About Stichting van Hagar tot Ruth

The Van Hagar tot Ruth Foundation offers accessible sewing lessons and knitting and crochet lessons for local residents and newcomers in Utrecht. We started in January 2016 with one volunteer, a bag of knitting wool and some knitting pens. Since then we have grown into a well loved and widely supported project. Our foundation was established in 2018.

We want to connect people from different backgrounds. You will find this desire in our name. Hagar means refugee and Ruth means friend. In this name it is visible that everyone is welcome with us, but also that everyone can undergo a transformation from newcomer to established, from alone to together and from rejected to loved, valuable and significant.

So everyone is welcome and our hearts go out to those who are socially or financially vulnerable for whatever reason. For example, people who do not speak Dutch, people who became isolated and people looking for connection and daytime activities

It is not only refugees in who need this. Hagar to Ruth can be a wonderful oppertunity to flourish for locals. The question is who Hagar is and who is Ruth. We regularly see how the literal refugee turns out to be a Ruth to the not so literal refugee born here.

In addition to our participant groups, we offer space to people who (again) want to take a first step towards participating in society and / or want to be socially involved. These volunteers teach or work on products that we design ourselves or that we make on behalf of third parties.

There is a safe, committed and accessible atmosphere at our participant and production groups. We help each other, whether you are a participant, volunteer or come to visit. Much beauty is created when people from different backgrounds meet and share their talents and qualities. We see time and again that our approach works. Participants and volunteers declare that they feel at ease with us and make successful contact, they move on to new activities, training, internships or work.