 emissions it has potentially prevented from going into the environment.

Justine said multiplying the 1 777kg material by 3.6kg of Co2 emissions, Tweak has potentially prevented 6 397.2kg of Co2 from entering the environment.

“The heart behind what we do is empowering women.

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“Living in a country with a high unemployment rate Justine said it is important to help women put food on the tables for their families.

“We’re in the business of helping others, upskilling women with our five-phase programme through the use of sustainable fashion.”

The PBO does this by requesting donations of secondhand clothing and fabric from the community.

These items are then sorted into reusable materials.

In instances where the organisation receives wedding dresses, suits and matric dance dresses they are donated to individuals and charities such as Uitkoms Home for Girls.

Any leather, rubber and plastic are removed and shipped back to other organisations Tweak has partnered with.

Justine said that once sorted, all the material is washed to remove stains and the women who work in partnership with Tweak can use the material and clothing to create items as they see fit unless the PBO receives specific orders.

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Justine explained the women Tweak works in partnership with are individual contractors.

She said although the partnership may not solve all the women’s problems, it does offer them an opportunity to learn and earn.

Speaking about Mumpy, Justine explained that it was created by her mom in 1967 for her sister Penny.
“Mumpy is very personal for me and my family,” said Justine.

“My sister, Penny, was born with a heart defect. In her fifties, she needed a heart transplant for which she went to hospital in May 2017.”

In December of that year, Justine’s sister was placed on the critical list and received a heart, which the family thought was a miracle.

“Sadly, it wasn’t a miracle and on February 19, 2019, she passed away,” said Justine.

She said after her mom died in 2021 the directors of Tweak decided to help her by getting Mumpy to children.
She said Mumpy, which stands for Mum and Penny was made in honour of them.

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“My mom’s dreams were to always make Mumpy, manufacture her and get her to children. However, while she was alive that wasn’t something we were thinking of.”

To assist the PBO in its endeavour email justine.tweakfashion@gmail.com or send a WhatsApp on 062 763 1872.

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