The coronavirus pandemic was a wake-up call about many things we take for granted in life, including where our food comes from. As the lockdown began in late March, uncertainty took hold and people began hoarding and scrambling for whatever food stocks they could find.
The National Farmers Federation was moved to reassure people that Australia produces enough food to feed 75 million people, more than three times our population, and that 89 percent of the food Australians eat is Aussie-grown.
With many global supply chains fractured through the pandemic, local production and manufacturing is arising to be more strongly grounded and appreciated in regional communities.
Earlier this year on February 15, Pine Rivers Heritage Museum had hosted a conversation to highlight how we can support local farmers in the Moreton Bay region which is home to a plethora of agricultural industries including berries, pineapple, avocado, macadamia nut, other specialty crop businesses as well as livestock production. (There’s a follow-up session planned for September 12, so put that in your diary if you are in the region.)
Are you up for a Slow Fashion Season? To make conscious wardrobe choices for three months from June 21 to September 21 this year? It might mean buying nothing for three months; or swapping, upcycling or sewing your stash; buying second-hand and vintage; or supporting sustainable, local, small fashion labels if you find you really need something new.
Slow Fashion Season, a global challenge out of The Netherlands, which aims to have 25,000 people participate and together save the equivalent of up to 750 million litres of water and 2.5 million kgs of CO2 emissions through positive choices. We’d love you to sign up and be part of this collective action.
I personally committed to making conscious choices in my wardrobe forever after noticing fashion excess and setting up Textile Beat in 2013 to have conversations about textile waste. My personal actions for the next three months will be upcycling what I already own.
As the world faces profound change and travel restrictions due to the coronavirus pandemic, everyone’s life, work and study has been disrupted, and we are sheltering in place unless required on the frontline.
This means only a handful of the 2019 Churchill Fellows have been able to complete their overseas investigations and the Churchill Trust has extended their timeframe by an additional 12 months.
Churchill Trust CEO Adam Davey said that as the COVID-19 pandemic started to unfold, the focus was on ensuring the safety of Churchill Fellows who were already travelling and providing a quick response for those who had not yet travelled.
Coronavirus is a catalyst for change. The world has shrunk and supply chains are under threat at this time of global disruption. Local manufacturing is coming into its own, and being niche, nimble and natural are key ingredients for success, says Kerrie Richards from Merino Country.
“We are people of action, and actions speak louder than words. It is not who you are, it is what you do and how you make a difference in the world,” Kerrie says.
Discombobulating, a one-word descriptor of this pandemic lockdown experience. My earlier shift to a more holistic way of living and working proved useful. Yet it still feels like the rug was pulled asunder. I am grateful for what I have. More On the Textile Beat May 2020 here. If you wish to subscribe there’s a link at the right-hand side of the Textile Beat home page.
During this coronavirus lockdown, Meriel Chamberlin has had more cold contacts than ever before about her local cotton supply chain Full Circle Fibres which provides beautiful, ethical and traceable fabrics, fibres and yarns. Meriel works directly with cotton growers at St George in south west Queensland, Glenn and Rebecca Rogan, from Australian Super Cotton, and then with local manufacturers for every stage.
As #15 in the ARISING from Disruption conversation series, Meriel chatted with Jane Milburn about adaptation, resourcefulness and self-sufficiency during this time of pandemic.
“This disruption of supply chains and our dependence on them has caused a lot more people to think about buying local and supporting local. Designers, brands and makers think customers are going to want Australian made and we have had practical benefit from the Aussie dollar value and cost of freight (air freight has gone through the roof) which means my offer has become more economically sustainable than before, especially in the category of ethical and sustainable fabrics.’’
“While Australia’s textile industry was much larger 20 years ago, it is quite some time since the nation focused on making the most of single-origin traceability. There is one stage not here yet, which is the spinning to turn the fibre into yarn that is still done in Manchester, UK. Usually Australian fibres are shipped overseas and mixed with others in the global supply chain. I decided that I would like to know where my fibres come from and that others would like that too.’’
One of main opportunities for Meriel during lockdown has been to take a hard look at how we do PPE (personal protective equipment) and the colossal waste in the system. “Along with responding to an increase in interest in my classic products, it is abundantly clear we need to do something radically different, smart and clever, and be even more protective than the PPE available out there. We need equipment that can be reused and to protect people from great shortages, as well as creating local manufacturing opportunities. ”
Listen to the conversation here, or read the notes below.
What Meriel Chamberlin said:
Katrina Rodabaugh feels incredibly grateful for the one-acre of land in upstate New York that has become the whole world for her husband and two children as a place of shelter, nourishment and learning during this time of pandemic.
Her journey to this place was meandering. After agitating for an environmental studies major, working in art organisations in big cities, studying creative writing and beginning her slow fashion awakening, Katrina moved cross country to now be homesteading in the Hudson Valley where her work and life are holistically cocooned.
What began as a personal project called Make Mend Thrift in 2013 has evolved into an inspirational career of making, writing and teaching others about mending, slow fashion and sustainable living by sharing her values, experience and skills documented in her book Mending Matters.
“I am this hybrid of having informal training in fibre arts and folk art heritage from land-based practices a couple of generations ago … through to conceptual and community-based art … and now homesteading. It is this funny space of being from the urban world and the rural world as well.”
“It is meaningful and touching to work with the plants and the seasons, and expand my knowledge of plants that I can identify, and expand their uses, their place in the ecosystem … I am interested in the triple power plants – plants that are edible, medicinal and dye plants.’’
Her creative projects just now are ones she can pick up and put down, that can be interrupted around children. ‘’I can grab my knitting while doing home schooling and knit a few rows. Mending and plant dyes are good too. We are turning to the garden a lot, prepping our garden for spring, starting our seeds, pruning our trees.
Tips: There is just something really important and beautiful about a daily rhythm is, whether it is meditation, exercise, or creative practice – whatever that thing is we can show up to on a daily basis and see how it changes, that can really be meaningful and truly transformative. So I walk, I garden and I stitch, then I’m on the computer, then I’m trying to help my children.
Changes: My worry is there will be such an economic crisis, the focus will return to building the economy by any means necessary. The model of profit over people is how we got to this mess environmentally to begin with, by forgetting our limitations and core values of taking care of people and the planet. On the other hand, the incredible interest in baking, gardening, raising chickens, homesteading and handcrafting is powerful and meaningful for people, and I hope it has staying power because it is so important to sustainability.
Find out more about Katrina here, read full transcript below.
While she doesn’t knit or crochet, Amy DuFault has discovered a sense of making by putting colour on cloth. She’s been a journalist for decades and now evolved into a regenerative thinker and storyteller about farming, history, food, and textiles. Based on Cape Cod in Massachusetts, USA, Amy is used to working from home unless travelling and everything still feels normal right now until she leaves the house or reads news about the pandemic. I was due to visit Amy for my Churchill Fellowship study tour, but we made do with this ARISING from Disruption #13 conversation as a Virtual Churchill until overseas travel becomes possible again.
Amy says DIY is arising. “Many people are gardening, they want to grow their own food, make face masks or do natural dyeing. Everybody is doing things. I am patching things, working on a denim jacket with patches sewn on and it spurs on all kinds of ideas. I’ve written about this in a ‘Foraging for Self’ article in Taproot magazine. I can’t knit, I can’t crochet but I can do natural dyeing. Putting colour to cloth, you can be proud of yourself. This is my form of making. Now I am making things, my shirt is dyed from madder root and most of my wardrobe is naturally dyed right now.”
Tips: I want to say slow down but I am having a hard time doing it. Read poems, drink coffee, listen to morning birdsong. It is important to keep moving our bodies, to be quiet, to stretch and listen, to realise we are not the only person going through something.
Changes: I am hoping regional supply will become more important to people. I hope we look at our communities as support systems – for emotional support, for food and for fibre. There may be a massive push, after being told you can’t, for crazy shopping and to live life in excess as a form of rebellion.
Listen to Amy DuFault in conversation below, or read notes at the bottom.
The timing could not have been better for Erin Lewis-Fitzgerald to publish her book Modern Mending and open an online shop for mending supplies as the coronavirus pandemic sent the population into lockdown, with time to mend.
As a Melbourne-based former journalist, editor and photo journalist who’s been teaching mending at workshops for six years, Erin had the skill set to produce this book she knew was needed to address modern-day mending for items such as jeans and t-shirts.
Mending has three magic factors happening at the moment:
The rise of visible mending started on Instagram and pinterest about 10 years ago and Tom of Holland coined the hashtag #visiblemending. Invisible mending is skilled work and hard for those who didn’t learn to sew at school so they are not going to take the time to get to that point. Visible mending has made it more contemporary and accessible.
The second factor is the environment because people are starting to care more about sustainability when it comes to their clothing. They are realising they buy too many clothes and can start fixing up the holes and rips in things they have already got.
The third thing is coronoavirus. Mending is a really good project to do when stuck at home and staring at your wardrobe – you are not going to go out shopping. This third factor is driven by the first two factors – now is the time to begin mending.
Listen to our ARISING from Disruption #12 conversation, or read the notes at bottom.
