It started with a pair of orange socks.

My mother gave them to me one winter to keep my feet warm. She told me her mother — my grandmother — had knitted them by hand. I remember the first time I wore them: they fit perfectly, they were soft in a way that shop-bought socks never are, and they felt warm in a way that had nothing to do with the wool.

I was wearing something made by someone who loved me. And you could feel it.

That feeling stayed with me for a long time. I kept thinking — why don't more people get to experience this? The comfort of something genuinely handmade, made with care, made by real hands?

That one question is where Made of Hands began.

I didn't know much about knitting myself, so I did what anyone would do — I called my friend's grandmother. She sat with us, taught us about yarn, about needles, about how to read a stitch. She was patient in the way only grandmothers can be. And through her, we got connected to other women in the area — women from the Himalayan foothills of Uttarakhand who knew how to knit and crochet beautifully, but who didn't have a way to turn that skill into steady income.

What struck me most was this: these women didn't want to leave their homes. They had families to care for, routines that mattered to them, lives rooted in their communities. They just needed work that could come to them — not the other way around.

So that became the heart of what we do. Made of Hands is a small handmade store run by an all-women team of artisans based in Almora, Uttarakhand, tucked into the quiet hills of the Himalayas. Every handmade beanie, every woollen muffler, every crochet plushie and keychain you see on this website is made entirely by hand by these women — in their homes, at their own pace, with real skill and real care.

No factories. No machines. No shortcuts.

Just hands, wool, and the same warmth my grandmother put into a pair of orange socks, passed forward to you.