This year we are celebrating women's achievements and smashing stereotypes as we follow this years IWD theme: #breakthebias.

Our company is female founded by Joely Brammer, a designer and maker who wanted to offer affordable laser cutting to everyone and help people to bring their ideas to life. As jobs in manufacturing tend to be male dominated, we wanted to celebrate our female staff and a handful of our inspirational female clients.

An Interview with Riina Õun.

BIO: Riina Õun is the creative director, a multi-disciplinary designer and a materials researcher behind the Riina O brand. She is a graduate of MA Material Futures at Central Saint Martins, specialising in bio-design. Previously she trained in leather art and accessories design at Estonian Academy of Arts before moving to London to work for high-end fashion designers.

Riina O started out as a handmade luxury leather accessories brand, specializing in hand-stitched leather gloves, launched in 2013. In recent years the brand has expanded into sustainable materials research and development within the circular economy. Riina O is aiming to explore how craft has to adapt to working with bio-materials, aiming to bring the materials out of the experimentation stage into practical use in the industry.

Why do you think it is important to celebrate International Women’s Day? What does it mean to you?

I think it is important to remember and celebrate the women who fought for equal rights, those women of the past who did not have an education did not have the right to vote or be their own person and gave their lives for our rights today. It is important to remember, nowadays there are still plenty of women around the world dealing with such worries and the issues of the pay gap are ever existing worldwide. The pursuit of equality is ongoing, even if it may seem that we are already there.

Have you faced any barriers in your career due to being a woman? If so, how did you overcome them?

Starting off as a shoe designer and maker I could feel the gender bias. But always sticking to what I want to do I have actually gained lots of support from other professionals, no matter what´s their gender.

What is the most important message you want to send out to young women thinking about their careers?

Don't be put off by any gender stereotypes. You can do it if you really want to. Perseverance and self-belief are the most valuable treats. Remember to stand up for your rights and take no nonsense from no one!

Why do you think diversity in the workplace is so important?

Everybody brings different skills to the table. The diversity of talent means a broader range of expertise among employees, the diversity of experiences and perspectives increase the potential for the multitude of ideas.

Why did you choose the career you are in now? What led you here? Did you face any obstacles?

When I was seventeen and an aspiring fashion designer, one day I had a vision of this beautiful pair of shoes with a long wide strap snaking up the leg gravity defying. I just felt I had to make it! I went over to the local shoe repairman and asked for help, he just laughed and said in his forty years of work he himself had made not a single pair of shoes and I better forget it. Instead, I started looking for other ways to make it, contacted a local shoe factory in my hometown Tallinn in Estonia and with their generous help, the pair of high-heeled strappy sandals got made.

This inspired me to join the Leather Accessories Design course at Estonian Academy of Arts, where I specialised in footwear initially, but other kinds of leather accessories and gloves emerged alongside. After my BA I moved to London and started working with local designers as a maker, eventually establishing my brand Riina O in 2013, concentrating on hand-crafted luxurious leather gloves.

In recent years I did my MA in Material Futures at Central Saint Martins concentrating on biodesign and my brand expanded into sustainable materials research and development within the circular economy.

I feel it is important to share the skills and knowledge, especially as glove-making skills are currently on the verge of extinction. This has led me to teaching workshops at universities and organisations worldwide.

If you could have dinner with three inspirational women, dead or alive, who would they be and why?

Nelly Bly – my muse for the next collection. She was an American journalist, industrialist, inventor, and charity worker who was widely known for her record-breaking trip around the world in 72 days, in emulation of Jules Verne's fictional character Phileas Fogg, and an exposé in which she worked undercover to report on a mental institution from within. She was a pioneer in her field and launched a new kind of investigative journalism. She lived at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th.

Pippi Longstocking – a playful and unpredictable character from Astrid Lindgren´s eponymous novel who lives a happy life free from social conventions with unsuppressed wild imagination but plenty of strength to stand up for herself and others when mistreated.

Natsai Audrey Chieza - a designer and the founder of Faber Futures, a R&D studio that creates biologically inspired materials. She pioneered the process of using bacteria pigments for sustainable textile finishing.