Unearthed

In summer/autumn 2025, in preparation for making the Moorland Shroud, I created four felt samples from local white wool and buried them for three months in two contrasting locations: peatland and woodland. In each site, one sample was bundled with natural dyestuffs (onion skins, lichen, ivy root) and one was buried unbundled.

My method was simple: find a spot, bury the wool, leave it, and then return in a different season to re-find and unearth the samples.

The results showed clear variation between the different environments, with distinct colour shifts and surface changes. The dyestuffs left visible imprints in both locations. Unexpected marks, likely created by the movement of water and soil, have persisted beyond rinsing, leaving evidence of environmental processes that cannot be fully controlled or predicted.

This small experiment opened up several lines of enquiry.

What happens to wool when it is buried over time? How do earth, moisture, darkness and the wider ecosystem leave their mark? How do bundled plant materials imprint on the wool? How do season, duration and location affect the outcome?

The experiment also raised questions about my own relationship to the process. I could make decisions that shaped the conditions of the burial — the locations, the dyestuffs, the duration — but the final results emerged through a combination of factors, many beyond my control. There was an element of surrender, and a sense of working in collaboration with land, plants and weather.

Returning to re-find and unearth the samples became an act of discovery. Would I find the exact spot? Would the wool still be there? What would have happened in my absence? While the samples remained buried, I felt a strong connection to each place, as though part of the work was continuing without me. The act of unearthing revealed not only what had happened to the wool, but also how my own relationship to time, place and uncertainty had shifted.