Katherine Soucie (BAA Fashion Design; Dip. Textile Arts; BFA, Printmaking/Textiles; MAA Visual Art, Textiles) is a Canadian/UK award winning artist and designer who specialises in transforming textile industry waste, specifically pre-consumer waste hosiery, into new textiles, clothing , accessories, sculptural forms and installations. She studied Fashion Design in London and Toronto, Ontario, Canada before furthering her studies in Textiles and Visual Art in Vancouver. Upon establishing her zero waste experimental textile studio in 2003 her material research and exploration of pre and post consumer textile industry waste and the discarded has resulted in an extensive body of work that has exhibited in Canada, USA, Hong Kong, China, Japan, Australia and UK.
Craft applications are (re)imagined through waste materials and combined with obsolete and discarded industrial sewing/textile machinery to produce unexpected, emergent forms, constructions and environments. She is motivated by an investigative hybrid approach to waste materials where an exploration of processes lead to alternate routes of discovery and sustainable solutions. The intention of her work is to honour, value and bring identity to the discarded in a way that reverse engineer modes of production and regenerates the role of craft in art, design and creative manufacturing in the 21st century.
Ms. Soucie is the recipient of the BC Creative Achievements Award 2006 (Canada), shortlisted for Niche Award 2007 (USA) and the recipient of the International Design Green Award 2008 (USA). Noted public speaker, juror and educator - she was the Visiting Professor in Textiles at the Welch School of Art, Georgia State University 2013 – 2014 and the Program Director for Fashion at LaSalle College Vancouver 2017 -2019.
She is currently based in London, UK.
photo by Ian Sheh