A new community-focused organization is almost ready to open its doors in Rouleau for women and girls seeking help with empowerment and self-esteem.
Lady Via is the passion project of Regina-based social worker and founder Sharon Kambale, who felt that there was a need for a space where women and girls could gather together and ask questions, seek advice, and feel comfortable pursuing their goals.
“[The idea is] organically seeing what are the ideas that these women carry with them that really are influencing them from getting to the end result they want,” said Kambale. “Conversation and dialogue are really essential to what we're doing.”
The goal for Kambale was to offer a safe environment in which to address any social, financial, and personal barriers that women often face in their daily lives.
She saw value in connecting women with each other to discuss their barriers and create solutions.
To do that, the centre will offer a variety of services, such as wellness workshops in both half-day and two-day formats, meant to provide tips and techniques for success. There will also be art workshops, morning coffee meetups, weekly family nights, creative cake classes, and more.
Lady Via is also offering networking opportunities and financial advice services to women in business, and a mentorship program for young girls to talk about all kinds of topics — friendship, body image, creativity, and more.
All of the centre’s events have childminding services available, to make things more accessible to women of all walks of life, said Kambale.
She’s hoping that by offering open conversation opportunities, workshops, girls groups, and business services, the women in the area will begin to form a community within themselves and create a network of support.
“[Our message is that] you are able to achieve virtually anything you want to achieve, as long as you are willing to dream that big,” said Kambale.
Kambale chose Rouleau as the foundation’s first venture due to pure happenstance, she said, and she’s excited to see things come together.
“I was asking, 'where is it that we're meant to call home?' and the space presented itself, really,” said Kambale. “[And] I do think when you're in the right place, when something is meant for you, it will happen and it won't be so much work [and] that's kind of been the process of all of this."
Her goal for the future is to be able to expand further throughout the province, to offer these types of services to as many women and girls as possible, but for now, Kambale is focusing on launching the centre first.
“We're definitely seeing what people can afford and what services will be more in demand in the community [during our rollout period],” said Kambale. “So if people have any suggestions or ideas, or maybe they see a service and think we can tweak it to better fit the community, I think that's really important for us and I welcome them to voice that.”
The new Lady Via centre is located at 101 Main Street in Rouleau and will open it's doors to the public on Mar. 28 to begin offering services.
An official grand opening to celebrate the centre will take place on June 27, said Kambale.
The centre will operate on a membership structure, with additional fees for events and workshops. All memberships purchased during the rollout period between Mar. 28 and June 27 will be offered an introductory discount.
More information about services, memberships, and events can be found on Lady Via’s website and Instagram.
