Western Textile Revival

Article Concept for Avery Truffelman, Articles of Interest There's a fresh pulse in American textile manufacturing right now. It's the hum of antique looms.

A few years ago, Cone Mill’s White Oak plant shut down and its Draper X3 shuttle looms scattered. Vidalia Mills tried to resurrect them in Louisiana but flopped. Now Mount Vernon Mills is acquiring and reinstalling those same looms in Georgia, effectively trying to keep the last great American selvedge denim lineage alive. Meanwhile, American Woolen Company, once a titan of New England industry, has been revived and is again producing cloth in Connecticut. Across the country, mills are quietly changing hands.

What fascinates me is not just the machinery, it’s the people. Headstrong revivalists buying century old equipment, lubricating iron that hasn’t turned in years, pulling out brittle product manuals to decipher how to run systems designed before digital control panels existed. It feels less like startup culture and more like mechanical archaeology, Textile Boom CPR. At the same time, designers like Alex Carleton are reintroducing heritage profiles that have already proven themselves in the field: barn coats, CCC jackets, anoraks, trucker jackets, guide shirts. Folks like Laura Fisher of Revivall, John Helle at Duckworth, Amos Culbertson at Greasepoint Workwear, and Luke Davis and Marshall Deming at HardenCo over in New England are building amazing clothing from these looms. Rudy Jude, Imogene and Willie, Jesse Kamm, These styles persist… They get adopted by hunters, farmers, bikers, ranchers, and eventually stylish soccer moms. They endure because they’re tough, and then they get handed down. They’re hard to kill…bleeding Americana.

There is a story here about why certain materials and silhouettes refuse to die… About why woven jacquard is worlds away from sublimated polyester…About what it means to make something real in a synthetic world. It's too different not to notice. It's heavy enough, tough enough, and honest enough to outlive trends. This story is about the quiet Americans who are trying to restart machinery instead of designing apps, and about the process by which a purpose built garment becomes stylish and timeless.