A interview with AGMARDT and our founder Sophie Poelman : Meet the future-focused textile designer who’s on a mission to create acoustic interior products with NZ strong wool. If you ask textile designer Sophie Poelman what her superpower is, she’ll tell you: “I think of crazy things!”. It’s that kind of thinking, that risk-taking spirit, and the ability to ask, “why not?” that led her to thinking more about wool, specifically strong wool.

Sophie Poelman has been devoted to designing with wool for the past two years in a bid to help turn around the declining fortunes of some New Zea­land wool farmers, but before this, she was circling the world as a functional sportswear designer and living the snowboarder's dream. She talks about her experiences from a job at an Amsterdam bagel shop to thriving as a designer for European brands, and her return to where she first started and where her creative seeds were sown, on Waiheke Island, where her family has lived since 1987.

In early January I traveled to Pirinoa, in the Wairarapa, to visit our farm partner Palliser Ridge for one of their twice-yearly shears. It is fundamental for me to meet everyone that works along the value chain, especially at a farm level. I want to take away the anonymity that accompanies so many wool brokering transactions and make it personal again between farmer and designer.