January 2026 will once again find Linda in Oaxaca, Mexico. She will be teaching a four-day Shibori workshop in Teotitlán del Valle at Centro Cultural Comunitario de Teotitlán del Valle. The participants will learn to make an Indigo/Ferrous vat as well as a variety of Shibori techniques, including folding, clamping, stitching, wrapping, pleating, knotting, and tying using cotton fabric.
In January 2025, Linda returned to Oaxaca, Mexico, to teach two 2-day workshops, “Making Maya Blue,” in Teotitlán del Valle at Centro Cultural Comunitario de Teotitlán del Valle. The participants will learn to make Maya Blue powder and then use the powder to create ink, watercolor paint, and natural printing paste. for screen printing. They will also screenprint their design on a cotton bandana with their Maya Blue printing paste.
January 2024, Linda once again found herself teaching in Oaxaca, Mexico. The first workshop was in Teotitlán del Valle at the Centro Cultural Comunitario de Teotitlán del Valle. The participants learned to make a sustainable indigo vat using local materials. We accommodated 16 participants. The second workshop was held at Calpulli in Santa Maria del Tule, where she taught an indigo/clay resist workshop.
March 2023 Linda returned to Oaxaca, Mexico to teach an indigo workshop at Calpulli in Santa Maria del Tule.
December 2022 Spoke on a panel (via Zoom) for National Indigo Day hosted by Crafts Council of Weavers & Artisans, Jaipur, India
January 2022, Linda taught two indigo workshops in Oaxaca, Mexico. The first was at Taller Teñido a Mano in Oaxaca City. The second was in Teotitlán del Valle at the Centro Cultural Comunitario de Teotitlán del Valle. The participants learned to make a sustainable indigo vat using local materials.
May 2021, Linda was featured in the Farm Bureaus magazine Cultivate
February 2020, Linda taught 2 workshops at Aranya Natural (Munnar, Kerala, India) in conjunction with their 25th Anniversary celebration. Painting with indigo on fabric and painting with indigo on handmade paper. She also spoke on a panel about the sustainability of natural dyes.
January 2020 Exhibited hand-painted textile, Blueness/Oneness, in a group show in Tokushima, Japan
November 2017, Linda taught 2 indigo dyeing workshops in conjunction with IndigoSutra in Calcutta, India. These workshops, “A Resist Dyeing Workshop with Great Purpose! Learn + Educate” were offered to educators, dyers, artisans, designers, growers, and students.
September 2017, Linda taught an Indigo workshop at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. This workshop kicked off the year for the textiles study students and included several of the school’s faculty members.
September 2014, Linda traveled to India, volunteering at a children’s home in Argatala, Tripura. Visiting with female micro-credit clients of CASHPOR in Varanasi. Visiting with women in several communities in the Thar Desert, Rajasthan & finally volunteering at the Aranya Natural Dye Unit in Munnar, Kerala.
September 2013, Linda was promoted to Entrepreneurship Program Manager at HandMade in America in Asheville, NC. Her duties included overseeing & coordinating both the Craft Labs & Appalachian Women’s Entrepreneurship Program. Her goal was to grow both programs, bring in new facilitators & offer timely entrepreneurial topics.
May 2013, Linda was appointed coordinator for the Appalachian Women Entrepreneurs program at HandMade in America in Asheville, NC. The program provides women in Western North Carolina the important education necessary to manage their craft-based businesses, along with a wide network of peers & fellow artists, access to resources, & opportunities to gain experience while implementing newly learned skills.
March 2013, Linda was invited to teach Indigo dyeing at the Vicenza Middle School, located on a US Military Base in Vicenza, Italy. While there, Linda did 8 Indigo Dyeing Workshops with approximately 200 6th, 7th & 8th graders.
2009 to 2012, Linda was invited to be a guest artist with YoYo Ma’s Silk Road Project’s educational program, The Silk Road Connect, taking place in New York City schools. In October and November of 2009 and 2010, Linda went into the schools and did indigo dyeing with 450 sixth graders. Linda returned to the schools in Oct of 2011 to work with 300 6th graders. Linda again returned to NYC in the fall of 2012 to work with JHS185/Edward Bleeker in Queens, NY.
November 2012, Linda taught an Indigo workshop at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte for the textiles study students.
May of 2012, Linda traveled to Turkmenistan at the invitation of the US Embassy. While there, she met with women entrepreneurs, did hands-on natural dye and indigo workshops with master artisans, and presented a paper, “Natural Dyes from the Beginning of Time to the 21st Century”, at the International Carpet Conference.
March of 2012, Linda traveled to Oaxaca, Mexico, to continue her work at the Museo Textil de Oaxaca with a group of master weavers. She also traveled high into the Sierra Norte, where 20 participants from four silk-producing pueblos took a two-day workshop in indigo dyeing, including the new, all-natural method of making an indigo vat (Michel Garcia’s 1-2-3 Vat). While at the museum, Linda taught three one-day workshops: two workshops on how to make a natural indigo vat and one workshop on shibori techniques and then dyeing the bound cloth in indigo.
Linda was awarded a travel grant by the Textile Society of America to attend isend2011 in La Rochelle, France, April 24th-30th 2011.
April 2011, Linda traveled to Kazakhstan as a cultural envoy at the invitation of the US Embassy to teach two natural dyeing and indigo workshops. This program was in partnership with a local NGO, “Our Heritage”, which is working to revive the traditional knotted pile carpet weaving of Southern Kazakhstan.
November 2010, Linda had an article published in HandEye’s online magazine about her work in Rwanda.
September 2010, Linda was featured in Calliope magazine’s Indigo issue in an article titled “Meet Linda LaBelle”.
September 2010, Linda found herself teaching an Ikat /Indigo workshop at the Museo Textil de Oaxaca. She worked with 10 weavers, returning to them a lost technique that will enable them to produce new products to sell in the marketplace.
In the spring and summer of 2010, Linda demonstrated Silk Reeling at the American Museum of Natural History for their science camps in conjunction with the Silk Road exhibit.
January 2011, Linda traveled to Oaxaca, Mexico, to present a scholarship for Creativity & Experimentation and an interest-free micro-loan. This was done through her charity-based organization, Stories of Hope (www.madderlane.com).
November 2009 Linda was a consultant for the MOMA/PS 1 project Rising Currents. Linda worked with Alice Feng under the leadership of Kate Orff of SCAPE / LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE PLLC.
November 2009 Linda demonstrated indigo dyeing at the American Museum of Natural History’s NYC Educator’s Night.
June 2009, Linda traveled to Musanze, Rwanda, and worked with 10 genocide widows on their spinning techniques as well as teaching them to dye with local plants and weave on a rigid heddle loom. After doing extensive research on African dye plants, she was able to identify and gather local plants and teach the women how to harvest the plants & then use them to make dye. The women then dyed the yarn they had spun.
February 2009, Linda traveled to southern India (Aranya Natural Dye Unit, Munnar, Kerala) and worked with a group of specially-abled young adults, teaching them to dye with Cochineal, an insect that produces beautiful reds. As a result of this workshop, the beautiful Pashmina shawls they are dyeing with Cochineal can be found in the gift shops of the Taj Hotels throughout India.
November 2008, Linda spoke on the sustainability of natural dyes to the Council of Fashion Designers of America at an event sponsored by Earth Pledge.
November 2008, Linda traveled to Puebla & Oaxaca, Mexico. She was instrumental in raising the funds to start a library, donating over 200 books in both Spanish and Spanish/English for a children’s center, Calpulli de los Niños, in Tlaxcalancingo. Mexico. At the same time, she was able to fund the purchase of shoes and school uniforms for the children at the center through another fundraising initiative.
In August of 2001, Linda opened The Yarn Tree, a retail store and teaching studio in Brooklyn, NY. Today, The Yarn Tree is an online-only business based in Roanoke, VA, selling natural dyes, fine fibers for spinning & felting, and handmade products.
Linda’s book The Yarn Lover’s Guide to Hand Dyeing was published in Nov 2007 by Potter Craft, an imprint of Random House.
Madderlane 