Weave

In this week's episode, LaChaun speaks with Jamila Norman a.k.a (Farmer J), Lauren Soleil, and Keisha Cameron of the Black Sheep Fiber Circle, a maker-style sista' circle and fiber arts gathering dedicated to BIPOC land stewards and agrarian artists who love to create, enjoy, and explore the legacy of African and Indigenous-American textiles. Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-149

In this week's episode, LaChaun speaks with adé Oh (they/themme/àjé) an afro surrealist, animist, and multimedia healing artist. Their creative fire is nourished by earth-based textile crafts, sound arts, experimental and abstract visual arts, nature writing, poetry, capoeira Angola, good food and healing herbs, river time, belly laughter, money, healthy relationships, and peaceful rest. They are a returning generation slow craft artisan and in 2014, made a lifelong commitment to cloth and tapestry weaving. In 2020, they founded dièdiè textile farm and production studio which is currently incubating on collective land Tierra Negra farms. They work with land and sky to grow and process plant-based fibers and dyes for the people. At Gist, we are lucky to support them as one of our artists in residence of 2022 and as a guest on the podcast this week. Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-147

In this week's episode, LaChaun speaks with one of our artists in residence Kesiena Onosigho. Kesiena's thought-provoking mixed-media collages and installations are informed by her lived experiences, curiosity, and the historic influence on arts & crafts from people within the African Diaspora. Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-145

Our WEAVE Artist in Residency program is a 12-week long remote residency that aims to support weavers and fiber enthusiasts who engage in community-based fiber practices. Each participant will receive a $1,500.00 cash stipend to use with no restrictions, and a $1,500.00 materials budget to shop for materials on the Gist Yarn website. We will select three Artists in Residence in 2022. Shownotes: www.gistyarn.com/artist-residency-2022 Residency Application: https://forms.gle/dfAcFhuPpJ1uL3X29

In this week's episode, LaChaun speaks with Melvenea Hodges. Melvenea is a Fiber Artist residing in South Bend, Indiana. She was born and raised in Benton Harbor, Michigan where she began learning about fiber arts through experimenting with hair braiding, beading, and weaving. It was through these experiences she found joy and realized her talent in creating with her hands. She creates clothing and accessories using traditional techniques such as block printing, sewing, weaving, spinning, knitting, crocheting, and embroidery. On a small scale, Melvenea grows processes and spins naturally colored cotton that she weaves with. Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-142

On this week's episode, Sarah speaks with Rebecca Mezoff. We are really thrilled to welcome Rebecca Mezoff back onto the podcast. Rebecca is a contemporary tapestry weaver in Fort Collins, Colorado, and a tapestry weaving teacher, both in-person and online. She's written books about tapestry weaving, including the recently published book The Art of Tapestry Weaving. We first spoke for the podcast in 2018 for episode 11 and since then, Rebecca and I have stayed in touch and Rebecca has been really instrumental in giving feedback throughout the development of our new line of wool tapestry yarn, Array. We have been collaborating on an exciting project that she’s going to be launching soon and we're excited to share more details in this episode! Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-140

On this week's episode, LaChaun speaks with Christine Jablonski, the Director of Operations for Gist Yarn, and designer of Twofold, our upcoming subscription box for rigid heddle weavers. Her theme for this project is double weave. Over the course of a year, she will take you step by step through this exciting technique to weave four projects of setts, textures, and widths not available with single-heddle weaving. In addition to her duties at Gist, Christine has taught extensively and is also a weaver and exhibiting fiber artist. You can find her on Instagram as @soulspaceart. Twofold Subscription box sign-up: www.gistyarn.com/pages/twofold Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-twofold

In this week’s episode, LaChaun speaks with Maud Lerayer. Maud is the founder of Behind The Hill, a textile company based in Brooklyn, New York. Behind The Hill creates unique and contemporary pieces for home decor using a variety of heirloom cotton which grows wild in shades of pink, terra-cotta, green, beige, and white in Mexico and Guatemala. They are partnered with three communities of Indigenous people in Central America who still grow, spin, and weave color-grown cotton, the same way it has been done for centuries. They work directly with their artisan partners, to strive to keep ancient traditions alive while working hand in hand with the weavers. Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-136

In this week’s episode, LaChaun speaks with Carolina Jimenez a Mexican-American textile artist and designer living in Brooklyn New York. In Carolina’s weaving practice she makes monuments as memory signifiers, and vessels into which the past is poured, molded or reshaped (woven, unraveled, or stretched). These monuments reference the body-her body and ours-they speak to the magnificence of our daily lived experience and the monumentality of the mundane. Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-134

We have a special episode for you today, a conversation between myself, LaChaun, and Maggie Putnam, that will be a peek behind the scenes at GIST Yarn and what we’ve been up to. Maggie Putnam Studio is a one-woman creative office that crafts refined brand systems for conscious, intentional brands. And for the last seven months, we have been working on redesigning our GIST Yarn and Weave Podcast brand identity and rebuilding our website to better reflect the company we’ve become, and to better share our podcast episodes, and to better serve our community. Maggie has led that process for us, working closely with our team to learn who we are as a company and translating those conversations into a redesigned brand identity that we are proud to have launched just last week. We learned so much working with Maggie and we thought it would be interesting to share a glimpse of the design process with our listeners and customers. Shownotes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-132

In this week’s episode, LaChaun is speaking with Lydia Wendt, the Founder and Design Director of the California Cloth Foundry. Originally from New York, Lydia trained at the Fashion Institute of Technology and worked with some of America's top fashion designers and brands, including Tom Ford for Perry Ellis America, Calvin Klein, Jones New York, and The North Face. Before founding CCF in 2014, she was a member of the faculty of the Academy of Art University's internationally recognized fashion department. There she taught graduate and undergraduate courses in textile design and sustainable fashion. Lydia’s past work in the fast fashion industry informs and guides California Cloth Foundry’s mission: to positively change the industry one bolt of fabric and garment at a time, for the health of the planet and the future of her two daughters. Show notes: www.gistyarn.com/episode-130

Hello, I hope all is well. Before I get into this week’s episode I would like to start out by expressing my excitement and gratitude for the recent election results. I’m glad we voted and I’m excited about the changes that are to come! While we are on the topic of the future I’m excited to introduce you all to a new project that we are working on at Gist. As part of my new role at Gist as director of partnerships and collaborations, I’m working on our very first Open Call for Gist Yarn Pattern Designers. The theme of our first Open Call for Designers is Hope. This past year has been hard for so many, and filled with a yearning for better days ahead. As we look with optimism towards the future, we are seeking designs inspired by what makes you feel hopeful. Maybe it’s the hope of gathering with friends and family, easy hugs in shared spaces. The hope that is present in every handmade gift - an offering of love and time. The hope for a better world, safe and just and healthy for everyone. The hope in a freshly wound warp, the promise of quiet moments passing shuttles through your hands. Whatever is bringing you to hope these days, we are excited to see how it inspires your designs with our yarn. If your design is selected for publication, Gist Yarn will pay you $350-$450 depending on the complexity of the project to weave and write the pattern. Gist Yarn will purchase exclusive rights to publish the pattern for one year, and you will retain rights to also sell the pattern from your own platform after one year. If your design is selected, you will be given free yarn to weave the sample project. Woven samples will be mailed to Gist Yarn for photography and then will be returned to you. Gist yarn will continue to provide access to our free patterns on our website however patterns produced in collaboration with Designers via our open call will be available for purchase on our website. If your interested in submitting a proposal with can sign up for email updates via www.gistyarn.com/designers. Look out for our announcement in January 2021 Thank you for your wonderful support, until next time HAPPY WEAVING!

In this week’s episode, LaChaun is speaking to Torrey Beckham. Torrey is a Texas-born Brooklyn-based interdisciplinary artist who weaves, uses plants, and many other creative mediums as outlets of expression. Torrey’s palette, texture choices, and subject matters all have their roots in Torrey’s personal experiences growing up Black. Torrey’s work aim's to create a space where Black and Queer folks encounter the work, seeing themselves in the lines, and feel "home" emanating from the textures. www.gistyarn.com/episode-128