Nadia Bunyan of Growing A.R.C. on how cultivating community led to the collective cultivation of the flax plant for linen

In episode 280, Kestrel welcomes Nadia Bunyan, a fashion designer & the cofounder of Growing A.R.C., to the show. Growing A.R.C. is a nonprofit that creates spaces and opportunities for people to activate, reciprocate and cultivate their relationships with all beings. Through plants, material culture, and bioregional design, they are engaging in a conversation on sustainability through active participation.

What started as an experiment – tossing some flax seeds into the ground in the backyard, has now led to the creation of a community-oriented nonprofit, that’s using the concept of farm to closet to shift peoples’ mindset on consumption; reinforcing their connection to the local environment and expanding their understanding of biodiversity to include the diversity of human perspectives, and experiences from diverse communities (because while we are trained otherwise, yes – we, humans, are also a part of nature).

Nadia gives us an education on the need to try new things, to jump in without the fear of making mistakes, and to embrace those so-called *failures* along the way. As she tells us, “No expert becomes an expert without first having tried something.”

With over 20 years of experience working as a fashion designer, she started growing flax – has now harvested it with other collaborators, and is working toward spinning and weaving it into linen fabric. 

Such a reminder that there is so much beauty that can be found through the act of stepping outside of your comfort zone and opening yourself up to learning new things.

Quotes & links from the conversation:

• “You can plant, you can craft, you can knit, you can do what have you. But we’re around each other and in those moments, we’re talking. And that’s the cultivation — not just of the plant, but of community. You need to put into your community, you need to support, you need to create spaces for that to happen, and you need to give space for that to grow.” -Nadia (25:38)

• “So, to grow the flax, it’s a period of about 80-90 days, to get it to the right maturity, so that you have fiber. And that changes, depending. You can harvest the flax at different times, depending on how fine you want the flax to be. Full germination to get seeds is 100 days. So, when you take it out at 100 days, then you have the seeds, but you’re gonna have a very rough kind of fiber. We’ve experimented with both and left some plants in a little longer so that we would have seeds for next year, and also to see how thick that fiber is going to be.” -Nadia (36:48)

• “How the pandemic transformed one Montrealer's relationship to her backyard and her world”, article in CBC that features Nadia

• Interview with Nadia on CBC, starts at around 12 minutes into the video

• Follow Growing A.R.C. on Facebook >

• Follow Nadia on Instagram >

• Follow Growing A.R.C. on Instagram >