From Field to Foot: Making Hemp Socks in Poland

From Field to Foot: Making Hemp Socks in Poland

This week's Hemp Show takes us once more back to Poland, where Maciej Kowalski gives us a tour of his vertically integrated hemp textile company in Elbląg, a small town in Northern Poland, not too far from the Baltic Sea. Today we'll let Kowalski guide us as we tour the Kombinat Konopny facility. His approach to business is straightforward: Make things people need. "What do they need? They need socks. They need beanies, they need pants, they need blouses, they need shirts, everything," Kowalski said. "The sock became like the symbol of what we're trying to achieve seven, eight years ago when we started." This episode follows Kowalski as he takes us from blending, carding, and spinning, to decortication and breaking up the bales, giving us a backwards journey from sock, to yarn, to fiber, to bale. Learn More Kombinat Konopny https://kombinatkonopny.pl [https://kombinatkonopny.pl] Kombinat USA https://kombinatusa.com [https://kombinatusa.com] European Industrial Hemp Association (EIHA) https://eiha.org [https://eiha.org] Natural Materials Unlimited https://naturalmaterials.eu [https://naturalmaterials.eu] European Hemp Hub https://www.pole-europeen-chanvre.eu/en/ [https://www.pole-europeen-chanvre.eu/en/] Thanks to Our Sponsors Americhanvre Cast Hemp americhanvre.com [https://americhanvre.com] IND HEMP indhemp.com [https://indhemp.com] Bish Enterprises bishenterprises.com [https://bishenterprises.com] 1937 International 1937international.com [https://1937international.com/] Condor Seed condorseed.com [https://condorseed.com] HEMI — Hemp Education and Marketing Initiative thegoodnessofhemp.org/ [https://thegoodnessofhemp.org/]

Hempcrete Hero: Little House on the Podcast

We have an outbuilding at home — we call it the Little House. It's a small old barn that sits out in our back yard, maybe 25 feet from the back door. It was a barn for animals at one point, then a garage, then an apartment. There's a lot of interesting energy in the Little House. It's been many things over the years: an art studio, a bakery, a jewelry-making place. By 2018 the Little House had given birth to this very podcast. The Little House has been an epicenter of entrepreneurial spirit and love for a long time. When I got home from my recent trip to Poland [https://www.lancasterfarming.com/farming-news/hemp/hemp-in-poland-a-trip-into-europes-industrial-hemp-industry/collection_ffb6bd03-2e6c-4c8b-93b9-7a4b129fc11b.html], I found out there was a water leak in the Little House, which sent me on a mission of ripping and tearing — rugs, floors, decking and drywall. And before I knew it, I needed a new wall on the west end. And of course, it was going to be a hempcrete wall, right? Hempcrete is hemp hurd — the woody inner core of the hemp stalk — mixed with a lime-based binder and water and packed around a wood frame like insulation. It's breathable, naturally resistant to pests and fire, and because hemp pulls carbon out of the air as it grows, a hempcrete wall can be carbon-negative. It's about as close as you can get to building a wall out of a farm field. After years and years of following the industry, reporting on builders like Cameron McIntosh, Micaela Machado, Danny Desjarlais and Matt Marino, these people are my heroes. And now, after having made seven batches of hempcrete by hand, anyone who has ever built something out of hempcrete is my hero. Luck favors the prepared, so I sought knowledge. I drove down to the Ice House in Ellicott City, Maryland, to learn from Gayle Killen. She taught me how to mix by hand, how to pack the edges better than the middle, and how to stay safe — PPE always, and a jar of vinegar handy to neutralize the lime. Cameron McIntosh, up at his shop in Bally, confirmed the numbers and sent me home with hurd, buckets, tampers and a saw. Drew Oberholzer and Ana Konopitskaya of Coexist Build [https://www.lancasterfarming.com/farming-news/hemp/pennsylvania-s-bio-economy-poised-to-grow/article_7e9aaa6c-32f8-11ee-832a-f30d1b5e1b94.html] donated nine bags of lime binder. Acts of kindness bind us all together. So I mixed and packed and mixed again, all through the Fourth of July weekend, sweating it out in the backyard, covered in lime burns, until a hempcrete wall stood where the old one used to be. My kids tell me it smells like corn. But whatever it smells like, it looks like agriculture. Imagine if we could build our houses with locally sourced, annually renewable resources so we can survive, so our children can survive, so our children's children can survive. That's what this is about: the future, and learning how to do things so we can face it together. This hempcrete wall is emblematic of the changes you'll see coming. We're building, growing, making and doing. Learn More LimeWorks.us – EcoLogic HempCrete Binder Platinum https://www.limeworks.us/product/ecologic-hempcrete-binder-platinum/ [https://www.limeworks.us/product/ecologic-hempcrete-binder-platinum/] Americhanvre https://americhanvre.com/ [https://americhanvre.com/] Hemp Building Institute https://www.hempbuildinginstitute.org/ [https://www.hempbuildinginstitute.org/] HempBuild Magazine https://www.hempbuildmag.com/ [https://www.hempbuildmag.com/] US Hemp Building Association (USHBA) https://www.ushba.org/resources [https://www.ushba.org/resources] International Hemp Building Association (IHBA) https://internationalhempbuilding.org/ [https://internationalhempbuilding.org/] Thanks to Our Sponsors HEMI Take Action: https://thegoodnessofhemp.org [https://thegoodnessofhemp.org] Condor Seed https://condorseed.com [https://condorseed.com] Forever Green – KP4 Hemp Cutter https://hempcutter.com [https://hempcutter.com]

Encore Presentation of Michael Klepacz's First Interview on Hemp Show, March 2024

This is a special encore edition of an interview we published on YouTube two years ago. This is my conversation with Michael Klepacz, an Ohio native and Air Force veteran who moved to Poland in 2012 and founded Natural Materials Unlimited, a company that makes textiles and products from hemp, linen and other bast fibers. In this bonus episode, he talks about how the business grew from hemp wick to guitar straps, pet accessories and custom fiber products for clients around the world. The conversation digs into long fiber versus short fiber hemp: why long fiber produces stronger, higher-quality textiles, why Europe's processing equipment wasn't built for it, and why China's demand for European long fiber has scrambled the supply chain. Klepacz also traces hemp's textile history (including its role in old ship sails and painters' canvases), and shares his frustrations with U.S. and Polish hemp policy, ignorant regulators and platforms like Google and Facebook that still block hemp marketing. This episode is being republished alongside a new interview [https://lancasterfarming.com/tncms/asset/editorial/2c227b3a-69a5-49ae-8139-bef1d46b03d6] host Eric Hurlock recorded with Klepacz in Poland, revisiting the conversation as the two catch up in person. Learn More Natural Material Unlimited naturalmaterials.eu [https://naturalmaterials.eu/] Sponsors HEMI (Hemp Education & Marketing Initiative) hempinitiatives.org/ [https://hempinitiatives.org/] The Goodness of HEMP thegoodnessofhemp.org/ [https://thegoodnessofhemp.org/]

Michael Klepacz: An American in Warsaw

This week on the Hemp Show, we continue our hemp adventure in Poland [https://www.lancasterfarming.com/farming-news/hemp/hemp-in-poland-a-trip-into-europes-industrial-hemp-industry/collection_ffb6bd03-2e6c-4c8b-93b9-7a4b129fc11b.html], catching up with American expat Michael Klepacz, owner of Natural Materials Unlimited. Klepacz sits near the end of the hemp supply chain — he doesn't grow or process raw fiber himself. Instead, he sources hemp and other natural fibers from regional mills and turns them into finished goods, from hemp wick to dog leashes, as a contract manufacturer for brands worldwide. Klepacz gives us a walking tour of his factory — beeswax, waxing lines and a dynamometer that tests twine strength — and makes the case for hemp as Europe's best fiber. We're also re-releasing his first appearance on the show, a 2024 conversation that never made it to the podcast feed, so you can get the full picture of an American entrepreneur building a hemp business from scratch in Poland. Learn More Natural Materials Unlimited https://naturalmaterials.eu [https://naturalmaterials.eu] RAW Hemp Wick (10ft) https://rawthentic.com/prawducts/smoking-gear/lighters-matches-wicks/raw-hemp-wick-10ft/ [https://rawthentic.com/prawducts/smoking-gear/lighters-matches-wicks/raw-hemp-wick-10ft/] Libeco Belgian Linen https://www.libeco.com [https://www.libeco.com] EIHA (European Industrial Hemp Association) https://eiha.org [https://eiha.org] Thanks to Our Sponsors HEMI — The Goodness of Hemp https://goodnessofhemp.org [https://goodnessofhemp.org] Bish Enterprises — FiberCut https://bishenterprise.com/fibercut [https://bishenterprise.com/fibercut] 1937 International https://1937international.com [https://1937international.com] Condor Seed https://condorseed.com [https://condorseed.com] IND Hemp https://indhemp.com [https://indhemp.com]

Beau Whitney — Making the Economic Case for Hemp, One Spoon at a Time

This is part seven of a ten-part podcast series documenting the European Industrial Hemp Association's 23rd Annual Conference in Poznan, Poland, at the Institute of Fiber Plants and Medicinal Medicine, June 10-12. Beau Whitney is the founder of Whitney Economics, based in Portland, Oregon. He has tracked the economics of hemp and cannabis since 2014, and his data is a fixture at industry events around the world. But he found that the numbers alone didn't always land with audiences. "When I would start talking about hemp as an automobile part or as a substitute for lithium EV batteries, I would lose the crowd," he said. So Whitney had a hemp-based spoon made and started handing it to skeptics during talks to show that hemp isn't a drug but a real material. That grew into a second venture, the Everyday Hemp Company, which now makes hemp cutlery, straws, plant tags and a plant-based pallet wrap he calls "planet wrap." Between the data and the products, Whitney's message is the same on both sides: hemp is a real economy, not a novelty. Learn More Whitney Economics whitneyeconomics.com [https://whitneyeconomics.com] Everyday Hemp Company everydayhempcompany.com [https://everydayhempcompany.com] Institute of Natural Fibers and Medicinal Plants (IWNIRZ) iwnirz.pl [https://iwnirz.pl] European Industrial Hemp Association (EIHA) eiha.org [https://eiha.org/] Thanks to Our Sponsors Condor Seed condorseed.com [https://condorseed.com] HEMI — The Hemp Education and Marketing Initiative thegoodnessofhemp.org [https://thegoodnessofhemp.org] Bish Enterprises — FiberCut Hemp Harvesting bishenterprise.com/fibercut [https://bishenterprise.com/fibercut] 1937 International 1937international.com [https://1937international.com]