W E A R E I S L A N D E R S

We Are Islanders is an eco-lux art and fashion house that redefines heritage through contemporary design.

Careful examination of society and culture is core to the We are Islanders creative process, pushing us to engage with diverse worlds creating fashion that tells new stories for the time we live in.

W E A R E I S L A N D E R S

Jenna wears trousers, bomber, and quilted crop tunic in hand-painted bamboo silks.

Rita wears white quilted beetled linen coat with beetled white gypsy skirt.

Jenna wears hand-knit Aran wool sweater with white quilted beetle linen mini.

Rita wears quilted black linen country jacket, black We Are The Sea sweater layered over black organic cotton pullover.

Jenna wears quilted coat with quilted crop tunic and gyspy skirt in black beetled linen.

The result of a continuing examination of what it means to live on the island of Ireland or any island – this globe included – We Are Islanders looks to reflect the necessity to look outward, not inward and to challenge accepted norms.

In consideration of the social and environmental story of our time, We Are Islanders creates trans-seasonal collections that marry tradition and craft with new skills and celebrate the journey created by process and not plan. Produced locally using only sustainable materials, we refuse to compromise on style and quality while remaining dedicated to better practice.

Rita wears organic waffle kimono coat.

Jenna wears salt and pepper throw coat layered over Irish wool bomber trimmed with organic salmon suede with black beetled linen trousers.

Photography by Sean and YvetteMake-up by Aushra Lauren at Morgan the AgencyHair by Jennifer Lawlor and Kate Crowley at Kazumi, Molesworth St, D2.Nails by Jennifer LawlorModels: Jenna Binley at Andrea Roche and Rita Zhang at 1st Options.Location: Special thanks to the Casey Family

For We Are Islanders, engagement with the worlds of art and culture are key aspects to a project which goes beyond just the production of clothes. This artistic exploration inspires the stories of each collection. These narratives are larger than the product we produce, they communicate the environmental and social stories of our time and are a statement of identity and intent.

Creating Narratives: Art and Fashion

“I spent December 2012 building two wooden rowing boats - currachs - with friends on Dublin’s coast, led by artist and boat builder Mark Redden. A lot of the time was spent thinking about what it means to be an islander; to look outward and not inward, observing the unobserved and tuning in to the basic natural systems that govern us - such as the tides.

The same year, Hurricane Sandy hit New York, leaving a physical mark of rising sea levels around its bay, but an unseen tide mark exists on their economic, political and human systems as they struggle to adapt. This is now a common global phenomenon with countries being forced to adapt to futures under water. I started visually exploring rising tides as a metaphor for an apathy that exist in society; a disconnect more commonly seen in cities between humans and their environment.

4/704 was conceived of as an audio visual experience for the public as part of Dublin Fringe Festival. With a team of people I designed and positioned 3 self-contained dying units on Sandymount Strand, engineered through a buoyancy system to record 4 of the 704 annual high tides, and transfer the mark of their rise and fall onto garments over 48 hours creating a textural time lapse. There are on average 704 high tides a year and this installation physically recorded 4 of them. In sync with the two night time high tides an audio / visual event took place to immerse people in the experience of a rising tide. Two audio tracks were composed to take people on a moonlight walk to the dye vats where music created from sounds of the surrounding urban shoreline played out the tidal dance.

Cycles unnoticed breath apathy and rising tides are points for discussion and exploration, both metaphorically and physically. 4/704 explores our vulnerability in the face of rising sea levels, changing the lenses through which we look outward.”

Rosie O’Reilly, Creative Director, We Are Islanders

4/704

“A recording of high tides, the mark of their rise and fall transfered onto garments, creating a textural time lapse. “

For We Are Islanders, the craft of printing has allowed us explore the possibility of merging art and fashion. Through the use of free-hand printing techniques we produce fabric lengths in limited edition runs that are completely unique and inspired by the hand of an artist rather than a digital machine.

Print Exploration - The Tidal Series

There is nothing more exciting than standing at the print table with 6 metres of white silk, knowing that an hour later a visual story will have been created through mark-making and painting using a free hand technique.

The process is simple, yet takes discipline in preparation and application. Introduced to the technique by a master printer in Dublin, it was a revelation; allowing for the free exploration of concepts, processes, tools and influences.

The process is driven and requires the painter to respond to previous stocks and colours rather than a technical plan. This drive to create harmony in chaos is ultimately the inspiration.

The first print story we explored was the tidal series where the mark making and painting of fabric was directly influenced by the garments that came out of 4/704. These tidal and wave lines became the point of exploration for fabric and colour throughout the following collections.

Each garment we cut from this cloth is unique. The markings are unreproducible, like the tides. Each garment bares a different story.

T I D A L I VS P R I N G S U M M E R 2 0 1 5

I R I S H L I N E N A C L O S E R L O O K

When Rosie and I decided to take a road trip around Ireland’s textile industry it was a journey driven by equal measures of frustration and enthusiasm. On the one hand we held unyielding love for the incredible textiles being developed by mills that have been weaving for generations. (This love had become one of the founding principles of We Are Islanders.) But we held deep frustration at the apparent destruction and stagnation of an indigenous industry that was, despite the small size of our country, difficult to access and remained for the most part undocumented.

We started with wool as it remains the most prolific of the two textiles associated with Ireland - linen is the other but despite much research and many phone-calls, we had yet to find an actual linen mill (but more about that in a moment.) Each time we stepped over the threshold and stood on the mill floor, we gazed in awe at the clamouring looms and took to the sample rooms like two kids dropped into Santa’s grotto.

Lifting and grasping at rolls of sample fabrics, it became obvious that despite a certain amount of confinement to traditional form to feed the ‘heritage’ market - behind the scenes a vibrant industry run by some of the hardest working people we have ever met was constantly sampling the new and re-working the old, each weaving their own identity.

Each visit to a woollen weaver uncovered another gem of industrious crafting but the words Irish and linen so synonymous, remained a mirage of the industry. Despite calls and visits we found no clamouring looms and once direct questions were asked about provenance, it appeared we had knocked on the door a decade too late. Where the woollen industry had somehow managed to survive a systematic stripping of infrastructure and investment from within and without, the linen industry was all but gone.

It was on a visit to a woollen mill in Wexford when Rosie spotted a roll of linen, nothing like we had seen before. Sitting amongst the wools and silks it was glowing - no joke. Quick-firing questions of where, how, when? The weaver thankfully remained obliging and we discovered a finishing technique called beetling (to achieve the glow) and finally, we had a lead on linen. A few phone-calls later we were opening the map and taking a look at the route to County Derry and a linen mill that has been in operation since 1736.

A long drive on ever-narrowing country roads led us to our picturesque destination - a cafe set in an old mill courtyard beside a babbling river.

Who’s Herman?

A confusing conversation about curtains and farmyard polyvinyls ensued and although we were surrounded by promising historical textile memorabilia our hearts sank as it started to become clear that this wasn’t what we had hoped.

“What about the glowing linen?” we asked. “Ach, yes we make it for curtains.”“Um... Can we see how you make it?” we asked, then suddenly this was exactly what we hoped.

Brought through the doorway of an old stone-house mill there stood the most fascinating row of pre-industrial contraptions we had ever seen. Now run by a generator, decorative cast iron wheels slowly turn huge wooden cylinders. One man feeds linen onto the turning batts as upright beams of polished wood cascade down in a mesmerising rhythm. So this is how its done. Beetling linen has been happening only in this one mill in Co. Derry for over 250 years.

Excited by the find, we drive on up the long entrance of nearly the 300-year-old linen mill passing a derelict deco building that makes us think we are in for a further treat but a tour of the plant reveals intense industrial and chemical processing of textiles shipped in from thousands of miles away. It becomes clear that no linen is woven here anymore. The beetling process is considered just a quirky remnant of the old mill and used only for a few weeks of the year or when Herman asks.

“Who’s Herman?”

More than a few wrong turns later and a stop at the local community centre we find Herman and Marion Baur hidden amongst ancient oak trees settled into the dip of a rolling green valley in the heart of the Derry countryside. You can’t get a more picturesque setting to this 250-year-old linen house. A postcard-perfect building with its rough-stone, white-washed walls. Red painted frames pick out the tiny windows that can be found in farmhouses across the country - there is even a wagon wheel and an outhouse - yes, an outhouse.

“What d’ye want?” A man in overalls stands in the roadway and his gruffness takes us aback as we tentatively ask if this is Herman and Marion’s linen place. With everyone’s identity and intent clarified, Herman immediately softens and opens up with demonstrations and frank descriptions of his experience working in an industry on its knees.

This is no whimsical undertaking. They have had to start from scratch as the chains of linen production have been broken for so long. Herman sows, grows and harvests their own flax in preparation for Marion’s skilled hands at once dormant looms. Herman’s pragmatism and dogged determination has secured them access to spinners,dyers and finishers that had all but disappeared, somehow convincing men out of retirement to fire up the spools again and despite the endless grief of it all, both of them look content to build slowly, take their time and do it right. Today, after 25 years of quiet industrial crafting, Marion can’t weave fast enough to keep up with the demand for hand-loomed linen. The demand still remains, for the most part from outside the country as Ireland has for so long turned it’s back on this textile.

We don’t know if the endless efforts Herman and Marion have made is built on a yearning to revitalise a disappearing craft or just a simple wish to follow their own path as self sufficient craftspeople - we hope to find out some evening over a glass of warm whiskey - but we can see clearly that Herman and Marion are the last chance for Ireland’s indigenous linen industry and we have decided that they will not fail if we have anything to do with it.

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