Our Story

In high school, Charles was an active volunteer at Hospice of the Valley – Arizona's leading provider of end-of-life care. Engaging in various activities with patients each week, Charles formed close friendships with many of the hospice patients.

Unfortunately, when the pandemic struck, all in-person activities at the hospice were suspended indefinitely. Family members were prohibited from visiting their loved ones, and volunteers were unable to spend time helping the patients, leaving patients lonely and confined to their bedrooms.

After learning about this dilemma, Charles brainstormed ideas that would instill an everlasting feeling of love into hospice patients’ lives and recalled his favorite childhood story “Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes”. In this story, a Japanese girl named Sadako, diagnosed with leukemia, folded one thousand paper cranes in hopes that she would become healthy. According to a Japanese legend, a crane represents good fortune and longevity and folding 1000 cranes means that a wish is granted.

Inspired by this story, Charles started folding origami cranes for hospitals and hospices across Arizona with his mission to instill hope and optimism into patients’ lives. On these cranes, he wrote heartwarming and inspirational messages, which were then delivered to hospice and hospital patients. To make a larger impact across patients throughout the world, Charles utilized social media platforms to expand the Wishing Crane Project to thousands of volunteers across the world.

Since its founding, the Wishing Crane Project team has created over 30,000+ origami paper cranes, cards, and care packages for the hospital and hospice patients in the world. The Wishing Crane Project is currently partnered with over 70 hospital and hospices. The success of the project thus far has encouraged its expansion to twenty states and three countries.