Fabric Fields
Grains have shaped landscapes and civilisations for millennia, feeding both bodies and cultures. For thousands of years, they have been the foundation of human life, shaping societies through their cultivation, storage, and exchange. Yet today, much of grain farming prioritises maximum yield, focusing on efficiency at the expense of biodiversity and taste. Distancing us from the landscapes and ecosystems that we are part of and depend upon.
This work explores the potential of straw, a byproduct of grain farming, transforming it into materials that are both tactile and visually expressive. Using techniques such as tufting, felting, and weaving, the material samples suggest large-scale applications that reflect the surrounding local landscape. Each piece serves as a bridge between the natural world and human craft, drawing the field into our interiors and offering a tactile story of place.
The stable, as a space where the landscape momentarily comes indoors, serves as the inspiration for these works. It is a threshold—a meeting place of outside and inside, where grains and labour briefly rest before continuing their journey. The samples echo this liminal space, celebrating the cycles of growth and harvest while inviting a renewed connection to the land and its rhythms.
This project emerged with an initiative in Flevoland, The Netherlands, a region renowned for its extensive grain cultivation. Traditionally focused on producing grain for livestock feed and selected for maximum yield, this initiative reimagines grains’ potential by developing a local grain chain centred on human consumption, with a focus on health, flavour, and sustainability. By incorporating overlooked byproducts like straw into design, the project examines how craft and agriculture intersect to create new, meaningful materials.
These samples are more than explorations in material; they are proposals for a future where landscapes, craft, and natural cycles shape the way we produce and consume. They invite us to see fields not as distant or utilitarian, but as integral to our lives and the objects we create.