Why fibre matters

There’s something grounding about fibre — you can hold it, smell it, twist it between your fingers and turn it into something that will outlive the moment you made it. Before I ever dreamt of a mill, before I hoped that Riverdance Farm Tasmania would become a home for growers and makers, fibre hovered in my periphery. I wanted it in the middle of my life. With a BA in Fine Arts, felting and fibre assessments appeared here and there — though sewing was never my skill set, and neither was knitting.

I have emotional memories, of every time that a person so much cleverer than myself – has taken my beautiful animals yarn, that I’ve processed and turn it into something amazing.  I have quiet moments where I touch and appreciate how wonderfully generous you are, to have taken my yarn and then returned it as a transformed wearable garment for me.  I also think with humour, that it’s likely to see me out of my farm flannel …

With my focus sharply part of the fibre journey as a grower, loving the land and animal health and that synergy of the beginning of the story and not the end product.  I can’t exist without the makers around me who follow on from what I’ve seen.  I see the animal, the land and the raw nature of the wool.  The partnership I have with makers, it feels like a dance. 

When I listen to a maker, my mind is triggered into a million directions of how to do that, how to create that yarn, felt or batt.  How would I ply, what would be the best wool, or blends?  And how to test that theory – we do what we know or what we are taught, but what happens if we blend that up, test the boundaries and the theory.  That is where curiosity is amazing.

Now it stands to reason there is no yarn, without shearing.  My earliest experiences with shearing and fleeces were far from glamorous. Who am I kidding - they still aren’t glamorous!  My first herd of rescue alpacas carried two years’ worth of fleece.

For machine processing the wool needs to be not too long and not too short, but just right so it won’t catch or break in the machinery.  With a 2 year fleece, laden with vegetable matter, the first cut from that year were turned into garden mulch.   It blew my mind that not only were the alpacas suffering from basic neglect, but the fibre they’d grown with such effort had been wasted.

None of this was remotely Instagram-worthy. It was tactile. Emotional. A bit chaotic. I was just giving it all a go. I lost some alpacas whose health couldn’t withstand the transportation or the shearing stress — hard lessons that arrived far too soon. I had to get over a needle discomfort, put my hands where I’d never imagined.  And learn fast. These beautiful animals were in my care now, so I pushed through and acquired what I needed to know. You do what needs to be done.

But long before that chapter, years ago, when I first plunged my hands into a fleece at a show day, I had no idea I was waking something up in myself — that soft, warm, earthy reminder that making things is deeply, instinctively human. Slow craft resonates with me because it pushes back against the things modern life demands of us: speed, efficiency, output, endless noise.

Fibre doesn’t care about any of that. It insists you slow down. It insists you pay attention. You can’t rush the skirting or the washing. You must watch it as it’s processed. You can’t bully a fleece into becoming something it isn’t meant to be. There’s honesty in that. And there is purpose for every fleece.

I’m deeply fascinated by how craft intersects with women’s historical roles. For centuries, the creative work traditionally done by women — spinning, knitting, weaving, sewing, mending — wasn’t hobby, or leisure, or decor. It was essential. It clothed families, protected communities, stabilised households, carried culture, and kept people alive through winter. Whole economies depended on women’s hands.

Yet as soon as human innovation marched forward, this “women’s work” was among the first things to be industrialised and, in turn, devalued. Skills once held in high regard became “pastimes” or “domestic duties,” while male-dominated visual arts — painting, sculpture, architecture — rose into the realm of “high art.” It’s not that one is better than the other; it’s the historical hierarchy that’s so striking. Women’s handwork became invisible the moment machines could do it. Men’s creative work became celebrated the moment money could be made from it.

And now we’re left with something strange. Handmade garments were once priceless; now fast fashion overflows in op-shops and landfill. Spinning and weaving were once community pillars; now they’re “niche crafts.” Fibre art is still dominated by women but rarely recognised on par with visual art. Machine-made textiles are cheap, disposable and environmentally devastating — and many people no longer know what real yarn even feels like.

The irony, of course, is that fibre artists, spinners and knitters are among the last guardians of tens of thousands of years of lineage of human making.  Perhaps that’s why fibre feels so meaningful to me — because it connects grower, land, animal, maker and wearer in one long, invisible thread. A jumper isn’t just a jumper. Yarn isn’t just yarn. It holds weather patterns, good years and bad years, paddock nutrition, countless hands, a farmer’s blood, sweat and tears — and the character of the animal it grew on. It’s story material.

The longer I spend dreaming about the mill, the more I realise this isn’t just about processing fleece. It’s about growers feeling proud when they hand over their raw fibre. It’s about makers feeling that spark when they touch the yarn. It’s about people knowing where their fibre comes from — not as a trend, but as a truth.

If you’re a maker: come and meet the animals you knit from.
If you’re a grower: come and see how your fleeces are treated and returned to you.

One day, when the mill finally comes to life, I hope to create and sell yarn that carries that feeling. Yarn with soul. Yarn that makes people pause. Yarn that reminds us of where things come from and how things grow.

Until then, I’ll keep collecting ideas, learning from others, dreaming out loud and sharing the journey.

What I’m thinking about today

• If you own any animal – you are responsible for educating yourself.  I don’t think there is a defence of ‘oh I wasn’t sure’ when you have google at your finger tips.

• Alpacas need to be shorn ever year (and their injections too).

• Shop local whenever you can, in whatever way you can afford. Generally you will pay more, because it’s been made – not manufactured.

• Visit farmstays.  It helps farmers feel like they have a holiday hearing your stories.

• Consider sharing your authentic self.  We wanna know the real you!