Slow Fashion 1.0
July 10-16, 2023
Medomak Retreat Center, Washington, Maine
with Cal Patch, Kristin Arzt, Alexis Bailey and special guest Melanie Falick
A small group of just thirty-six Makers will spend five full days in exploration of line, color, and stitch at a contemplative pace. Surrounded by the woods, on the edge of a lake, with the rustic beauty and charm of Maine as the backdrop. Small groups, individual pacing, natural inspiration-this will be a week for unwinding and exploring....
Click on the button below to register for the cabin choice you prefer:
• Single cabin, $2,100. SOLD OUT
• Double Cabin, $1,900. SOLD OUT
• Triple Cabin, $1,700. SOLD OUT
We successfully gathered the last two years, with care and consideration. We intend to do the same this year.
I continue to take Covid seriously. All possible precautions will be observed. Proof of vaccine and whatever boosters are readily available will be required for participation. There will be no exceptions to this requirement. Testing will be required upon arrival.
Are you seeking the time and space to slow down and connect with your skills, your agency, your creative practice? In these challenging chaotic, isolated pandemic days, we crave connection and community with other Makers. Maine is a good place to retreat, step back from the daily pace, and spend some time in community with needle, thread, dyepots, and cloth. This July, I invite you to join Cal Patch, Kristin Arzt, Alexis Bailey, and Melanie Falick to make that time and space for yourself.
Join Cal, Kristin, Alexis, Melanie, Katherine, and I at the Medomak Retreat Center in Washington, ME where you can relax, unwind, and dive into your stitching practice. You will sleep in a modern yet rustic cabin, eat three meals a day with the community, and spend as much time as you like with cloth, needle, thread and dyepot. Each day will be spent with Cal, Kristin, or Alexis, learning their techniques and tips, and practicing new skills or sharpening old ones. In addition there are two days of time for musings, wanderings, exploration, and epiphany, both of the textile and human variety. The emphasis here is on settling into your Making practice and letting the rest of it float away....
~Cal is an integral part of our Slow Fashion retreats, having been a founding instructor. She joins us this year to expand on her Boxy/Drapy top or tunic with a Hacking workshop. HACK IT! Once you have a sewing pattern you like, it can become the foundation for infinite variations by using pattern "hacks". A simple pattern for a pullover top can become a hoodie, a jacket, a dress, a sweatshirt, a tunic, a jumper, a t-shirt, a smock... Whatever you envision. Add seams, gathers, flare, pleats, collars, cowls, hoods, cuffs, plackets, yokes, facings, or other design details, and you'll see that there really are no limits!
You may have drafted your own boxy top pattern in a previous class with Cal, or one of her online workshops, or you can bring a purchased pattern (shared after registration) to use as your starting point. We suggest that you have made at least one muslin or test garment from the pattern in advance, to confirm you are happy with the fit or size chosen. Cal will demonstrate a variety of pattern manipulation techniques, and then you can apply some of them to design one or more variations. Before you know it you'll have a closet full of handmade clothes!
~Kristin returns this year with her magical Natural dye pots. Explore printmaking and patterns using natural dyes! You will mix mordant print pastes, and print directly with thickened mordants on natural fibers. Kristin will go over mixing an aluminum (bright) print paste and an iron (dark) print paste, and many values in between. You will paint, screen print, and block print with these pastes, creating varied values and patterns on a single piece of cloth dyed in immersion dye baths.
~Alexis joins us for the first time this year to share the wonder that is Zero Waste patterns. Her workshop will teach you the fundamentals of zero waste sewing patterns and hand-sewing a garment by means of the Zero Waste Iris Blouse.
“Iris was designed to be the ultimate wardrobe workhorse pattern. With a zero waste design, this pattern leaves you with a stunning and beautifully finished garment with little to no waste leftover.
The blouse versions feature a collar and cuff combination or a bow and ruffle sleeve combination. A button placket makes the tops simple to take off and also gives a subtle unique detail. The dress versions feature the same details as the blouse versions only the bodice stops at the waist and a gathered skirt with pockets is added.”
You will spend a day with each teacher, with plenty of time for inspirational wanderings. Two back-to-back, then a break. On the third day we will make a small field trip to the coast, and a fabulous local fabric store. Or if you prefer, you can go for a swim, take a hike, do some stitching, some reading, or whatever your heart desires. The last day of instruction on Friday. Then Saturday is entirely for you to do with as you please. Check in with one of the instructors on a technique you need clarification on, take a nap, draft out a new hack, the day is yours!
We will have a clothing swap, so bring any and all wearable items that no longer sing to you, and watch them leave with another, while perhaps bringing something new and thoughtful into your closet. If you have no clothes to swap, yardage and patterns are always welcome for swapping! The swap nights are always tons of fun! We will also have an evening for Garment Stories. Bring a beloved item of clothing that has a story behind it. We will share our stories and our thoughts about the lives of our garments. Our garments hold so many untold stories and memories, it is fascinating to hear them. So much emotion, so much history, culture, identity in our closets. Let’s share our stories.
The primary focus for the week will be on slowing down, taking time, connecting to your practice, the community, and your inner voice. Evenings will be open for more stitching, conversing, knitting, star gazing, cricket concerts, Loon appreciation, and anything else you might like to do in Maine in July....
Cal Patch
Cal has been a maker since she was a Girl Scout in the seventies. She sews, crochets, spins, embroiders, knits, prints, drafts patterns, dyes… hence the name of her label: Hodge Podge. Cal has been teaching textile arts for over 15 years, and loves showing people new skills. She designed clothes for several big names in the fashion industry before leaving to forge her own path as an independent artisan and create one-off handmade pieces. Cal owned a boutique in Manhattan and later opened one of the first indie craft schools in 2002. After seventeen years of designing clothes in New York City, she recently relocated to the Catskills, where she is becoming a crafty farmer. Her book on drafting sewing patterns, Design-It-Yourself Clothes, was published in 2009. Currently she teaches at various shops, studios and retreats around the country and sells her work at craft fairs and online in her Etsy shop. You can see what she's up to at calpatch.com.
Kristin Arzt
Kristin Arzt is a natural dyer, educator, gardener and designer based in Western North Carolina. Kristin believes that by exploring the collision of textiles, plants and sustainability, she can help make the study of natural dyes accessible to everyone through education and enthusiasm. When not teaching, Kristin grows her own seasonal dye plants in her home garden for closer experimentation. She serves on the board of directors of Local Cloth, an Asheville-based nonprofit organization, supporting its mission to educate the community on sustainable textiles and regenerative fiber. You can find her work on her website Kristin Arzt.
Alexis Bailey
Alexis Bailey is a sustainably focused pattern designer, sewist and hand-sewist dedicated to creating a making practice that is closed looped and minimizes waste. You can find her work at her website Fibr & Cloth Studio.
We will have a special guest for SF 1.0 this year! Melanie Falick is a lifelong maker who has spent her career exploring and celebrating the important role that handwork and creativity play in our lives, and also writing and editing books on these subjects. Today, she believes, it is more important than ever that we fully embrace our creativity and our maker spirit for the good of ourselves and the world around us. During our time together, Melanie will share stories about her personal and professional journey in the maker community, and she will lead thought-provoking conversations and hands-on exercises that will challenge all of us to think about our own maker journeys, our paths and passions, how we define success, and how the decisions we make each day, the small ones and the large ones, move us toward (or away from) our goals and dreams.
Melanie Falick is an independent writer, editor, and creative director—and a lifelong maker. She is the author, mostly recently, of Making a Life: Working by Hand and Discovering the Life You Are Meant to Live. She is also the creative director and editor of Modern Daily Knitting Field Guides.
Melanie is the former publishing director of STC Craft/Melanie Falick Books, an imprint of Abrams, where she spearheaded books by many esteemed authors, including Kaffe Fassett, Clara Parkes, Norah Gaughan, Lotta Jansdotter, and Natalie Chanin. She is also the author of Knitting in America, Kids Knitting, Weekend Knitting, and Handknit Holidays, and the co-author of Knitting for Baby, with over 500,000 books in print.
At present Melanie is working on a new book, tentatively, titled The Maker’s Way.
If your time in Maine opens up even more pathways to creativity, our good friend, and my right hand during the retreats, Katherine Ferrier will offer up her workshop, Making, Being, and Being Made, Contemplative Writing for Makers, again this year. Folks who are interested can sign up for this two hour workshop on site.
If making is a practice of paying attention, what can we learn about ourselves, and the world, by tuning in to the layers of meaning and metaphor embedded in every thread of our lives as makers? How is making its own kind of making sense? How does what we make in turn make us? This workshop is one part making, one part meditation, and one part contemplative/ creative writing. We’ll begin with some quiet, meditative handwork, (sewing, stitching, spinning knitting, drawing, etc) each tending to our own work. From this place of deep listening and connection, we’ll work with a variety of writing prompts that will act as invitations into memory, metaphor, and meaning. Absolutely no formal writing experience is required. Please bring some handwork and a journal. It’s best to bring something you can work on without concentrating too much, so that your hands can be steadily working, leaving your thoughts to drift into the rich realms of memory and meaning.
Katherine Ferrier is familiar to those who have spent any time at an AGOS event, but for those new to this forum, she is a poet, dancer, maker, teacher, curator, and community organizer. Her research grows out of a deep practice of paying poetic attention to the world, and lives in the intersecting communities of movers, makers, writers and activists. A self-taught quilter, she has improvisationally designed and constructed nearly 100 quilts, drawing on her studies, both formal and independent, of movement, poetics, painting, and architecture, among other forms. She is the Director of the Medomak Fiberarts Retreeat and has recently expanded her fluency as a maker by embracing felting, weaving, and natural dyeing. She regularly teaches and performs throughout the US and abroad, and believes in patchwork as a radical practice of being patient, saying yes, and making space for everyone at the table.
Registration includes lodging in a cabin (shared, or otherwise), all meals, and all instruction for six days. The cabins are rustic and spare, but modern and comfortable. Please do note that many of the cabins are in the woods, and require an uphill walk. If mobility is an issue for you, please contact me when you register. I will assign you an appropriate cabin. We can accommodate most dietary restrictions within reason, just alert us to your needs in advance.
There are ten private cabins available. You can make this choice at registration. However if you do not get a private cabin, I can assure you there is plenty of room in each cabin for two or three adults.
A supply list will be sent out at least a month in advance of your arrival in Maine.
Otherwise, all you have to do is get yourself here, I'll take care of the rest. I will send out recommendations for what to wear and bring in advance. I send very detailed emails about how to get here, what to bring, how to prepare. Read them when they show up, most everything you could need will be in there…
Medomak Retreat Center is in Washington, Maine, about 80 minutes from the Portland airport, 3 hours drive from Boston, 7 hours drive from NYC. Washington is only 30 minutes inland from Camden. The campus has 250 acres of blueberry fields and forest, with trails for hiking, tennis courts, and lakefront where canoes and kayaks are available. The cabins are clean and spare and perfectly comfortable. Medomak is going to great lengths to secure our safety as regards Covid. We will be conferring with them up till arrival about best practices to keep all safe. You will be required to be fully vaccinated and boostered as advised by the CDC before coming to camp. No exceptions. We will require written proof of your vaccination before arriving. We will also require testing upon arrival. These measures are taken to keep us all safe, and allow us to relax into our practice while together.
The food at camp is fresh, simple, wholesome, and satisfying. Please notify me of food allergies, or if you are Vegetarian (specify if you do/do not eat dairy, eggs, fish, etc…) , but we suggest that unless you have a specific medical condition, you will find plenty to nourish you during your time at camp.
In order to give you some time to check, and double check, your schedule, and confer with partners, bosses, children, parents, and pets, to make sure this will work for you, I delay the opening of registration. This year registration will open Sunday March 12th at 3:00pm EST. I will send an email to my newsletter group when registration opens. If you want to be notified when registration is open, you should sign up for the newsletter, spots have gone quickly in the past….. You will need to pay a non-refundable deposit to register, and then arrangements can be made for how to pay your balance.
[Deposits are non refundable, but registrations are transferable. All efforts will be taken to accommodate Covid changes, but the virus moves in mysterious ways, and is good at outmaneuvering me. I ask for your patience and forbearance in dealing with these changes.]