What started out as a hobby business for Clare Thornley of Jilliby has developed into a successful enterprise.
Fibre Arts Shed, run by Clare and her husband Paul, is a mini woollen mill and fibre arts and crafts supply retail website.
A lifelong avid knitter who holds a PhD, Clare had no business experience or training before starting what soon became a full-time enterprise.
In the Autumn of 2021 during the COVID pandemic and in between lockdowns, the Thornleys expanded their business with the acquisition of a mini mill, partially supported by a successful crowd-funding campaign.
Paul left his job as a database analyst and threw himself into learning how to run the eight-piece mill, which arrived at their shed on the back of a truck up from Melbourne – and without a “how-to” manual.
Since then, the two have worked to build relationships with wool, alpaca and mohair farms from the Central Coast and across Australia, bringing high-quality, locally grown fibre to yarn dyers and crafters.
One of these is Central Coast micro business Three Trees Fibre Crafts, which the Thornleys have supplied with yarn on more than one occasion.
The first was a yarn spun from alpaca from the Hunter Valley blended with wool from the Thornleys’ own sheep, Madam.
A more recent collaboration resulted in the creation of a beautiful woollen-spun yarn which was a blend of Central Coast grown alpaca with a lovely wool.
The yarns have been expertly dyed at Three Trees Fibre Crafts and sold to customers from around the country.
Outside of the Central Coast, Fibre Arts Shed has sourced fibre from wool growers in Cooma and Taralga and worked with a wool grower and a yarn shop from Rylstone to create a yarn with a very small footprint.
Following shearing, the wool was brought to the mill at Fibre Arts Shed where it was washed, picked, carded, spun, plied and steamed before being returned to the yarn shop, a mere 3.5km away from where it was grown.
In addition to striving to build community through their work sourcing, milling, and selling fibre and yarn that is 100 per cent Australian (and in many cases 100 per cent NSW), Clare and Paul are also working hard to make their mill a zero-waste mill.
Up to 40 per cent of the weight of the fibre can be lost during the milling process (from raw, dirty fleece to finished product).
Some of this is dirt and lanolin (grease) that is washed away during scouring.
However, much of this weight is “unsuitable” fibre that gets removed from or falls off the carder during milling.
Clare and Paul have created a yarn that reuses some of this mill waste.
This yarn blends reclaimed mill waste with a “new” wool to create a lofty yarn, called Yarn Over Yarn, that is suitable for beanies, jumpers, cardigans, shawls and blankets.
They also have plans to create a yarn that incorporates all the bits of yarn that they save from the ends of bobbins to create a “scrappy” yarn.
And they are working to secure funding to purchase a machine that can take all the dirty “unsuitable” raw fibre and turn it into a product that can be used as a soil amendment.
On a community level, the availability of local wool and alpaca farms in the Yarramalong and Dooralong valleys as well as the nearby Hunter Valley gives Fibre Arts Shed the amazing opportunity to create yarns with an incredibly small footprint, keeping it local.
Clare and Paul are licensee holders with the Australian Fibre Collective, a not-for-profit association formed with the aim of increasing awareness of the Australian fibre and textile industry and providing transparency and certification for businesses that are creating 100 per cent Australian grown, manufactured and or crafted products.
“Fibre Arts Shed is one of many micro businesses that calls the north-western end of the Central Coast home,” Clare said.
“The location, resources and most importantly the community make our region rich with possibilities and opportunities.”
Member for Wyong David Harris popped in to check out the niche business recently.
“I was amazed by Clare and Paul’s demonstration of how to manufacture high quality fibre and yarn,” he said.
“What makes this even more special is locally sourced products are being used.”