This week’s FEEDBACK FRIDAY was with Alabama Chanin founder and creative director, the amazing Natalie Chanin. We talked about Natalie’s design journey, a sense of place and Alabama Chanin’s seed to shelf/cottage industry business model, the design process and working with natural dyes, as well as thoughts on the future of making.
Watch the video:
With a background in environmental and industrial design, Natalie has worked for 20 years building sustainable practices and community values into the design and making process through her business. You can follow along with the storytelling behind all of this on the Alabama Chanin Journal and on Instagram.
Natalie has long been a pioneer in the Slow Fashion movement and teaches these fundamentals to thousands of people each year through sewing workshops and online classes. She has authored five books on sewing and craft. Natalie is a member of the Council of Fashion Designers of America and a recipient of multiple awards and grants for fashion and the arts—including the 2013 CFDA/Lexus Eco-Challenge—an award competition that identifies and celebrates the greatest American designers working in the realm of sustainable fashion.
Join us next week, May 21st, 9am Pacific, 12pm Eastern for a live Zoom FEEDBACK FRIDAY with Liz Spencer also known as The Dogwood Dyer. As a mother to three young children, Liz will be talking about the evolution and adaptation of her natural dye practice, her insatiable thirst for a deeper understanding of natural dyes and the fine balance of caring for others while carving out time to continue on the endless path of natural dye learning.
FEEDBACK FRIDAY
If you are not familiar with FEEDBACK FRIDAY, every week, we speak with dyers, artists, scientists and scholars about our favorite topic, natural dyeing and color. Curated by Amy DuFault, Botanical Colors’ Sustainability Director and presented by Botanical Colors’ Founder Kathy Hattori.
We even have our own theme song thanks to musician Jimmie Snider!