Cut from the same cloth
THE late artist and film director Derek Jarman’s home on the shingled coast of Dungeness, Kent, has inspired a new Romney Tweed collection. A former fisherman’s hut, Prospect Cottage was saved for the nation with a £3.5 million crowdfunding campaign last year, with support from the likes of Tilda Swinton and David Hockney, major donations from the National Heritage Memorial Fund, Art Fund and Linbury Trust, as well as members of the public.
The Prospect Collection features four new designs in black and yellow, echoing the house’s tarred walls, yellow-painted window frames and vibrant garden. All wool used comes from Romney sheep, which have grazed in the nearby Romney Marsh area since the 7th century. By the 1900s, Romney sheep had been exported all over the world, inspiring the saying ‘the sun never sets on a Romney’.
Romney Tweed (www.romneytweed.co.uk) was established in 2014 after it was discovered that the native sheep’s wool, traditionally used for carpets, could also produce a fine cloth soft enough to be worn next to the skin. Two existing collections, Heritage and Coastal, evoke the colours and atmospheres of local historic churches and the Kent coastline respectively, and five new Coastal colours, such as Tussock and Valerian, focus on Dungeness.
‘Sustainability is paramount to Romney Tweed’s ethos, and the central reason as to why we focus on quality over quantity of cloth,’ explains weaver-in-residence Rosie Green. ‘From the sheep’s back to the finished tweed, nothing is wasted, and every aspect of our supply chain is traceable.’