They're Making It From the Inside Out: "Con Art"

A handmade product line by incarcerated women. All proceeds to CREW.

We've been doing this type of work for more than thirteen years. We have watched women walk out of Coffee Creek with almost nothing... a sweatsuit, sometimes a bus ticket, and a world that doesn't slow down for them. We've also watched what happens when community shows up in the gap. What the Lifers of Coffee Creek (LOCC) are doing right now is something we will be talking about for a long time.

Con Art: Made Inside, Sent Out With Love

LOCC, a group of women inside Coffee Creek Correctional Facility, named and launched Con Art, a handmade product line now available through our website. Jewelry. Beaded crafts. Crocheted hats and scarves. Stuffed animals. All made by hand, inside the facility, by women who know exactly where the money is going.

Every single purchase is a tax-deductible donation to CREW. You can shop the full line right now at tjcoregon.org/category/crew-products.

Before Con Art, There Was Candy

Con Art didn't come out of nowhere. LOCC organized their first-ever CREW fundraiser by selling candy to other women and women-identifying supporters inside Coffee Creek. They raised $3,000.

Three thousand dollars, raised in a correctional facility, sold bag by bag by women who won't benefit from the purchases themselves.

With that money, CREW was able to provide hygiene products to 100 women leaving prison. One hundred women who didn't have to start over without the basics.

LOCC called it the first of many. And they meant it.

Why This Matters to CREW

CREW meets women at the gate on release day. We provide transportation, clothing, hygiene and feminine supplies, and access to our Then-Now-Next trauma-healing curriculum, a program created for women in prison that focuses on healing from trauma. We also offer tattoo cover-up services for women carrying visible marks from trafficking or gang involvement.

We do this because the moment of release (for women especially) is one of the most dangerous moments in the reentry process. Traffickers know when women are releasing. They wait outside. Women who walk out without a safe ride, without resources, without someone who knows their name, are the most vulnerable.

LOCC knows this, too. That's exactly why they do what they do.

They don't want women leaving with nothing more than the sweatsuit they're wearing. They don't want anyone seeing the name of an abuser or the brand of a trafficker every time they look in the mirror. They don't want a single woman forgotten.

How You Can Help

Shop Con Art. Every piece was made by hand by a woman who is currently incarcerated and chose to use her skills to fund another woman's freedom.

Share the link. The more people who know about Con Art, the more CREW can do when a woman walks through that gate.

And if you've ever wondered how to be part of this work without knowing where to start, this is the place.

Shop Con Art now: tjcoregon.org/category/crew-products

All purchases are tax-deductible donations to CREW.

Questions? Reach us at crew@tjcoregon.org.