Fibre to fashion: Amee Dennis strives to uplift communities and farmers

A Jill of many trades, Amee Dennis hopes to offer Australian farmers and regional communities new avenues with her fashion and fibre projects.

Rebuilding a life is no easy feat, but a ‘Jill of all trades’ has started anew in South Australia, with her two daughters and a determination to connect people to memories and landscapes.

Amee Dennis, 42, has spent the past 12 months setting roots on a farm at Peterborough, SA, and building a home for her family after a relationship separation.

And the self-taught artist has wasted no time throwing herself into life in her new hometown, launching a community arts festival as well as joining the local fire service while she and her two daughters learn the ropes of running a farm.

“It was the right time to do something that was just ours for a bit. All of the blood, sweat and tears that go into this now is mine and the girls at the end of the day,” she said.

Amee’s girls are 19 and 18, one of whom is not her biological daughter; she found Amee in her mid-teens with just the bare necessities.

“She was 15, so too old to go into foster care... She was brought home from school one day because she had nowhere else to go,” Amee said.

The family has 75 alpacas including 65 rescues, 10 cattle, one pig named Dolly, goats, camels, llamas, 6000 planted sunflower seeds and one hectare for her seven lavender varieties.

Running the farm has been a steep learning curve, with Peterborough in the midst of an unusual dry. Her hay bill jumped from $350 a week to nearly $1200, and she recently lost a contracted 100 bales for this year.

“In a way that’s good, I’m discovering this as my normal, and it’s only going to get better right?” she said.

Sourcing bore water was another big task - she found it about 70 metres down - and then with her usual resourcefulness installed driplines for the sunflowers and lavender with recycled materials.

Amee is a self-taught fibre artist and hand papermaker. She learnt to use native desert grasses to make paper and translated it to fashion while living between the Northern Territory and NSW.

“I want to connect people back to that moment or memory or that landscape,” she said.

She now sells alpaca wool products, which she started while living in NSW during the height of the drought to help fund living essentials.

“In the morning we had 80 orders and I went straight into the butcher shop and filled the freezer, bought the uniforms, and filled a trailer load with hay,” she said.

“They are a symbol of resilience and hope.”

Amee Dennis, Peterborough, SA, with Cookie and Sugar. Picture: Supplied, Nicole Drew Photography

Amee pitched her most recent community project on a whim, which brought paid opportunities, creativity and crowds to regional South Australia.

The Open Doors Festival is a five-week-long event, which featured 60 workshops, 36 reimagined doors, and brought more than 3000 people through the town and paid work experience.

“We have so many incredible artisans in this region who were quiet and I wanted to bring them into the light,” she said.

The outdoor exhibition transformed the town with old doors redesigned and scattered around Peterborough’s main streets.

Her next venture is a pick-your-own business with on-farm accommodation when her sunflowers bloom in mid-December, and incorporating her lavender to create jewellery products.

Meanwhile, Amee’s alpacas, llamas and camels are dedicated to educational tours and wool for farm-made products, while she has also launched a new virtual course to teach children globally about agritourism, diversification and Australian living.

Amee Dennis, Peterborough, SA, with her alpaca wool bouquet. Picture: Supplied, Nicole Drew Photography

The designer, farmer, educator and event organiser also added firefighter to the list, after joining Metropolitan Fire Service on her arrival to Peterborough to learn new skills and help her community.

She said she felt grateful for establishing a support network while she was new to the town.

“Every time that pager goes off for [us] it’s a small community, we’ll probably know them, and it’s the case a lot of the time,” she said.

Amee will also be a feature designer at Eco Fashion Week Australia on November 2.

The Shine Awards is a joint partnership between The Weekly Times and Harvey Norman that is a true celebration of women right across rural and regional Australia.