The hamlet of Vondeling consists of scattered homesteads that house 29 families alongside the now disused Vondeling railway siding, midway between Willowmore and De Rust, in the shadow of the great Swartberg mountain range.

There is also a primary school and church hall amongst the tiny houses, but no electricity and no connection to the outside world, bar a dirt road, particularly as the train stopped running long ago.

Vondeling Optel Craft was initiated in 2006 as a community upliftment project, sponsored by the Cacadu District Municipality (now Sarah Baartman District Municipality). Out of this project the Karoo Angels were born. These tiny angels are made of meticulously hand-knitted wire, adorned with a mix of merino wool, wire wool, beads and other local products like ostrich feathers, clear beads and sequins.

A chance encounter meant two angels made their way to Norway that led to an order of 100 angels that sold out in one day.  Several hundred more were ordered and that was when the angels really took off. Feathered Karoo angels began to gleam on Nordic conifers, magical and exotic by candlelight. They spread to Germany and France, and by 2015, the angel team in Vondeling was battling to keep up with the orders.

In 2009 the district municipality looked to repeat Vondeling’s success in another remote community – Rietbron, between Willowmore and Beaufort West. Rietbron’s women learned to crochet and knit hearts, delicate snowflakes, wire trees and small jewellery items using fine wire, welding skills and spray paint. The end-products were beautiful, delicate and quirky. They sold fairly well locally and overseas, but there was less demand for their ranges than for Vondeling’s. The demand for angels, meanwhile, was absolutely exploding.

By 2015, it seemed only natural to deploy the deft hands at Rietbron Handcrafts to help fill the demand. Since then, the two groups have worked together under the Karoo Angels label, naming themselves as “The Angel Factory in the Karoo”. Every year the angel-makers, barely more than a dozen of them, fashion about 20,000 Karoo angels that isn’t just sold locally, but get dispatched to faraway places like Norway, Sweden, Canada, the US, Germany, Switzerland, the UK and France.

The Karoo Angles factory shop is located in Willowmore. It’s here were all the angels are brought and orders come in to before they get despatched all over the world.

More information – https://www.karooangels.co.za/