Workwear Stories
Industrial hemp is a crop that has the potential to lower the environmental impacts of textile production, empower small-scale farmers and create jobs in a wide variety of industries. Two non-profit groups, Fibershed and Growing Warriors, are working to reintroduce industrial hemp into Kentucky—and eventually U.S. agriculture.
Forest and river restoration work fueled by a love for wild salmon.
As the seventh generation of her family to farm the same land, working from sunup to sundown comes naturally to Heather Darby. The fourth profile in our Workwear series takes a look at the perpetual motion required to be both a research agronomist at the University of Vermont and the backbone of a 200-year-old, certified…
Mike Wood’s last name is a wholly appropriate coincidence of birth. He’s got a fetish for the stuff. When building his off-the-grid log home masterpiece on the banks of Alaska’s Susitna River, he’d range out into the surrounding boreal forest, select each perfect tree, hug it at the chest in solemn ceremony and then gleefully…
Doing the Dirty Work with the Oregon Natural Desert Association
Editor’s note: This post discusses anxiety and suicide. In a humble workshop in Washougal, Washington, a blind craftsman holds a locally harvested log that he has made into a blank with his miter saw. He turns it in his hands to feel its shape and weight. He measures and marks, measures and marks. A flick…
In 2019, after a record Colorado avalanche season bulldozed millions of trees, a team of avalanche experts rallied to collect as much information as possible from these 300-year-old keepers of time.
A bona fide American hemp farmer and entrepreneur shares his stash—a guide to farming hemp with tips for planting, growing, harvesting and processing.
Making face masks in the time of COVID-19: when “breathable face fabric” takes on a whole new meaning.
Some farmers, anglers and chefs are providing food for their communities during the time of COVID-19.
A colorful tradition of building and running Grand Canyon dory boats is passed to the next generation.
Patagonia has 73 styles using hemp this season. Cultivation of hemp replenishes vital soil nutrients, prevents erosion and requires no synthetic fertilizer.
Who made the first hammer, the thing that’s used to make other things? For blacksmiths, it starts with the forge—and it’s hammers all the way down.
Two Patagonia styles this season use bison hide. Grazing bison help restore prairie ecosystems, whereas grazing cattle can damage native grasses.
On a small farm outside Minneapolis, Minnesota, a farmer takes a regenerative approach to keeping his community fed.
Nicholas Herrera brings new life to old things on his ancestral homestead in El Rito, New Mexico.
In Colorado’s San Luis Valley, worsening drought is causing farmers to face the prospect of losing their livelihoods. Two farmers are placing their bets on a drought-tolerant crop—industrial hemp.
In Colorado’s San Luis Valley, two farmers are growing industrial hemp to improve their topsoil—and their bottom line—as they face worsening drought.
Only 4 percent of US farm owners are Hispanic. Mexican immigrant and organic farmer Javier Zamora is working to change the narrative.
How can Hispanic farmworkers become farm owners? For Mexican immigrant Javier Zamora, the sunup to sundown work ethic was already there—he just needed some support from his community.
How can an organic farmer with no successor make sure the farm will end up in good hands? Paul Bickford started his search in an unexpected place.
In San Luis Obispo, California, a team of bakers is building community by “pedaling” their wares.
Under the gaze of southern Arizona’s cinnamon-hued Canelo Hills, a mother passes along an ancient Puebloan tradition of natural adobe building to her three sons.
In Western Apacheria, a tradition of cooking in the ground endures.
Women make up less than five percent of US carpenters by trade. Some tradeswomen are changing the narrative, one dovetail joint at a time.
This story was supposed to be about a thriving, women-led organic farm in Maine. Then came news of the ”forever chemicals.”
In Warren County, North Carolina, a Black farmer is growing industrial hemp to help his century-old farm thrive for at least another 100 years.
A road trip through California’s worst drought in 1,200 years, and the folks working to restore broken ecosystems and rewild lost landscapes.
A look inside Delta Brick & Climate Company, where doing is undoing.
Architect and climber Dylan Johnson joins up with Yvon Chouinard and a hardworking crew to construct two houses using straw bales.