A HandBuilt Life

This week we're joined by Elizabeth Suzann (Liz to her friends), the designer behind the slow fashion brand that shares her name. Liz started the brand on Etsy at 22, taught herself pattern drafting and sewing, and grew it into a beloved label with a Nashville studio and, at its height, a team of 40+ people making everything in-house to order. Since COVID she's had to pivot several times: scaling down to just her, her husband and a few contractors, shifting her focus to sewing patterns and workshops, and now sheep farming in rural Tennessee. Heather has admired Liz's principled, transparent approach to business for years, and this conversation was a great excuse to finally meet.

Liz is refreshingly candid about the hard parts, from the cash flow crunch that closed her warehouse to why "you have to honor the math," and how she rebuilt as a cottage industry with 10 to 12 week lead times. She shares how her sewing patterns started (a drive-thru, a giant Diet Coke, and a "let's just put them out there" moment), why teaching energizes her, and how 30 acres of empty pasture led to a flock of Shetland sheep and the pure joy of being a beginner again. They also get into creativity as an antidote to anxiety, and what reality TV they’re watching.

Mentioned in this episode:

The Red Hand Files by Nick Cave (https://www.theredhandfiles.com)

Fibershed and climate-beneficial wool (https://fibershed.org)

Love Is Blind, The Traitors, and Heather's pick, Below Deck (start with Sailing Yacht season 2 or Down Under season 2)

Find Liz:

🌐 Website: https://elizabethsuzann.com

🧵 Sewing patterns: https://elizabethsuzann.com/collections/for-makers

📷 Instagram: @elizabethsuzann

A HandBuilt Life is brought to you by Closet Core Studio.

🌐 Website: closetcorepatterns.com

📷 Instagram: @closetcorepatterns

📺 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdb_3OevoozegQB6C5meFjQ

#sustainablefashion #slowsewing

This week Heather and Amy are wrapping up October with some reflections. Heather is back from touring on the road with her man. Amy is getting vulnerable about her worst nightmare coming true and they are sharing some of the Fall traditions that are getting them into cozy season.

Grab a warm cup of something and join us.

A HandBuilt Life is brought to you by Closet Core Studio.

🌐 Website: https://closetcorepatterns.com

📷 Instagram: https://instagram.com/closetcorepatterns

📺 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdb_3OevoozegQB6C5meFjQ

You can watch this epsiode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/3bwPpBALIQc

Beatrice Deer is an award-winning Inuk and Mohawk singer-songwriter, designer, and seamstress who grew up in the tiny village of Quaqtaq, Nunavik, and moved to Montreal in her twenties. She calls her sound "Inuindie," a mix of indie rock, folk, and throat singing, sung mostly in Inuktitut with flashes of English and French. She's also been sewing her own clothes since she was 13, and in 2023 her work was seen around the world when Governor General Mary Simon wore an annuraaq Beatrice made for her to the coronation of King Charles III.

It's a conversation about culture, craft, and what it means to carry stories forward, whether in a song or a garment.

Find Beatrice:

🌐 Website: https://beatricedeerband.com 📷 Instagram: https://instagram.com/beatricedeerband 🎵 Bandcamp: https://beatricedeer.bandcamp.com

A HandBuilt Life is brought to you by Closet Core Studio.

🌐 Website: https://closetcorepatterns.com 📷 Instagram: https://instagram.com/closetcorepatterns 📺 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdb_3OevoozegQB6C5meFjQ

Ben Viapiana is a one-man denim brand, a fount of knowledge about all things jeans, one of our favourite makers to follow on IG, and a fellow Canadian. Ben started making his own jeans at sixteen after asking his dad, an Italian-trained tailor, to teach him; "It's too late," his dad said, but he spent the next few years teaching himself as much as he could through trial and error and dogged determination.

What began as a teenage curiosity turned into a decade in Thailand building an entirely self-taught custom denim operation, and now a one-man shop in Toronto producing everything from small batch in-house releases to big production runs for clothing shops, using his collection of over two hundred industrial sewing machines.

Heather sits down with Ben in his studio to talk about how he taught himself denim construction from scratch, why finishing every project (even the ugly ones) matters more than getting it perfect, the difference between sewing jeans on a domestic machine versus a full industrial lineup, and the wild story of how a chance conversation with a customer turned into an amazing trip through Japan's denim mills. Fair warning: they nerd out hard on jean construction and industrial sewing machines, so this one's a great listen if you love getting into the weeds, and also just a genuinely fun conversation if you don't.

Find Ben on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/viapiana_custom_denim/ or check out his work at https://benviapiana.com/.

A HandBuilt Life is brought to you by Closet Core Studio.

🌐 Website: https://closetcorepatterns.com

📷 Instagram: https://instagram.com/closetcorepatterns

📺 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdb_3OevoozegQB6C5meFjQ

Heather and Amy are reflecting on the end of summer and the joys and pains of summer vacationing with their respective families. Other items on the docket: moving to get the thoughts out, moodboarding fall style and building stairs! Heather also shared her deep dive into Eve Babitz's fascinating life and essays, and Amy is now hunting down a copy of To Live and Die in L.A.

Find us at: www.closetcorepatterns.com

Heather is sitting down with author and humourist Eve O. Schaub to talk about her latest project: growing a dress. Her previous works, which include Year of No Sugar (2014), Year of No Clutter (2017), and Year of No Garbage (2023), have all been experiments she's engaged in with her family, and this latest project is no different. From growing the flax and weaving it into cloth to making the dye from cultivating indigo, Eve is sharing the painstaking process that is connecting her to the history of making clothes on a level that we find fascinating. Tune in to hear the whole conversation.

Connect with us: www.closetcorepatterns.com

This week, Heather and Amy are sharing what has been filling their heads, hands and hearts this July. From Amy's staycation to Heather's journey into the classics, we are proving that not only are we huge nerds, but we also have nerdy hobbies. Bird watching, anyone?

Find us at www.closetcorepatterns.com

Heather was delighted to speak with Dr. Claire Ashley on the pod this month. They have a long chat about detecting and healing from burnout (check out her book, The">https://amzn.to/4aB36Vl">The Burnout Doctor), her sewing practice, and ADHD and how it relates to sewing. Claire is a licensed GP and has a neuroscience degree, and the confluence of that background and her interest in making led to a really fascinating conversation. This is exactly why we started the podcast: nerding out about how our brains work, the mental health benefits of a creative practice, and the things we can do to take care of ourselves with intention.Learn more about Claire at drclaireashley.com">https://www.drclaireashley.com/">drclaireashley.com or follow her on Instagram @wiredtomake">https://www.instagram.com/wiredtomake/">@wiredtomake.

Join Heather and Amy as they get into what has been filling their heads and hearts and keeping their hands busy this June. Coming to you from Amy's basement, sorry the production values aren't perfect on this one!

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Our guest is business advisor, strategic consultant, and style icon Gretchen Jones. Heather and Gretchen go deep on values-driven entrepreneurship, what it means to be truly creative in today's culturally flat landscape, how to break out of the stagnation of late-stage capitalism, and why we should all be embracing "sloppy boobs”. Real wisdom and genuinely thought-provoking ideas from one of the most original thinkers we know!

Read Heather's 2015 interview with Gretchen for Seamwork. https://www.seamwork.com/craft-projects/a-closet-tour-with-gretchen-jones?srsltid=AfmBOooCX6Bd1cdtYrpm3WyOpIZp-NmUeI_LcIhZAdSbm-2Na1_t93Wr

Read Gretchen's essay The Cultural Plateau: https://mailchi.mp/gretchenjones.co/sage-advice-the-noonday-demons-19885062?e=64e3c9a6ee

Sign up for Gretchen's newsletter : https://www.weirdspecialty.com/