Looner jewellery is the company of former World Freestyle kayaking Champion Deb Pinniger.

Deb first began Looner in 1999 at the World Freestyle Championships in New Zealand. After travelling the world for several years, Deb decided to make a few extra dollars by selling wooden kayak pendants, that she had made for her, on the banks of the Zambezi River, whilst training for the World Championships.

Looner has moved on a little bit from its early days, however Looner’s ethos couldn’t stand much stronger, than that of its original roots! Deb still travels the globe paddling new rivers and surfing sweet waves, now introducing others to her favourite paddling destinations.

Looner jewellery is still hand crafted in the villages surrounding the Zambezi River. Over the past three years Deb has worked hard at improving the quality of her products.

Deb now works directly with porters who make their money by carrying rafts in and out of the deep volcanic Batoka gorge. The porters come to work in the morning and carry their loads in to the gorge for the commercial rafting trips, then hang out until the clients arrive at the end of their day trip, where all of the rafting equipment needs to be hauled out of the steep gorge for yet another day.

Whilst waiting for the commercial trip to finish, the porters can be found hand carving Looner pendants with their pocket knives on the banks of the Zambezi River.

Looner believes in a fair trade policy and in supporting the communities in which we work from. This is why we work directly with local communities. We hope that our small example of fair trade can be of influence to others.