Charlie & Helen - Flax workshop

Helen Keys and Charlie Mallon have been working to restore the supply chain for flax to linen on their farm in County Tyrone.  They knew that flax had been grown on the farm two generations before so it seemed like a simple experiment.  Seven years on, the scale of the challenge has become clear but the opportunity to re-build hyperlocal textile production as part of a regenerative food system is also emerging.

Helen and Charlie will share what they have learned so far about the process of growing and processing flax for textile and the range of other potential outputs from this crop.  They will set out a vision for how their systems could be replicated across the island.

The desire to bring more diversity onto the farm and build resilience was the seed for a series of other projects, all designed to make a more direct connection between the land and the food on our plates.  Helen and Charlie will discuss the importance of shorter supply chains and how collaboration can be a catalyst for change.  

'For years we felt like we were terrible farmers.  Our weeds and untidy hedgerows, our old machinery and narrow gaps; but those are the very things that we value now.  We'd become disconnected and disheartened.  Once we see how the land provides for the wider ecosystem, our approach to farming changes.  We spend more time looking and learning.'

Charlie & Helen will be running a Natural Fibre workshop in Regeneration Education space after their talk where you will learn about work through the processes of breaking, scutching, hackling and spinning flax from plant to yarn.