On a mission to cultivate plant and microbial dyes in Morocco…
ATW80Fabrics is honored to be one of 26 grant recipients from Daughters for Earth to support women-led projects in 17 countries. Co-founded by women leaders in climate, social rights and philanthropic sectors, Daughters for Earth mobilizes and unites women globally to reduce climate impacts and heal our planet.
Our project is a collaboration between the Ain Leuh Cooperative and Artisan Project in Morocco, and multiple US based institutions--ATW80Fabrics, The Microbe Institute, and Jude Lab at Bard College. Working with regional weavers, our collective team of researchers, makers and storytellers are exploring and cataloging local plants and microbial sources for the creation of natural dyes. Marrying traditional knowledge with new techniques, we hope to address some of the challenges facing the Moroccan carpet industry.
Project Partners
Nina Mohammed of Artisan Project
For over 10 years, Nina Mohammed has partnered with weavers at Ain Leuh Cooperative in the Middle Atlas Mountains of Morocco to create unique, thoughtfully designed textiles through her design studio and company, Artisan Project. We met Nina several years ago and have found inspiration in her work. We admire her passion for responsible dyeing and finishing of carpets, and her candor about the environmental challenges facing the carpet industry. She is a true artist and will be working closely with our team to apply the research from our Daughters for Earth project into a new textile collection while developing open source dyeing resources for local weavers.
Ain Leuh Cooperative
Ain Leuh Cooperative was founded in 1977 in Ain Leuh, Morocco and has 24 active members. This women-led collective generates income through the sales of handwoven natural fiber items including rugs, blankets and cushions and are not reliant on government subsidies. Three women lead the cooperative: Hashmia A’douri who has been with the cooperative since it opened; Khadijah Oushkak who joined in 1979; and Khadijah El Abdi who started her training in 1987. All three women started working at the collective when they turned 12. For over 10 years, Nina Mohammed of Artisan Project has worked closely with this group of master craftswomen to design and create unique, thoughtfully produced textiles. The weavers of Ain Leuh Cooperative hold significant knowledge of textile processes and natural dyeing, and we are very excited to work alongside their cooperative to support their efforts in strengthening the use of natural dyes in their textiles.
Dr. Brooke Jude, Jude Lab at Bard College
This summer ATW80F displayed a lovely purple textile as a part of our at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival exhibit. This fabric was dyed using the microbe violacein, as part of an ongoing research collaboration between Drs. Brooke Jude (Bard College) and Anne A. Madden (The Microbe Institute). As a molecular microbiologist and research professor, Dr. Jude uses an interdisciplinary approach to microbial studies combining primary research with science communication, and community science. Her passion for microbes has launched a number of citizen science projects and led to exploring violacein as a dye on a number of diverse natural fibers. She will be an integral part of our team in Morocco leading the microbial dye foraging alongside our natural plant dye research.
Dr. Anne A. Madden, The Microbe Institute
Dr. Madden is a scientist, microbe wrangler, TED speaker and founder of The Microbe Institute--a global organization that fosters microbial discovery for a better tomorrow through interdisciplinary education, art and research initiatives. She works to democratize microbial discovery and create diverse initiatives to engage people with microbes in new ways. No project is too big, and “no project is too small, so long as it is beneficial and impactful.”. The Purple Microbe Project of Drs. Madden and her partner Dr. Jude, not only provided a precious purple fabric dyed with violacein microbes to our ATW80F fabric collection and Smithsonian exhibit but also catalyzed our desire to learn more. We are excited to team up with Drs. Madden and Jude to document, discover, and conserve microbes for dyeing in the Ain Leuh region of Morocco.
More About Daughters of Earth
Daughters for Earth is a new campaign powered by One Earth to mobilize women-led climate action around the world to protect and restore the Earth.
Daughters for Earth supports women-led and women-operated nature conservation and restoration on land and sea, and regenerative agriculture efforts around the world that are directly contributing to solving the climate crisis by protecting and restoring the Earth.
Daughters for Earth has funded 50 women-powered projects to protect and restore the Earth. Daughters for Earth believes that by putting capital into the hands of women changemakers around the world, these efforts can quickly scale and become a powerful force in the fight against climate change. Daughters for Earth is a campaign of One Earth, an organization working to accelerate collective action to solve the climate crisis through groundbreaking science, inspiring storytelling, and an innovative approach to climate philanthropy.
LINKS TO OUR PROJECT
LINK to DFE awards announcement
LINK to our project page, text below