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On a sunny, windswept day in early September, students from Professor and Chair of Printmaking Melissa Haviland’s class gathered at OHIO’s Land Lab, nestled along the path to Radar Hill, to prepare plots for planting flax in a newly created Fiber and Dye Garden.

The project was originally conceived by Assistant Professor of Printmaking Matthew Presutti (BFA ’05) as a way to develop a sustainable source of fibers and dyes for use in his papermaking practice. In his second year of teaching at OHIO, Presutti drew on prior experience collaborating with an agricultural institute at his former university, where he grew hemp and flax for similar purposes. That experience sparked the idea for a new interdisciplinary collaboration on campus.

Upon arriving in Athens, Presutti struggled to find local sources capable of supplying the volume of plant fibers needed for sustainable studio use. He also hoped to create a more immersive, “field-to-studio” learning experience for students, one that would extend beyond the traditional indoor classroom setting. With that vision in mind, he reached out to the Environmental and Plant Biology Department and quickly found a partner in Department Chair Jared DeForest.

“When Matt contacted me, it was like, ‘Oh, I see an opportunity to do some interesting interdisciplinary science,’” DeForest said. “I'm a soil biogeochemist and ecosystem ecologist. My whole career has focused on understanding how different proportions of soil nutrients, such as nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, alter ecosystem function and community composition.”

The three primary crops planned for the Fiber and Dye Garden are hemp and flax for their fibrous properties, and indigo for its rich natural dye. While the plants will eventually serve as studio materials, DeForest also plans to conduct scientific research on how soil nutrient composition affects the quality of the plants.

“If you manipulate the stoichiometry of nitrogen, potassium, and phosphorus, you can get plants to behave differently,” he explained. “Then Matt can tell me — if we increase phosphorus here, it results in this paper quality, or if we reduce nitrogen, we get that effect.”

To begin exploring those possibilities, DeForest has already started growing indigo in controlled lab conditions. His research assistant Tristan Rieman, an Honors Tutorial College Plant Biology major, has observed early differences in plant quality based on UV spectrum readings.

“The one with potassium showed more blue light, and the one with phosphorus showed more red,” Reiman noted. “This could lead to fertilization recommendations — for example, ‘If you do this, you'll get more indigo,’ or ‘If you do that, you’ll get a different quality.’”

For Haviland, the hands-on experience offers students a chance to engage with the full lifecycle of their materials.

“It’s important that students see where their materials come from,” she said. “Papermaking already teaches us a lot about that, but this takes it one step further. We’re excited to get our hands dirty earlier in the process.”

Looking ahead, Presutti hopes this research won’t just benefit OHIO’s campus but will have an impact beyond it.

“One outcome I’m really hopeful for is helping to generate material for a local fiber shed, a system where local farmers can be encouraged to grow these plants,” he said. “If we get strong results and have the science to back it up, that’s valuable information for community members who might want to grow these fibers themselves. This isn’t just for us, it’s knowledge we hope to share. I want to make a paper that’s as good as any European paper, but made entirely from materials grown within a 30-mile radius.”