Global Georgia Initiative: Natalie Chanin

Natalie “Alabama” Chanin is the owner and designer of Alabama Chanin. She has a degree in environmental design with a focus on industrial and craft-based textiles from North Carolina State University. Chanin continues to learn and to teach craft traditions, using them to bridge generational, economic, and cultural gaps. Chanin’s talk is part of the Willson Center’s Global Georgia Initiative, which brings world-class thinkers to Georgia. 

After graduation, Chanin worked in the junior sportswear industry on New York’s Seventh Avenue, before moving abroad. For over a decade, Chanin worked as a stylist and costume designer, travelling the globe. In 2000, Chanin returned to her home to begin the sustainable work that has become Alabama Chanin.

Since 2000, Alabama Chanin has expanded to include a family of businesses: the Alabama Chanin collection, The School of Making, The Factory Store + Café, and Building 14 Design + Manufacturing Services. All facets work together to create a collaborative community and idea exchange, healthy growth and a love of quality goods that last.

In 2013, Chanin won the CFDA/Lexus Eco-Fashion Challenge, an award competition that identifies and celebrates the greatest American designers working in the realm of sustainable fashion. Chanin is also a mother of two, an avid gardener and an enthusiastic cook from her home in Florence, Alabama.

Chanin’s visit is presented in partnership with Georgia Sewn, the Georgia Museum of Art, the Lamar Dodd School of Art and the College of Family and Consumer Sciences.

The Willson Center’s Global Georgia Initiative presents global problems in local context by addressing pressing contemporary questions, including the economy, society and the environment, with a focus on how the arts and humanities can intervene. Global Georgia combines the best contemporary thinking and practice in the arts and humanities with related advances in the sciences and other areas.

For more information, visit: 

http://willson.uga.edu/event/natalie-chanin-global-georgia-initiative/?instance_id=1192