What Fashion Farm teaches me
What began as a personal study has grown into a place where we collectively explore how fashion can reconnect with its origins. The Fashion Farm in Welsum, a small Dutch village on the left bank of the IJssel River in the municipality of Olst-Wijhe, raises a fundamental question: what happens when we reconnect fashion with the source of textiles?
In 2023, I moved from Rotterdam to a farm in Overijssel. This was not because I wanted to become a farmer, but because I wanted to investigate what happens when you reduce the distance between fashion and nature. That research was given a name and a home on 1.1 hectares of land in Welsum: the Fashion Farm.
Natural fibres and plant pigments
When you walk around the Fashion Farm, you do not see a traditional fashion supply chain. You see flax growing in the field and woad among the vegetables in the kitchen garden. Sheep's wool is sorted and processed. You see colour emerging from walnuts. People from the local community work side by side with contacts from my fashion network during “Volunteer Friday”. You see the weaving experiments from the first flax harvest. Here, a garment begins not with a design sketch, but with a seed.
In spring, we sow flax at the Fashion Farm, one of Europe's oldest textile crops. Months later, it is harvested, retted, processed and ultimately spun into yarn. This process shows us just how much knowledge, time and attention lie behind something as seemingly simple as linen fabric. Since April 2024, I have been on a journey to create a home-grown linen garment, which has been a lesson in slowing down. Fortunately, we celebrate every step, such as the first Welsum linen thread incorporated into our Lin jacket.
Elsewhere on the property grows woad, a historic dye plant used for centuries to colour textiles blue. The leaves are harvested and processed into natural pigment. What starts as a green plant ultimately ends up as a deep blue hue in a garment. This is reflected in the magical colour gradient of our Gertrude jumper. Named after my favourite chicken, the jumper tells the story of local wool, dye plants and collaborations. It raises the question of what value we attach to these elements. In 2024, the Gertrude jumper began a tour of fashion exhibitions, clothing libraries, radio and television. From October 22, it will capture the hearts of visitors at the Zuiderzeemuseum (the exhibition runs for ten months, ed.). The large walnut tree at the Fashion Farm also provides colour, which we used to dye our Rona knitted vest.
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Studio building
We extended our philosophy of designing with a love for nature to the renovation of the former chicken shed (400 square metres) on the property. It now serves as a design studio, workshop and knowledge centre for local textiles. The renovation demonstrates that craftsmanship, aesthetics and responsibility transcend disciplines and reinforce one another. Together with architectural firm la-di-da, bio-building contractor Dijkhuis, various experts and a dedicated group of volunteers, we have created a building made entirely from natural and recycled materials. These range from shells and cellulose for insulation to a facade of hemp fibre panels and a unique rammed earth floor.
Rammed earth
A loam floor seems like a logical choice: earthy, sustainable and natural. However, a surface area of 400 square metres had never been achieved in Europe before. The building contains nearly 50,000 kilograms of loam: a natural material based on clay and sand that was built up, compacted and levelled layer by layer. Italian loam expert Tomasso Venturini supervised the process, sharing his knowledge and experience with architecture students and volunteers. In turn, all of these people were indispensable in pooling their strength to literally and figuratively put the material in its place. Together, they helped lay the foundation for a regenerative future. In this way, we are collectively building the story of a new fashion system, step by step.
Bringing craftsmanship back to Dutch soil
What all these experiments have in common is that they make Dutch craftsmanship visible. They show how many steps exist between raw material and wardrobe, as well as how much skill, knowledge and collaboration are required. After all, the Fashion Farm is not only about materials. It is also about people who each bring their own expertise and collectively explore what an alternative way of producing could look like.
Art of asking questions
The Fashion Farm is not a place where we pretend to have found all the answers. It is a place where we ask questions and where we learn. How local can a garment become? Which raw materials can grow on Dutch soil? How do we restore knowledge that has been largely lost? Finally, what does fashion look like when it once again becomes part of a living ecosystem?
Through workshops, masterclasses and guided tours, we make visible what normally happens behind the scenes. We share knowledge about local fibres, natural dyes, craftsmanship and regenerative production, inviting others to reconnect with what they wear.
The Fashion Farm is therefore not just a farm, design studio or knowledge centre. It is a living study into what fashion looks like when you make it part of life itself once again.
Joline