About Local Fiber
Our mission
LocalFiber’s mission is to engage the natural fiber production community in our region and collectively address supply chain and marketing challenges. We host sales, marketing and networking opportunities and connect fiber farmers and producers in the Finger Lakes and Central New York State area to each other and to new markets. Collaboratively we are working to rebuild a vibrant, ethical, sustainable regional fiber and textile economy.
How it all began
In 2017 LocalFiber was founded by Cornell graduate student Dana Havas. In conversations, she heard of the difficulties fiber farmers have with processing and marketing their fiber. In response, Dana launched a series of community conversations inviting fiber farmers and enthusiasts together to brainstorm, understand shared challenges and get to work on solutions, and wrote a SARE grant to support this work, communicate findings to the community, and create marketing opportunities.
LocalFiber is now a farmer-member run organization. We offer memberships to farmers and makers in the Finger Lakes and Central NY region. Our premier project is hosting a six week holiday pop-up store in a retail space in Ithaca, NY that features our LocalFiber members’ fiber products. As of 2026, LocalFiber also is responsible for the demonstrations and the retail store at the New York State Fair Wool Center.
LocalFiber occasionally offers hands-on workshops where attendees can work with fiber to create their own works of art or learn a fiber craft. Contact us for more information.
Dana Havas, LocalFiber founder
Connecting the dots. LocalFiber is working to build a network between fiber farmers, producers, fiber services, artisans and customers in the Central and Finger Lakes area of New York State.
“Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much”
– Helen Keller