LIMA (Peru) - Santos Arce Ramos is doing 18 years for aggravated
robbery, but today he is carefully cutting organic cotton cloth in
a workshop at San Pedro, a notorious prison in Peru's capital
Lima.
With the help of a French designer who cut his teeth at Chanel,
inmates at two Peruvian prisons have launched their own clothing
label, seeking to bring their urban style to the world - and find
redemption in fashion.
"It's like putting together a puzzle," said Arce, 46, as he
manoeuvred pieces of cloth into place on a beat-up work bench.
Arce is one of 30 inmates at San Pedro and a women's prison
across town, Santa Monica, who make the clothes sold by Pieta, a
label that describes itself as socially conscious and was set up by
29-year-old French fashionista Thomas Jacob.
The label specialises in a gritty urban look: T-shirts, hoodies
and jackets in black, white and army green, stamped with stark
black designs.
Jacob, a graduate of French business school INSEEC, got the idea
for Pieta in 2012, when a friend who taught French lessons to
inmates at San Pedro invited him to tag along with her.
Galvanised by the visit, he plunged head-first into an ambitious
new project. He asked prison officials for permission to set up a
tailoring workshop for inmates, and then quit his job at revered
fashion house Chanel to dedicate himself to his new label.
"Prison inspires me - the dark side of humankind," he said.
It was slow going at first, but within a year the inmates were
making "high-quality, competitive" products, he told AFP, speaking
nearly perfect Spanish.
Pieta takes its name from a sculpture by Renaissance master
Michelangelo in which the Virgin Mary cradles the lifeless body of
Jesus. The name "represents the final step before resurrection, the
rebirth of a man who never gives up. That's the hope of these
inmates," Jacob said.
Jacob designs the clothes and the inmates make them. "The idea
is to do everything within the prison walls," he said as a group of
inmates modelled the 2016 collection, which will be sold
online.
His designs recall the work of Alexander Rodchenko, the Russian
artist whose angular lines and stark colours epitomised the
20th-century movement known as constructivism.
In one T-shirt, the outline of a black padlock is barely
perceptible against a black background. In another, the jagged
shape of an industrial building bears the inscription "Factory of
Tears."
The brand's logo is four bars with a diagonal slash through
them, evoking hash marks carved into a prison wall to tally the
days of lost freedom. "It's an authentic concept, with different
designs. There's nothing false. We use organic cotton and natural
materials," said Jacob.
Pieta produces some 100 T-shirts a week and has sold more than
12,000 items in just over three years. The T-shirts go for US$35
(S$47) online.
At San Pedro, the inmates' small workshop sits in a recreation
area that was the scene of one of the worst prison massacres in
history 30 years ago, when inmates from the Shining Path, a leftist
guerrilla group, staged a mutiny that left more than 100 people
dead.
The crowded space is packed with sewing machines the inmates use
to turn the materials Jacob brings twice a week into clothes. The
prisoners receive a percentage on every sale.
Carlos Uribe, who is serving 15 years for drug dealing, said the
money helps the inmates care for their families on the outside. "We
need people like Thomas, people who believe in us," said Uribe,
67.
"We're a potential labour force. Working helps redeem us,
provides money for our families and makes us feel productive. We're
not useless."
