Unless you live in the cotton-growing regions of the South, acquiring locally produced fiber is a real challenge. We’re in the farm-to-table era, but local fiber is the last frontier. “The more I learned about synthetic fibers and how they don’t decompose at all, the more natural fibers seemed crucial to get back,” she said.
She’d always loved textiles, but became disillusioned with the current state of the apparel industry. A broken systemīefore founding the Pacific Northwest branch of Fibershed, an influential nonprofit based in Marin County dedicated to reviving local fiber production, Shannon Welsh was a clothing designer. With no place to take their crops, farmers quit growing fiber flax, bringing an end to the domestic industry. By 1955, the last of the government-run processing facilities closed. When the war ended, Belgian mills ramped back up, and the Oregon industry declined as the U.S. “Quality standards were never really developed,” said Wartes-Kahl. Fourteen mills processed it.Īt that time, the focus was on quantity, and the people in northern France and Flanders were in no position to advise on best practices. In 1940, more than 18,000 acres of flax grew in the Willamette Valley. When World War II began, demand for flax skyrocketed to supply the factories manufacturing rope, netting, canvas tents and flak jackets for the war effort. Over the following decades, the industry continued to grow. The government established flax processing facilities where the crop could be retted (dampened or soaked), dressed, spun into thread, and woven into linen. Prisoners were enlisted to grow and weave flax fibers, producing household goods like tablecloths, napkins and placemats. So they started out with a captive audience: those in the penal system. government decided that western Oregon might be the next global leader in the natural textile industry. The Willamette Valley’s climate has many similarities to the climate of Flanders, Belgium, and in the early 1900s, the U.S. There, mild temperatures, fertile soil and a centuries-old textile industry have combined to create an industry known for producing exceptionally long and fine fiber flax used to create very high-quality linen fabric. The world’s best flax has always come from Europe’s lowlands: Belgium, the Netherlands and northern France.
Oregon’s flax story is both local and global. But by 1950, fiber flax had nearly vanished from Oregon, and today the only flax grown in the Willamette Valley is harvested for seed, not fiber. Angel, complete with flax-themed floats and the crowning of the year’s Flax Queen (in 1938, her name was Maxine). During the first half of the 20th century, flax was a flagship Oregon industry, so important that it merited an annual Flax Festival in Mt. She had good reason to believe in the Northwest’s potential for growing flax. Photo by Micah Fischer Oregon’s flax history
Co-founders Shannon Welsh and Angela Wartes-Kahl envision a regional farming network centered around a fiber processing facility in Oregon. Flax, once a staple of Oregon agriculture, is making a comeback thanks to Fibrevolution, a company bringing flax production back to the Willamette Valley. “I thought: I’m in Oregon, I can do this,” she said. After researching the history of Oregon’s once-thriving flax industry, Wartes-Kahl took it as a sign. Flax - the fiber plant used to produce linen - seemed more promising. “I was thinking it would be nice to have a complete wardrobe,” said Wartes-Kahl. Her flock of English Longwool sheep supplied plenty of wool for winter apparel, but the appeal of knitted sweaters fades as temperatures rise in the Willamette Valley.
She owns Common Treasury, a blueberry, livestock and fiber farm in Alsea, Oregon, certified organic since 1993. This one started in 2012 when Angela Wartes-Kahl wanted a summer work shirt.
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