Wave Weir is a clothing designer, wool mill owner and operator in Seguin, Ontario, near Parry Sound on the shores of Georgian Bay. Her designs are simple, classic, unstructured pieces that are meant to showcase the fabric, last for years and accommodate body changes. Looking for a quantity and quality of local, natural fibre and materials for her clothing line, Weir came face-to-face with the limitations and bottlenecks in wool processing being felt by small sheep farms. Most are forced to sell their annual harvest of raw fleece to the wool grower’s co-op to be shipped off-shore, or to destroy it, if the cost of transport from the farm is more than will be realized by the sale. Living in an area in desperate need of permanent year-round employment, Weir decided to start a fibre processing mill in her small community. Purchasing vintage equipment from a retired business, Weir has established a semi-worsted spinning and weaving mill, providing added processing services for area farmers as well as purchasing raw material from regenerative farms to be used in an ever-growing possibility of product.
