87. How it’s Made: On Wool with Marianne Mclean-Atkins

On this episode, we’re taking a deep dive into wool production with Marianne Mclean-Atkins, a textile designer and knitwear specialist with 20 years of experience working as an in-house designer for Asia-based apparel suppliers, doing everything from concept to execution. She is currently Sustainable Fashion Education Director at Redress in Hong Kong. We go through the various stages of the production of wool, starting from the rearing and shearing of the sheep, to the classing of the fleece, degreasing, scouring, spinning, dyeing, blending, and finally the knitting or weaving of the yarn. We also touch on why wool fell out of favour, and what the future looks like for it.

This episode is part of a mini-series that explains the production processes behind different fabrics, the players involved, what are their incentives, and more. It's hard to have a conversation about how to make a material better if we don't understand how it's made in the first place.

Connect with Marianne on LinkedIn to follow her work. And, connect with me on LinkedIn, or drop me an email at [email protected].

CREDITS:

Host: Kim van der Weerd

This is a Maed in India production.

Recording Engineers: Lakshman Parsuram & Kartik Kulkarni
Sound Editor & Mix Engineer: Kartik Kulkarni

Creative Director: Mae Mariyam Thomas

Project Manager: Shaun Fanthome

Producer: Husein Haveliwala