Alpaca to Avant Garde

Words by Melinda Green / Photography by Leonardo Carrizo & Wendy Pramik / Layout by Atlas Biro

"Touch them. They’re so soft. They’re like buttah,” she croons, touching an indigo-and-cream colored dress in her studio window, its hem pooling on the floor. She’s created this piece for the upcoming Decorative Arts Center of Ohio Gala.

Celeste Malvar-Stewart is a renowned sustainable fashion designer and felting artist based in Columbus. Not only is she very concerned about where she sources her raw materials, but she is also friends with the animals who provide her with fiber and wool. “I know all my animals by name, whose fibers I use. These are two animals. This one is Dameon,” she said, fingering a perfect creamcolored loc of fiber on the dress. “There are two types of alpacas. He’s a suri alpaca, which has these long locs. And then Santiago is this [fiber] here, which are more the alpacas that we’re familiar with, the fluffy ones.”

Those fluffy alpacas, huacayas, have fiber so soft and light that you can hold it in your hand and not know it. Sometimes, she has friends close their eyes and wait for her to drop the pouf of fiber… that’s already in their hands.

Pure silk is the only fabric she buys off the bolt. “This is felted with RaeRae, my favorite alpaca who lives in Springfield, Ohio,” she said, holding up a silk and felted dress. “And she is my favorite girl. RaeRae’s in a lot of my pieces.” She pulled out another silk dress with tiny, exquisite white curls. “This is actually from a little lamb named Christian Dior,” she laughed. “He lives in Medina. I got to name him because he was born when I visited the farm. There were two little ones, black and white. They’re Coco Chanel, for the little black dress and Christian Dior, for his wedding gowns.”

With a sustainable approach, Malvar-Stewart controls every facet of her materials usage, and all are biodegradable, except for deconstructed waste denim. “Every loc is accounted for,” she said. “Because of my methods and processes, I know how much material I’ll need to make my specific pieces. One time, I made a wedding gown that was a little too long, and the waste from that gown fit in one hand. So I had some waste, but it wasn’t significant. And then I reused that!”

Malvar-Stewart commits to being sustainable and mindful at every step, including collecting rainwater for the felting process and using natural dyes, like the indigo blue and logwood gray, on display in her studio. “I grow quite a bit in my courtyard,” she said. “I have madder root, an ancient dye, Hopi black dye sunflowers, marigolds, black-eyed Susans, all kinds of wonderful plants and flowers.” She pulls out a dress recently featured in Vogue Digital—a rippling combination of deep, lustrous browns and tan with striking, rust-colored highlights. She had buried the lighter-colored silk with some rusty objects, creating “a really cool effect.”

The time in her studio lately has been dedicated to constructing pieces for her DACO Gala collection, themed “Ambiguous Citizenship.” Born in the Philippines and raised in San Francisco, Malvar-Stewart lives in ambiguity. “In the Philippines, they have a special word for us that means you were born there, and you’re coming home—but it’s understood that you’re not really part of the community. And then here, people always ask me, ‘Where are you from?’ It’s like, ‘Oh my gosh, can’t I have one place where it’s not ambiguous?’”

She feels this in certain aspects of her career as well. “I’ve been at this for more than 30 years, but I’ve only been known in Ohio as a fiber artist, a felting artist,” she said. “But I’m a tailor; I have my Master’s in fashion design.”

Celeste studied at the American College in London, then returned to San Francisco and started her brand. Quickly, she began seeing the adverse effects of her typical approach to fashion production. “We were in this building—it was slanted; it should have been abandoned. I had these big bins. I used natural fabric, but it was off the bolt, and I was sewing and would dump my waste into the bins. I would start to see how much waste I was creating, just me.’” This was where her zero-waste approach began to take shape.

It was in graduate school at Eastern Michigan University that she learned Nuno felting, her standard method of felting now. The process allows the fiber to retain its memory and gives MalvarStewart the ability to create form-fitting clothes free of closures.

Malvar-Stewart eventually moved to Columbus from New York City when her husband, a statistical geneticist, took a job at Nationwide Children’s Hospital.

Photo courtesy of Priscilla Dwomoh

I was like, ‘I am not moving to Ohio; I don’t know if they even have fashion there,’” she recalled. “I was so ignorant. We’re third in the nation in concentration of fashion designers.”

Along with her design work, Celeste teaches tailoring and design sustainability at Columbus College of Art & Design, getting her students to think about using more local material. “When I came here, and we would fly around in our little plane, I would see all these farms.” She began cold-calling the farmers, seeking raw fiber. “We’re always like ‘support local, support local,’” recounting handing payment to a local farmer at Christmastime. The farmer got teary-eyed and admitted they could buy their grandchildren Christmas gifts with that money. “I was like, ‘Oh my god! This is what it means to support our local farmers! Like, profoundly, that’s what it means!’” Malvar-Stewart exclaimed. “That motivated me to make sure our economy is robust, and let’s support local in a real way. Not just the finished products, but the raw materials available in our area.”

From farm to finished product, she estimates a typical garment, like a dress, takes 40 hours—and that’s now that she’s “pretty fast” at it.

Upstairs, in her work studio, a Santiago/Dameon fiber tube top sat, wet with soapy water, on a pattern much larger than life size. Scrubbing with soapy water intertwines the individual fibers to eventually create felt. Curls and locs are strategically placed by opening their fibers and scrubbing them into the base to become extensions of the felt.

“Gandalf was my first Lincoln Longwool,” she said, sorting through a rack to find a piece with fat curls and denim embroidery. “Look, he has really big curls. He’s my babe. He’s really old now.” She pulled out another dress. “This is Sugar,” she said proudly, touching tight, perfectly formed curls. “When I started working with [Lincoln Longwool sheep], they were endangered. Now they’re threatened, which is nice; they’re moving up. That’s why I want to use their wool. Isn’t it wonderful?”

Malvar-Stewart gives talks to promote using Lincoln Longwools. “They don’t have the finest wool, so they’re not popular for yarn,” she admitted. “One of my biggest fears is that we have these sheep breeds, and one day, they’re just gone because we don’t care to use their fiber.”

She held up yet another piece, covered with curls in delicious pecan, caramel, and buttercream hues. “This is Penelope, the variegated, and this is Brandywine. I’m just in love with the natural colors and the perfect little curls.”

Her energy for her craft is infectious. No matter what, though, her favorite part of her work is the farm. “The connection that you can have with these materials, these beings, you know… a lot of times, animals are just out in a field,” she said.

“I’m so grateful that they give me their fiber, and [grateful] to the shepherdesses who are so great about breeding and getting fine fiber. I love being able to have a deeper connection to the materials I have.”

She rushed across the room to remove a submersible heater from a five-gallon bucket of indigo dye sourced from a community of growers in Bangladesh. In a south-facing window, brightly colored jars of other natural dyes heated in the sunlight. She works mostly alone, bringing in interns or assistants occasionally.

Soon her studio is moving, possibly to her courtyard at home. For now, bags of fiber and wool, labeled with their sources’ names, line shelves and tables in the work area. She picked through various chunks of raw fiber, fluffing pieces from RaeRae and Dameon to show their inherent textures and their different warmth next to the skin, and returned to the bucket of indigo for a stir.

A Few of Celeste’s Favorite Local Things

Replenish +skin Hydrating Cream for your Body from Replenish Spa

I love this balm and the way it makes my skin feel soft and hydrated all day! It contains shea butter, cocoa butter, and grapeseed. I also love supporting this wonderful Women of Colour Owned Business (replenishwith.us)

Alpaca products (love their socks!) from Majestic Meadows Alpacas & Boutique (in Medina)

Really wonderful yarn, accessories, and clothing made from alpaca fibre from this family owned/run farm and it’s a great place for families to visit too! (majesticmeadowsalpacas.com)

ZenGenius Marketplace

This is a great local go to for eclectic creative gifts, home decor, local souvenirs and vintage fashions. Many of their items are by local artists and makers and many decor elements are gently used that support their reduce and reuse values! I love their clever t-shirts and, of course, their disco balls! (zengenius.com/marketplace)

Ranchero Kitchen

Really great authentic Salvadoran food. I especially love their delicious pupusas (hand-made corn tortillas stuffed with various fillings)

Petals that Inspire

Whenever I need beautiful flowers, this is my go to! It is a woman owned social enterprise; so, supporting them means supporting the community! (petalsthatinspire.com)

Bendi Wok’n Bar

A neighborhood fave and my version of “Cheers” (in German Village), this local restaurant serves delicious Asian dishes with creative cocktails, and they have excellent service with the friendliest staff! (bendiwoknbar.com)

Everest Cuisine

Excellent local spot for delicious Nepali, Indian, and Tibetan dishes! (everestcuisinecolumbus.com)

Glass Axis

A great place to find cool and unique glasswork, and a fun way to support local glass artists! (glassaxis.org)

Star Jewelers

A great family owned/run jewellery store with beautiful and unique pieces. They are such a sweet family and I recently bought a beautiful necklace and had a special family coined made into a pendant with them!