Handmade Nation sweeps across the big screen

More united than ever, independent crafters stand in a new doc

By Joanne Hinkel
Published: February 19th, 2009 | 4:25pm

Since the turn of the new millennium, the indie craft movement has been steadily growing and becoming a counter-culture force. Each year more books, blogs, regional indie markets, and online stores devoted to the cause pop up. Though, one of the grander gestures at telling the story of indie craft to happen is Handmade Nation, the hotly anticipated documentary by Faythe Levine, which screened at the Museum of Art and Design in New York last week and will be traveling to select cities in the U.S. in upcoming months.

In 2006, Levine traveled 19,000 miles and interviewed more than 50 crafters in 15 different cities, from Portland to Austin to Chicago to Brooklyn, and several spaces in-between. The film that came out of that ambitious journey is a scrapbook collection of impressions, voices, and thoughts on what the indie crafting culture means to those involved in it.

At first, I was disappointed that there is no narration or any storytelling device employed to give a historical perspective on why the indie craft movement evolved when it did, what it owes to the legacy of punk/DIY, and how it relates to feminism. But I don’t think Levine set out to make that kind of film.

Rather she lets the crafters, designers, and artists (all terms used throughout the film, though their distinctions are ambiguous) speak for themselves. This is more appropriate after all, as the film is about documenting their work. Thus, it is this collection of 20-odd voices, which also include gallery/shop owners, crafting magazine publishers and organizations like Austin Craft Mafia and Knitta, a group of guerilla graffiti knitters, that makes this film compelling, especially to outsiders of the scene, to those of us who are barely able to make our own dinners, let alone our own clothes or Christmas gifts.

There are myriad reasons Levine’s subjects give for opting for the handmade lifestyle: for the pure joy of creativity; in order to live outside the system of mass consumerism; to take a stand against the commercialization of culture; to simply slow down; to leave less of a carbon footprint.

For Sublime Stitching owner Jenny Hart, embroidery feels “better than drugs, alcohol, therapy, or anything I’ve had.” Ileana Rodriguez, a Chicagoan crafter who repurposes vintage fabrics to make purses, has this take on why crafters are so committed: “It’s people who grew up being creative and are trying to find a way to incorporate that into their grown-up lives.”

At turns the film is more invested in the process of creating than the philosophy behind it: these are shining moments, like when we visit Nikki McClure’s studio in Olympia, Washington, to watch her meticulously cut paper with an Xacto knife for calendars and stationery, or when we experience Jenine Bressner starting in on a glass bead that will take 45 minutes to shape with flame. A segment on BuyOlympia.com, an online market for handmade goods in Olympia, is also illuminating, for showing a successful merchandising model for crafters.

The end of the film leaves the audience wondering about the future. Will the indie crafting movement continue to grow or stagnate? Will it be co-opted by the mainstream for commercial gain, or will it have a meaningful affect on manufacturing and retail? With the downturn in our economy, more of the mainstream may soon be resorting to DIY practices than ever before. Only time will tell how much of a handmade nation we will truly become.