Our Vision is to promote environmental regeneration and social inclusion of women victims of human trafficking and unemployed youth. The activities of The Nest organisation activities include:

SOFFA is a manufacturing production studio, a cooperative of fashion designers, creates sustainable fashion garments with great social and environmental impact for its B2B customers being Sustainable Brands. offering to brands and retailers mending facilities for their collect-back schemes to go for used marketplaces and upcycling re-designing possibilities. provides work integration to women survivor victims of GBV. Created Wear Your Origins to be a close loop circular brand. Protocols include SOFFA Impact Evaluation Metrics, Bribery & Corruption Policy, Due Diligence process, Living wage structure, SOFFA Fashion Production Islands, Zero Waste design, Recycling processes. SOFFA has signed the EU Charter for Diversity & Inclusion.

With our minds on the planet and our souls on women a new brand is born! WYO is an ode to female power advocating for the elimination of gender-based violence and the exploration of women. The hidden faces behind our clothes is the central focus of Wear Your Origins. Every garment narrates a story the story of the women who designed it.  Wear Your Origins designers are selected through Wear Your Origins Award. 30 women from different life paths. 15 international young designers and 15 women victims of violence and exploitation from our partners safe houses and refugee centres will work together to create their own fully ecological capsule collections inspired by their country of origins and their culture.  WYO is a cultural meeting centred on clothing. is an opportunity to express the thoughts and the soul through clothing. WYO is a visual journey of the culture tradition and histories of these women. Wear Your Origins is a sustainable luxury brand with a strong environmental, social, and cultural impact combining different cultural heritage features and is a circular close loop brand. WYO brand collects dead stock from the industry and its own customers to use for the creation of its new collections.

Why CREATE

SOFFA first started its operations in 2015 by inviting fashion designers and scientists in a mentoring program to co-create a new business and production model. It entered in a collaboration with a safehouse of women victims of human trafficking, with the scope of integrating the women to the workforce of SOFFA. At the same time SOFFA chemists and textile engineers were researching the most innovative novel plant-based sustainable textiles to source for its operations. SOFFA controlled its CO2 emissions by having all the supply chain locally and offered full transparency to its customers. SOFFA narrated a story of how a manufacturer can help preserve the environment, respect human rights, and help resolve social issues. 

Wear Your Origins narrates a story of how a brand can be fashionable, while respecting traditional fashion techniques and heritage, help resolve a social issue and be fully clean to the climate and the planet. CREATE Project supports us in bringing together fashion designers and women from excluded groups of population to create their capsule collections inspired by their country of origin. CREATE helps us learn and understand how to integrate women victims of violence in the design of Wear Your Origins brand. 

Wear Your Origins comes from the years of experimentation in trying to be environmentally and socially sustainable, it comes as a natural evolution of SOFFA to become fully sustainable and circular by asking its customers to co-create a close loop system. The innovation of WYO is that being circular and close loop to us in not only towards the environment, but also towards social inclusion and towards cultural heritage preservation. CREATE supports us to accomplish this objective.

Our team

Dr Fiori A. Zafeiropoulou

Ethical Fashion Researcher Athens University of Economics and Business, Founder Fashion Revolution Greece & SOFFA

Social entrepreneur, NGO Founder, Academic Lecturer & Fellow Researcher, Novel Writer, Policy Advisor & World Speaker in eradicating human trafficking in fashion supply chains and empowering women victims of slavery & women in risk of exploitation. Addressing climate change & re-generation of the environment through changing paradigms in fashion production, sourcing, and consumption.

  • Keynote Speaker at New European Bauhaus 2022 Festival of the European Commission

  • Keynote speaker at EU DG Growth Forum for the consultation on the European Sustainable Textile Strategy July 2021

  • Keynote speaker at ‘Greece 2021’ Forum on Climate Crisis & Fashion 2021. ‘200 Years Greece’.

  • Nominated member of the Green Woman Board Greek Ministry of Energy & Environment by the Minister for Energy & Environment 9th March 2020

  • Global Changemaker’ Keynote speaker Ship2B Impact Forum Madrid 2020

  • Keynote speaker Athens40 & BBC News International Woman Day 2020

  • Ranked in 100TOP Women 2019 by Marie Claire Hellas

  • Was the central speaker at the UN Women Day event 2018 in Athens

  • Was the central character in ‘One Over Many’ film by Swiss Director Daphne Bengoa, produced by Flux Laboratory ‘17

Fiori has an awarded PHD on social entrepreneurship from Brunel Business School and is currently a postDoctoral Researcher in Managing Ethical & Green Supply Chains at the fashion Industry at Athens University of Economics & Business (AUEB). She is Project Managing the Research Centre on Sustainable Fashion and Textiles (FRFashtech) within Management Science Lab at AUEB. Founder & Country Coordinator of the local office in Greece of the global movement Fashion Revolution, the Coordinator of Raise Your Voice Festival co-organised by 56 State Bodies & NGOs to end human trafficking, the Founder of Social Fashion Factory – SOFFA.gr that targets gender empowerment and work integration of women victims of violence and the environmental regeneration, the Founder of ‘Wear Your Origins’ clothing brand and the rebirth of the iconic ‘Zita Hellas’ sneakers brand. She is also the Writer of the Novel “The Timeless Beach” by Kaktos Publications, a world speaker; her story has inspired various documentaries including One Over Many by Daphne Bengoa. She is the Executive Producer of TV Show ‘Social Growth’ at ERT TV Channel, the Founder of Refergon employment refugee matching platform, the Founder of The Nest Centre on Social Entrepreneurship; TEDx talks ‘Unity, Ubuntu’ TEDxNTUA 2021, ‘Are you still dreaming how to be a Doer?” TEDx Alexandroupolis 2016. Her research has been published in international conferences and research books. She is a nominated member of the Green Woman Board Greek Ministry of Energy & Environment by the Minister’s Office 9 March 2020. Ranked in 100TOP Women 2019 by Marie Claire Hellas.

Facebook: Fiori A. Zafeiropoulou
Instagram @fiori_lpp_zita
Twitter @FioriZita
LinkedIn: Dr Fiori A Zafeiropoulou

 

Christangelos Georgandelis

Christangelos lives and works in Athens, the greek capital. He is the Head of Design of SOFFA-Social Facion Factiory. He studied at the Technoligical Institute of Central Macedonia, graduated from the Department of Fashion Design & Technology. He has presented his collection at the greek fashion week and the new designers fashion week and he held 6 individual fashion shows in Athens and Lesvos. Also, he has taken part in plenty of group exhibitions (Athens, Thesaaloniki, Lesvos, Instunbul). He has been awarded in several competitions and has raken part in workshops (Copenghagen Fur). He has has collaborated with a number of greek and foreign companies as a fashion designer, pattern cutter and creative director.

 

Eleni Mavrogeni

Eleni is a Psychologist with a particular interest in Organizational Psychology. She has a Master's Degree in International Human Resources and works as a Recruiter and Executive Search Headhunter for the multinational corporation, Boyden. She is a feminist and environmentalist. She strives to eliminate toxic social and organizational environments. Her goal is to raise awareness about sustainability and circular economy through her work. That is why she joined SOFFA's team as a volunteer.

 

Dimitrios Paraschos

Dimitrios is an emerging visual artist and media specialist based in London. He holds two Master's degrees, a Master of Arts in Convergent Journalism at H.M.K.W Berlin and a Master of Arts in Fashion Media Production at the University of the Arts London. His fashion short film "Epilogue" has officially been selected and received awards from film festivals worldwide and it was exhibited at Victoria House, London and Aesthetica Short Film Festival, York. He is currently the Creative Lead for iDAL agency in London and his previous experience in the fashion industry includes System Agency, Louis Vuitton and Maje Paris.