From Flax to Fiber to Fashion

March 23, 2011 11:49 AM

Be Linen (vimeo) a video commissioned by the European Linen and Hemp Community beautifully shows how flax plants become linen fabric.

Linen can, of course, be made into garments of all sorts and what we think of as linens but it can also be used to make art and crafts.

Learn more about linen by visiting one of these museums or reading about the Magic of Linen.

Don't forget to properly care for your linen garments!

posted by vespabelle (10 comments total)

The oil from the linen plant is also useful.
posted by MrMoonPie at 11:53 AM on March 23, 2011

It's strange, the things that stick with you. As soon as it got to the part where they loaded the huge flax bundles into the warehouse I thought, "five tons of flax!"
posted by jedicus at 12:00 PM on March 23, 2011 [1 favorite]

Lovely video aside, there's something about the vimeo interface/layout design that makes every video look better. Facebook should really think about that.
posted by you're a kitty! at 12:07 PM on March 23, 2011 [1 favorite]

Flax pants, cool!
posted by clavdivs at 12:24 PM on March 23, 2011

Yay linen!

I decided that this summer I want to have linen things to wear (linen dresses! linen blouses! linen skirts! linen shirts for my boyfriend!), and ordered a bunch of swatches from this internet linen store to see what was what. IL019 is my new best friend and I am going to sew everything ever from it. (No affiliation, just satisfaction.)
posted by bewilderbeast at 12:30 PM on March 23, 2011 [3 favorites]

bewilderbeast, I've got some from that line myself, and have used it for apparel. It's a dream to work with, and I can't help putting it in everything. In fact, my son's birthday present this past week was linen pants, which I may appreciate more than he does.
posted by pajamazon at 12:46 PM on March 23, 2011

bewilderbeast, I love the stuff, but how do you keep it from looking wrinkled within ten seconds of ironing?
posted by you're a kitty! at 1:00 PM on March 23, 2011

I'm inspired now. I might just have to make a linen Easter dress.
posted by TooFewShoes at 1:09 PM on March 23, 2011

So many sewing mefites!

you're a kitty!, I dunno if there is a secret magic way to reduce the immediate wrinkling effect that I don't know about; my strategy is to pull linen things out of the dryer before they're completely dry and hang them up. Same deal with ironing; I give my linen shirts a lot of steam and don't press them 'til they're bone-dry, and hang them to dry completely. They seem to get a little less wrinkle-prone each time I wash them, too (this may be wishful thinking with respect to shirts, but is definitely true of my linen handkerchiefs, which I barely feel moved to press anymore now that they've taken many trips through the laundry).
posted by bewilderbeast at 1:49 PM on March 23, 2011

It's alright to get comfortable with some wrinkling of your linen clothing. That's part of the appeal.
posted by pajamazon at 2:03 PM on March 23, 2011