Audio Resources
Hear more about our work and how it connects to the larger ecosystem (literally and figuratively!). If you need a speaker, we’d be happy to share with your audience. Please reach out hi@driftlab.earth with any speaking inquiries.
(Audio) Sarah and Jess’s Keynote Address at the 2025 Rust Belt Fibershed Symposium
Co-Founders Sarah Pottle and Jess Boeke lovingly share their perspective on the question of why this work is important and what about this work is important. As in, what are we doing all of this textile re-localization FOR? What's the point?
In a world where we can get priorities all twisted around, where greenwashing abounds, where truth feels more confusing each day, Jess and Sarah share the heart of Why Rust Belt Fibershed.
Sarah and Jess interviewed on Botanical Colors’ Feedback Friday
This week’s FEEDBACK FRIDAY was with Sarah Pottle and Jess Boeke, twin sisters from Cleveland, OH, who are natural dyers, educators, activists, and are the co-founders of the Rust Belt Fibershed and Drift Lab Dye Studio. Watch the video recording here: Links we promised to put here: Rust Belt Fibershed Drift Lab Textile Co. Grounded Teaching Chico Flax webinar Fibrevolution (more flax farming in the US!) Fibershed video: Black Fiber Systems: with Teju Adisa-Farrar, Sha’Mira Covington, and Amber Tamm Call of the Reed Warbler-A New Agriculture, A New Earth, by Charles Massy Fibershed: Growing a Movement of Farmers, Fashion Activists, … Read more
From Lady Farmer Show Notes:
“This week we will hear from twin sisters Jess Boeke and Sarah Pottle of the Rustbelt Fibershed, a bioregional textile network growing hope and resilience through the use of local fibers. We speak with this dynamic duo on a multitude of topics, touching on ways to shift and expand our mindsets towards a more sustainable paradigm. Jess is an educator and fiber artist who has been working with natural dyes since 2008. Born and raised in Ohio, Cleveland, she is known for engaging and educating communities on the importance of local labor, dyes, and the carbon impacts of our soil-to-soil textile industry. In her teachings, she has inspired others on the promotion of ethical fashion and the importance of regenerative learning. Her twin sister, Sarah has personally coached hundreds of teachers through thousands of lessons in high-quality, equitable instruction. Her desire to create transformational systems change has led her on a daunting journey with her twin sister of slow living and sustainable fashion, spreading awareness on regenerative learning education in the Rust Belt Cities.
Today we will learn more about how we can focus our relationships between people and the Earth in order to enable transformation in our society, explore the impact of the clothing and textile industry on climate change and incorporate more environmental teachings in the classroom. We will also speak to Sarah and Jess about what they envision for the future, their hopes and aspirations, and how we can continue to promote regenerative education learning in the classroom.
Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or on your favorite podcast platform.
Topics Covered:
What is regenerative living for modern families?
How we can incorporate more environmental teachings in the classroom.
The impact of the clothing and textile industry on climate change.
Jess Boeke and Sarah Pottle on the Good Dirt Podcast
Regenerative Ed Podcast
We started the Regenerative Ed podcast back in 2019 when we were both still full-time teaching in public, K-12 education. It was at this point that we had noticed so many of the similarities between the problems of extraction in our side-work in bioregional textile supply chains (Rust Belt Fibershed) as well as what we were learning about our food systems, our healthcare systems, and how it all connected to the same sort of mechanical, colonial, extractive systems thinking as the public school system.
We wondered— what if we applied the same principles we were seeing in the regenerative agriculture industry to the public school industrial complex? This podcast records our thoughts and interviews in over 60 episodes beginning in 2019.
We’ve learned a lot in the past 6 years since we started the podcast, but we’re still surprised to see how many of these ideas stand the test of time, because of the truth in which they are rooted: seeing ourselves as a part of this living system.
Sarah interviewed on Green Champions podcast
Hear from the Rust Belt Fibershed Co-Founder, Sarah Pottle, on this podcast that highlighted speakers at the Midwest Sustainability Summit.
SHOW NOTES
The Midwest Regional Sustainability Summit (MRSS) is the largest sustainability conference in the Midwest, bringing together hundreds of visionary leaders to share ideas and solutions for a healthier, more resilient, and equitable future. The annual summit features a full day of programming, including speakers, exhibitors, interactive sessions, and networking opportunities, covering a wide range of topics from climate justice and green workforce development to resilient food systems and circular economy practices. MRSS serves as a vital platform for collaboration and innovation, inspiring action and accelerating the transition to a sustainable future in the Midwest.
Shownotes
Sarah Pottle is the co-founder and regional organizer for the Rust Belt Fibershed, a grassroots initiative working to rebuild a regional textile economy rooted in sustainability and care. In this conversation, Sarah shares how the Fibershed is challenging the fast fashion status quo by cultivating a local, circular system for clothing production in the Midwest—one that connects farmers, makers, and consumers in a shared ecosystem of regeneration.
She explains the concept of a "fibershed"—similar to a foodshed—as a framework for understanding where our clothing comes from and how it impacts people and the planet. Through this lens, Sarah emphasizes the importance of “cultivating care” at every stage of a garment’s life: from the health of the soil where fiber crops are grown, to the labor conditions of textile workers, to the disposal or reuse of clothing at the end of its cycle.
Sarah discusses the environmental and social costs of fast fashion, citing the growing amount of clothing production and the declining rate of clothing use. She emphasizes the importance of caring for the entire lifecycle of a garment, from the sourcing of raw materials and the treatment of workers to the end-of-life disposal and the potential for upcycling, mending, and clothing swaps. She highlights some of the innovative projects emerging within the Rust Belt Fibershed network, including the development of small-scale mills and knitting machines, and discusses the organization’s success in securing funding from the Cleveland Foundation to host annual symposiums, which have drawn hundreds of attendees.
Episode in a glance
- Sarah Pottle & her work with Rust Belt Fibershed
- The Importance of Care in the Textile Supply Chain
- Challenges and Solutions in Sustainable Fashion
- Sarah's Journey into Sustainable Fashion
- Building Community Through Education and Engagement
- The Future of Local Fiber Production
- Impact and Success Stories of Rust Belt Fibershed
About Sarah Pottle
Sarah Pottle is the co-founder and regional organizer of the Rust Belt Fibershed, a passionate advocate for building a more sustainable and equitable textile industry in the Midwest. With a background in education, she believes in the power of community engagement and hands-on learning to inspire change.
Sarah and Jess interviewed on EcoSpeaks Cle
Episode: Creating a Bioregional Textile Community with Rust Belt Fibershed
Hear from the Rust Belt Fibershed Co-Founder, Jess Boeke, on this podcast that highlights ecological movers and shakers in the Cleveland area.
SHOW NOTES
In this episode, we speak with Jess Boeke. Jess and her twin sister Sarah Pottle, are the co-founders of Rust Belt Fibershed and are growing a bioregional textile community within a 250-mile radius of Cleveland. Imagine sourcing your clothing from a regional fibershed where local fiber farmers, workers, and artisans produce natural clothing that originates from the soil and can return to the soil. This is the vision of Rust Belt Fibershed. Jess and Sarah are helping connect us with our clothing the way farmers' markets connect us with our food. It starts with systems thinking and education, then the community magic follows. Listen and hear about alpacas, hemp, flax, natural dyes, microplastics, and what's needed to bring natural textile production into our fibershed and the many ways to engage with this regenerative community.
Guest
Jess Boeke, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Rust Belt Fibershed
Resources
Rust Belt Fibershed website
Community Forum - get plugged into the Rust Belt Fibershed community
Drift Lab Earth - the twins’ natural/botanical dyeing workshops and living systems education
Regenerative Ed - regenerative thinking for our educational system (also listen on spotify)
Reading: Fibershed: Growing a Movement of Farmers, Fashion Activists, and Makers for a New Textile Economy