Each year we challenge a local dyer to create a custom colourway exclusively for the Manitoba Fibre Festival, using our ram’s head logo as inspiration. The original artwork for the logo, by Gerry Oliver of Spirit Sands Farm, has provided a richness of colour depth and variety.

Our past dyers have been Hilori Thompson of Hilori’s Magical Yarnorium (2016), Daria Rakowski of Cloud9 Fiberworks (2017), and Tammy Ivanco of Manjusha Fibre Arts (2018).

We are delighted to announce that Allyson Schneider of Dye for Ewe is creating our 2019 custom yarn. Many of you will have seen Ally’s work at fibre festivals or at your local yarn stores. She has a passion for self-striping yarn! We can’t wait to see what she is cooking up for us. The yarn base is called Snug, a fingering weight yarn, 80% superwash merino and 20% nylon. Here’s the “before” picture:

Ally clearly hasn’t lost her enthusiasm for dyeing yarn!  Dye For Ewe was born out of a desire for rainbow self striping socks and a homeschooling experiment gone right.  Ever since that fateful day, Ally of Dye For Ewe has been learning to colour yarn through trial and error and dyeing up a storm, now with quality acid grade dyes.  Her inner mad scientist, armed with a warping mill and fueled by podcasts, loves to take colours some consider to “clash” and smash them together!  She still wears her original rainbow socks.

Watch for Ally’s blog post in mid-summer explaining her process and revealing the new colourway.

We welcome to our Festival market place this year One Nation Exchange, a unique and inspiring social enterprise that began as an intercultural collaborative art project in Winnipeg’s North End.

Here is their story, from their website:

Inspiration: The city of Winnipeg has the largest Indigenous population of all major Canadian cities. In 2014, Manitoba welcomed the highest recorded number of refugees per capita in Canada.  This same year,  a North End drop-in for mothers and young children hosted “First Nations, All Nations: Setting the Table”: a sharing circle/art project to bring together indigenous mothers with their newcomer neighbours.

Conversation: Once a week for 6 weeks, 15-25 women gathered in Turtle Island Neighbourhood Centre to meet, enjoy cultural foods and learn phrases from each other’s languages.  We shared childhood stories, values we were taught as children, and dreams for own sons and daughters.  We spoke, wrote, sculpted and drew.

Creation: Professional printmaking artist Karen Cornelius integrated our stories and drawings into a beautiful “One Nation” emblem.  This emblem was silkscreened onto a tablecloth for each women’s home, symbolizing the belief that how we “set the table” together today will determine the atmosphere around the table when our children sit down to join us.  We collectively embroidered and beaded two of these tablecloths.

Celebration:  Upon completion, approximately 100 community members celebrated this project together at an outdoor “Bread and Bannock Fest” featuring indigenous and African drummers and Canadian singer/songwriter Nathan Rogers.

Expansion: This same emblem was silkscreened onto fabric panels and sewn into striking canvas bags as varied and colourful as the women themselves.  Sewing machines were purchased, women were offered free sewing instruction, and these bags began to be be produced for sale in the community.

Women trained in sewing the bags were given kits to sew together over the summer, along with new sewing machines and the opportunity to purchase them at a reduced cost.  The Canadian Museum for Human Rights began selling One Nation bags in their gift boutique, while consumer demand continued in the greater community.

Mitchell’s Fabrics provided fabric at greatly reduced cost, EQ3 Furniture generously donated discontinued fabric rolls and leather samples, and Levy’s Leathers contributed a commercial leather sewing machine.  The dream grew larger…

One Nation:  With the assistance of SEED Winnipeg in 2016, we further developed our vision for a social enterprise focused on creating opportunities for intercultural exchange, training, and employment for women representative of Canada’s diverse cultures.

On International Women’s Day 2017, our not-for-profit incorporation papers were submitted and One Nation Exchange was born.

Liz Boily  volunteers with O.N.E. to organize their market sales and is also a regular at the Manitoba Fibre Festival. She is happy to be introducing the women and the products of O.N.E. to other Festival visitors this September. This is what Liz has to say about the project:

We are pleased to welcome Sarah Elizabeth from Rossland, B.C. to the Festival as a vendor this year. You will be delighted with the unique style of  locks, batts, yarns and notions she has to offer. Sarah’s class “The Textured Spin” runs on Friday morning, September 14. 

Here are some excerpts and photos from her website, Sarah Elizabeth Fibre Works: 

“I started Sarah Elizabeth Fibre Works the year after my first daughter was born. I was driven to create a business that would allow me to work from home and enjoy every precious (and sometimes exhausting) moment together. In  July 2017 we welcomed our second daughter into our fibre filled world.

My love affair with fibre (from the crimp, to the texture, to the transformation from raw fleece to finished product) has taken me on an extraordinary journey of creation. I love almost every aspect of my business from searching out of raw fleeces to the spinning of hand carded batts, to large felting projects. I have transformed my artistic practice from paint and canvas to all things fibre.

With a focus on sustainability, environmental consciousness, and consumption with awareness, my aim is to both inspire creators, wearers and admirers as well as to create change through action. I am proud to be a part of the slow fashion movement.

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I aim to use only the highest quality fibres and yarns in my creations; from hand processed and dyed fibre supplies to one of a kind fashions, I have hand-selected my raw materials from all over the world. I work hard to make conscious purchasing decisions that recognize a need for strong local, regional and global trade practices that in turn promote resilient economies throughout the world. I focus on purchasing fleece from small scale farms, minimally processed fibre and yarns from eco friendly mills with good working conditions and, in general, from suppliers that have a strong focus on community.

I want each and every customer to feel like they are a part of something bigger than just the fibre, yarn or fashion item that they purchase. A conscious purchase from Sarah Elizabeth Fibre works is a full circle connection; to the farm, to the fibre, to the mill, to the fabric, to the people involved in the process, to the natural world.

I hope that this approach will fuel change. Each of these steps taken together can produce change. Change in product origins, change in consumption patterns, change in resource use, and, ultimately, the ripple effect of a safer and more sustainable future.”

Welcome to the Manitoba Fibre Festival, Sarah.

Meet two sisters who are starting out in the entrepreneur world and promoting angora rabbits within Manitoba. They live near Neepawa, Manitoba. Their interest in rabbits started as a 4H project and has blossomed into a young business.

Regal Rose Rabbitry is offering Satin Angora Rabbits and hopes to expand in the future with providing angora yarn and fibre. This breed of rabbit is incredibly friendly, inquisitive, calm, and provides lovely fibre to spin or felt with.

The girls will have a display at the Manitoba Fibre Festival on September 14 & 15. People interested in the rabbits they currently have available for sale can contact them at   regalroserabbitry@gmail.com .

Here’s an example of what you can do with angora fibre —  at a recent workshop on raising Angora rabbits, Anna Hunter said “I spun just 40g of locally grown satin angora fibre with some Manitoba Rambouillet and it made this beautiful, soft yarn!”

Stop in to see the Regal Rose Rabbitry girls at the Festival and learn all about the lovely creatures that provide this luxurious fibre.

We are extremely pleased to announce our latest sponsor, the Campaign for Wool. Having the support of this international program is a milestone in the growth of the Festival. It means we are recognized as the primary focus of fibre related activities in that large geographical area of Canada between Toronto and Vancouver. The Campaign is sponsoring the 2018 Fashion Show at the Festival, featuring work from our talented vendors.

The Campaign for Wool is a global endeavor initiated by its patron, His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales, in order to raise awareness amongst consumers about the unique, natural and sustainable benefits offered by wool. The Campaign now operates in 12 different countries across the globe including Canada, France, Australia, Japan and the United States.The Campaign was officially launched in Canada in 2014 by Their Royal Highnesses The Prince of Wales and The Duchess of Cornwall during an event in Pictou, Nova Scotia.  Every year since, the Campaign has worked with all levels of the wool value chain (farmers, processors, manufacturers, retailers, designers, etc.) to promote wool in general and Canadian wool in particular.   Their activity centres around an annual Canadian Wool Week where media, retail and event partnerships are all leveraged to educate and inform Canadians about the wonders of Wool. The Campaign also supports wool research and other events throughout the year that promote wool as a sustainable and renewable fibre.

Canadian Wool Week 2018 takes place from Nov. 2 – 11 with events in Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Vancouver including our signature partnership with The Royal Winter Fair. 

My name is Merita Robin Ferrada and my business is called ‘Robin & Yarn’.

Raia Bryan of Marigold Made is a new addition to our vendor market. Welcome, Raia!

Raia started out experimenting with plant dyes and was taken with the luminous quality of natural dyed silk. She then discovered pleating as a way to create lovely wearable shapes out of the silk. The shapes are reminiscent of items from nature: flowers, leaves, coral, the gills of mushrooms.

She loves the playful, experimental aspect of natural dyeing, and bridging a connection between art, colour, and the natural world.

A favorite piece would be a pair of earrings made from bundle dyed silk. The various colours turned out beautifully and the way the colours come together after gathering the silk is always a fun surprise.

“LeVerne Tucker and Last Dance Ranch” …. a great country music band? No, that’s our vendor profile for today! 

My name is LeVerne Tucker, and my farm/business is The Last Dance Ranch.  In 2010, I jumped rubber boots first into farming.  The adventure began with the gift of Loki, the housewarming llama .  Loki was joined shortly by several alpacas,  and my first fibre business,  Storybook Art & Fibre was born.  I am a self-taught indie dyer, an avid spinner, and a lover of all things fibre and textile.

A farm move in 2014 sparked new beginnings on the farm.  Adjacent to a now closed, locally famous dance hall, The Last Dance Ranch is home to Icelandic sheep, and a small herd of dairy goats.  I use only ethically sourced Manitoba fibre for my yarn and roving;  soaps are made from raw goat’s milk from the farm herd. 

I am passionate about local goods, and am proud to be a member of Manitoba’s farming community.  My inspiration for colour comes from daily living; this year’s colourways include Alfalfa, Weathered Wood, Rhubarb, and Big Red Barn. 

The Manitoba Fibre Festival is an exciting, inspiring event for vendors and visitors alike, and I look forward to sharing my new work with everyone!

Tammy Ivanco, of Manjusha Fibre Arts, shares her process of designing and dyeing this limited edition yarn. Each year a local dyer creates a colourway for us based on our wonderful ram’s head logo drawn by artist and shepherd Gerry Oliver.

The yarn will be available at our merchandise table at the Festival September 14 & 15.

Tammy has named this colourway “MB Sheep Thrill”. Here’s her story:

“MB Sheep Thrill – 2018 Custom Colourway Yarn”

“It was very exciting to create the Manitoba Fibre Festival 2018 Custom Colour.  This yearly event is something that I am very happy about – it started small and grew in ways that were hard to imagine even just a few years back.  The crew running the event have done a great job keeping it going and expanding it.  With this in mind, I was also very nervous!  The general direction for the Custom Colour was the Manitoba Fibre Festival Logo.  I had a high resolution copy on my Ipad and I could zoom in and out to think about the selections I would make. 

The sheep head is rather unique with a lot of colours, so had so many places for inspiration.  I thought I had my general plan very quickly, but in the end, the process was a bit all over the place because of the techniques I had been using, and then the modifications that came when the yarn decided it needed to be something else.   In the beginning the sheep head reminded me of my sheep and the colours I saw were harder, darker, and really based in the grey and black tones.  I did some test skeins on a heavy sock yarn and really liked them, but then when I held and started working with the yarn I was going to use for the Custom Colour, I revised my colour schemes.  The light and beautiful organic merino/nylon fingering weight yarn really called for the softer colours in the logo, with the expression of the darker ones less pronounced.  I have called this yarn base GAIA, which in Greek mythology is the personification of the Earth. Gaia, the goddess, is the mother of all life and was also the giver or gifts. I selected this base for the custom colour to the idea of making clothing from sustainable sources, but also to generally sing the praises of the Earth and the benefits we get.

The colours I selected were from the creamy golden yellows on the sheep horns and face, the rose grey on the face that shifted from pinks to greys, the black and teal curls of the sheep fleece, and finally the teal and orange of the eye.  I also wanted more white to capture some of the light curls of the fleece, and this made so much sense to me as a dyer because white fleece is so prominent and necessary in a dyer’s toolkit.

The technique I have been rather hooked on lately is based in knots, and maybe a little like the tie dyeing that some people have done.  This technique was used for the “Prairie Storm” yarn that became Heather Bailey’s inspiration for her “Prairie Wheat Shawl” in the Maker’s Challenge, as well as my “Polar Bear” and “At the Leg.” from the MBFF 2018 Mood Boards.  I really like how this technique creates a unique variegated yarn, with less obvious pooling, but that works for a range of patterns.  For the MBFF 2018 Custom Colour, I used a single knot that was in the same location on each skein, with the orientation the same in each dye pan used.  This allowed me to layer a blush pink and grey to give the mottled look of the logo sheep face, and have a bit of transitioning cream gold found in the head.  The fun part was that I could use the knot to have teal blue and black spattered in the white areas remaining with the base yarn colour around them, like the fleece curls.  A small bit of speckling with teals and orange captured some of the subtle teals throughout and the sheep eye. 

All in all, there were 10 different dye colours used to capture the logo colours I selected.  The yarn will work for shawls and socks, and a range of other items calling for a fingering weight.  It has a mix of colours that allow it to be part of a fade pattern, or just set against a solid from the selection.  I called the MBFF 2018 Custom Colour “MB Sheep Thrill”, and I have been knitting with some of it and I love it.  I hope others find it as fun and great to work with as I have.”

My name is Deana Wilson, and my business is Mammoth Yarn Studio. I am an indie Dyer and my mom Judy sews project bags!