Indigo, Intention & Slow Craft

A few weeks ago, I spent a sunny afternoon in Sauvie's Island with Kara, the woman behind the beautiful indigo that gave life to our latest batch of Sample Room jackets. Kara runs Vibrant Valley Farm, a flower and dye plant farm just outside Portland that’s as soulful and intentional as the woman herself.

We sat down in the field where the indigo was grown — surrounded by blooms, birdsong, and the buzz of early summer — to talk about what it means to live and work slowly, with your hands in the earth and your eyes on the seasons.

Kara doesn’t just grow color. She grows connection. Her work is a reminder that every step of the making process holds weight. It carries stories. And it carries the energy of the people who touch it, and it has been passed down to her from generations.

We talked about the pace of farming. How indigo takes time. How you can’t rush nature. How the slowness of her process is the point — and how that deeply resonates with me as a designer trying to unlearn urgency and create clothes that respect time, not chase trends.

The indigo used for our jackets wasn’t just harvested — it was coaxed, fermented, and shared. Kara invited me into her dye studio to test the bath and stir the vat, and I watched the fabric turn from green to blue in real time — literal magic. There’s something spiritual about watching color bloom from plants, especially when you know the hands that grew it.

This collaboration reminded me that slow fashion doesn’t just mean slow sewing. It’s slow farming. Slow learning. Slow craft. And above all — slowing down enough to notice the people behind the process.

Kara is one of those people — a quiet force making the world more beautiful, I am so lucky to have found her in this chaotic digital world. I'll thank technology for that 1 thing!

You can watch our full conversation here. I hope it brings you as much peace, inspiration, and presence as it brought me.

Meg