The School of Making is an overseeing body that directs and innovates Alabama Chanin's learning initiatives and educational programs. This arm of the Alabama Chanin Family of Businesses oversees Studio Style DIY, Host a Party, Build a Wardrobe, and workshop programming, format, and content; it acts as a researching body for new subjects and new ways of disseminating information. The School of Maki
ng is an active voice in our local community, our state, and the making community, at large. Alabama Chanin, as a concept and a company, began as a DIY enterprise. In the 2000s, our workshop programming was a natural outgrowth of the emerging DIY initiative growing around us. Our experiences showed us that face-to-face and hand-to-hand contact helped our customers better understand the what, why, and how of our making processes and the importance of an organic supply chain. DIY offerings expanded, our workshop offerings became more diverse, and our Journal content added additional DIY instruction, stories, and ideas. Natalie's Alabama Studio Book Series open sourced our techniques and materials, which grew from our commitment to sustainability. Doing so allowed us to make living arts accessible to all consumers. Our hand-manufacturing operation grew to include machine manufacturing with the launch of Building 14 and our machine-made line in the summer of 2013. The machine skills, once so prolific in our community, needed to be honed. Our design team needed to develop a new language for stitches and machine parts that had been forgotten since the signing of NAFTA changed the textile industry in our community. Chanin line, we re-dedicated ourselves to our own education, which brought about our partnership with non-profit organization, Nest—appropriately called The School of Making Project. Educational programming is one of the fastest growing and most exciting aspects of our business model. And so, opportunities to educate our team and our customers fall within this home of knowledge. Find project inspiration on the Journal: http://journal.alabamachanin.com/category/the-school-of-making/
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