FIVE MINUTES WITH A FRIEND: CATE VICTORIA
In this week's edition of five minutes with a friend we catch up with Cate Victoria. Being in the middle of what Cate sees as a broken supply chain, her ambition through co-creation and collaboration, is to establish a transparent supply chain from farm to branding. Offering a full breakdown of existing supply chains, Cate offers alternatives to fit companies ethos and limitations. Started in 2013, Cate Victoria is built on extensive experience in Asia in production houses and trusted relationships with textile manufacturing and sourcing.
We sit down to learn more about Cate's personal relationship with textiles and what inspires her practice on a daily basis.
What is your first memory of a textile?
I have very comforting memories as a child of family heirlooms such as the softest Irish rugs from Connemara where my grandmother is from and her musty smelling cashmere cardigans. We also had beautiful welsh blankets in our home as a child which were super heavy on the end of our beds which gave a sense of security as you slept.. all of these represented the landscapes of our Welsh and Irish ancestry.
Can you put into words what you love about textiles?
Textiles are a feeling, a deep instinctive feeling of belonging, they represent the person who wears them and where they are from, this is especially true in Asia. I have been living between India and Nepal for over 15 years now and I am fascinated by the anthropology of textiles - as I watch people go by I imagine how they made what they are wearing or where it came from, especially what they are made of - which led me to the research I have been doing for many years.
I love the stories most of all of how a natural fibre from a plant or animal transforms into an object you can wear or have in your home as a piece of art - the sense of place it brings and the raw landscape they represent - and how we can replicate that in the textile itself. 
Where is your most inspiring space / place to create?
Landscapes inspire me the most through my love of the countryside and the depiction of them in film and documentaries while learning about new fibres - its what gives me inspiration and a vision to play with the colours and textures. I have been supporting my Ladakhi friend and film maker stanzin Dorjai through showing his documentary “the shepherdess of the Galciers” at our recent Exhibition of Natural Fibres in Stroud. Its a film about the beautiful landscapes of the Northern region of India and the life of a nomadic shedardess. The simplicity of her life and the harsh and sometimes unforgiving landscape gives even more meaning to the fibres from the animals she rears and therefore the textiles produced. Also a book Im reading by Harriet Sandys about her life as a textile and rug collector in the 1970s and 80s in Afghanistan and Pakistan and how she set up silk weaving projects to bring a dying craft back to life in war torn areas - a truly immersive read reminding me of my early days of living in Kathmandu.
What is your most cherished textile?
My most cherished textile is probably a blanket I got in Mongolia in 2019 on my first research trip there, It's a deep brown and grey Yak twill weave and unbelievably soft. It's what won my heart and set me on a mission to introduce Yak wool as a more sustainable alternative to cashmere, and inspired me to learn about the alternative solutions and what's being done to reverse the effects of desertification on the Steppes.
Images courtesy of Cate Victoria
Find out more about Cate Victoria:
www.catevictoria.com
@catevictoria