Flavia Shaw-Jackson was born in South Africa. Of French nationality, she studied in Brussels where she received a B.A. in Economics. She started her professional life in 1990 in the private sector as the director of a trading company.

She has always felt deeply affected by the suffering and distress experienced by many children in the world. FACE was born in 2003 after watching a documentary broadcast on the BBC called The Dying Rooms that was about orphanages in China. It was a horrifying documentary that inspired her to take concrete action to alleviate the suffering of children.  She chose Cairo as the focus for this work. Meanwhile she became a mother of three children.

Since then, FACE has grown and now manages six projects in Cairo, employing 150 Egyptians full-time. Over 35,000 street children and/or orphans have received support from FACE, 12,700 have received medical care and 500 have been integrated into families.