Flax & Fleece: The Sustainable Brand Born on A Sheep Station
Based on a remote sheep station in Western Australia, Julia's brand champions sustainable fashion inspired by outback life.
1. How has living on a sheep station in Murchison, Western Australia shaped your perspective on community and sustainability?
I moved up to the Murchison 8 years ago from Perth and my perspective on the importance of community quickly blossomed.
Community and connection are the lifeblood out here and are vital for enjoyment, prosperity and thriving rural lifestyles. I was previously completely oblivious to the immense reward that can be gained from being involved in and being an active part of a community. I’ve also found the opportunities for what you can achieve in a rural area are huge and are in many ways more accessible.
I love rural communities for their diversity, the friendships that span over every age bracket and their openness and acceptance.
Sustainability is also something that has lodged itself deep in the forefront of my mind, in every aspect of my life, since living on the station. This, I think, is mostly due to the personal responsibility of everyday tasks in our lives.
No one delivers power to your house via a line, or empties your rubbish bin when you leave it out the front. Suddenly you think more about your power consumption when you’ve switched your iron on and it’s made the lights flicker or your generator start.
I’m proud that we’ve got a great power system that runs for the majority on solar, which has in part come out of necessity. We grow a big portion of our own food, which in many ways makes my life easier given we’re 2 hours from the nearest supermarket. Where our food comes from, what’s in season, how much power I’m using, if I really do need to make a trip to town or if I can wait another 2 weeks are all questions always floating around, making me more conscious of our footprint.
2. What are some of the challenges and rewards of raising a family in such a remote location?
The rewards are huge! My kids have such a free childhood, there’s space, it’s peaceful and I get to enjoy our beautiful environment every single day. It’s a unique, ancient landscape out here that is largely untouched by modern civilisation, and we are lucky that we get to call it home.
I have many interesting experiences and opportunities that wouldn’t present themselves in other places. This comes with challenging elements as well though and schooling would have to be the biggest one for me. My kids are with Meekatharra School of the Air, distance education, as we live too far from the nearest school. Becoming a ‘home tutor’ and teaching my own children has been challenging and difficult in every way but it’s part of life out here and I’ve had to learn to accept that.
3. Can you share a specific moment or experience in your daily life that sparked the idea for launching Flax & Fleece?
Flax & Fleece was born because I needed an outlet for the creative side of myself.
The hardest times in my life have been when I haven’t been creating and I’ve come to realise it’s not a want for me, it’s a need!
I love making things, particularly clothes, and there’s only so much you can make for yourself. I also wanted to keep using the skills I had gained from an adv. diploma I did in costume at WAAPA (West Australian Academy of Performing Arts).
I chose the name ‘Flax & Fleece’ because flax (linen) and fleece (wool) are my two favourite fibres. The flax element of the business is the linen clothing, but the fleece element is yet to come to fruition. I’ve taken the first, early steps for this in the last month so at some point it may or may not happen, we’ll see.
4. What prompted your transition into the slow fashion movement, and how has that journey reshaped your understanding of ethical consumption?
It actually wasn’t a transition for me, it’s how I started out with the brand. In a funny way I didn’t have much choice – I love the making aspect of the process, not just the designing.
So I was always going to be the sole maker/designer and because of my location, I have extremely limited access to staff. I could outsource some of my work, but I feel that the personal connection between myself and the garments would be lost. I’m not designing ground breaking styles, I’m just making every day clothes, in simple cuts, from beautiful fabrics. The fact that they are created locally with a single pair of hands is what makes them special.
Flax & Fleece has made me reconsider my own personal consumption, as well as global consumption. I think more than ever about where and who created the items I purchase. The real, living faces behind the product, the livelihoods, communities, everything.
Ethical consumption starts with asking questions and brands should readily have those answers available.
Consumers have the power to change the future and I hope in my lifetime I have the chance to witness that change.
5. What steps do you take to ensure that every garment produced by Flax & Fleece has a minimal impact on the environment?
It starts with predominately using linen fabrics, as they are one of the most sustainable fibres. Every part of the flax plant is used in production, it requires significantly less water to grow than cotton, it’s durable, then it’s biodegradable at the end of its life.
I source quality linen that has been manufactured well, resulting in a garment that will last as long as possible.
In the cutting process, I cut my garments in small batches to reduce cutting waste, I also make lots of one-off pieces with remnants of bolts, using as much of the cloth as possible.
I compost the cutting scraps that are too small to use and the resulting compost goes on our garden.
My garments are all made using solar power on second hand industrial machines. My main machine (a straight stitch Juki) had a previous life before me in a General Motors factory in Ireland, making upholstery for car interiors!
Finished garments always get a cold machine wash and dry on the line in all our beautiful sunshine.
6. In your view, how can transparency in fashion benefit the future of regional communities in Australia?
Transparency in fashion can help consumers to make good choices.
It revels the long and complicated process of fibre creation to final garment, often exposing the people, places and resources that are exploited. Consumers can then use this information to make well informed decisions about the products they purchase.
Cottage industry has played an important role in civilisation for a long time, for good reason. Given that childcare is so often completely inaccessible in regional areas, with many women unemployed and raising their children in the home full time, cottage industry is the perfect match.
Small business start ups, run from the family home in the snippets of time available to busy mothers, can give back so much to regional communities.
I’ve seen some awesome examples of this come up in the last 5 years and I think there’s so much opportunity for growth here. Regional communities need more young families and if there was more demand for locally made, small business products, it could be a great future.
