Arriving at Pia's was like finding yourself wrapped up in the most beautiful tapestry of colour. When we walked into the house, Pia asked us to follow her up to her weaving studio, which made us giggle as her whole house is a weaving studio in a way. Walking up to the studio you could see and feel the inspiration in every corner.
Pia came to Canada from Copenhagen in 1989 and found herself as one of the founding vendors at the Wolfville Farmers' Market, selling children clothes. It wasn't until 1996, after a friend's fourth attempt to get her to check out a loom that was for sale, that she started weaving.
"In 1994 I was part of a group of 6-8 vendors at the market selling children’s clothing and baked sourdough bread I made with a smuggled sourdough" - Pia
Her daughter would also accompany her to the Market, selling coffee. She was around 12 years old and would come prepared with 20 cups of coffee to sell, eventually needing to borrow equipment to keep up with demand.
After a few years at the Market, she started to integrate some of her weaving projects into her offerings. She says that her process for starting a project is not really a process at all, "it's like dancing". Pia doesn't use patterns for her work, instead she focuses on the colours, texture, and density, and likes to to do a sample size until she gets the "puzzle" right.
Once we left Pia's studio, we had the opportunity to go visit her sheep, from which she collects wool and makes her own yarn. We stood at the fence while Pia called them over, and they all came running to greet us.
"Pia's farm is a full on demonstration of love in action from sheep who come to her call, and colours that meld in her hands, textures that intersect in just the right way to bring warmth and comfort through her woven scarves and her own words of gratitude that left most of the staff team with a tear or two. Pia gives and gives and the love she shares makes all of us feel even better about the work we do." - Kelly Marie, ED of the Wolfville Farmers' Market
Pia left us with a thought that all of us will take into our work here at the Market:
"I've been thinking all morning about how the work you are into with at the market, it's an age old community tradition that has seen people feeding their families for years" - Pia
If you'd like to find Pia's beautiful handwoven products, please visit her online shop at WFM2Go, here or find her at the Saturday Market some weeks (check our Market Map to see if she will be there).
