Luca lost his sight as a child. Now he’s making braille greeting cards to help others.

More than 575,000 people in Australia are blind or have low vision, and teenager Luca Weber is among them. But fewer than a quarter are in full-time work, so Luca has started his own business.

Luca is 19 and lives in Seaforth a suburb of Sydney with his parents. Luca’s blindness is the result of a congenital brain tumour. He also has a range of disabilities including a weakened right arm.

Navigating daily life can be challenging and frustrating but Luca has overcome the obstacle of eating at a restaurant and not being able to read the menu: using his advanced braille skills, Luca has made local menu inserts for local restaurants.

“Luca is an expert operating the braille machine. So we felt there might be a business offering braille cards,” says his mother Susanna Wagner.

His business is called Braille by Luca. As well as inserts for cards, ‘Braille by Luca’ offers inserts for event invitations and books. The aim is to open up the world for people with limited vision, as well as help Luca earn an income and gain independence.

“Otherwise Luca would end up in a day program being bored for the rest of his life, just being babysat. And that’s what we didn’t want to have happen” Susanna says.