Talent Talks: Milk of Lime
Milk of Lime is the Belgo German design duo of Julia Ballardt and Nico Verhaegen. Their collections consciously move away from trends, instead drawing inspiration from the overlooked materials, techniques, and local craft traditions of their rural surroundings in Germany and Belgium. Working with nearby artisans, they transform discarded fabrics, rare textiles, and natural dyes into one-of-a-kind pieces that reflect time, place, and a deep respect for resources. Their most recent collection continues this exploration, creating contemporary garments that celebrate thoughtful craftsmanship and the stories embedded in each material.
We asked Milk of Lime to tell us more about their approach and what inspires their distinctive, handcrafted aesthetic. Their work is currently on display in Dyers Garden, the LAB exhibition running from 4 June to 14 September 2025, alongside the botanical dye research of experts Karin Waag and René van Eersel.
Image by Harry Miller
What can you tell us about your new collection?
Our SS26 collection titled ‘CHIME’ was a deep-dive into the items, textures and thematics we intrinsically like. In many ways, the materials themselves caught our attention and the smaller red threads, that build the stories within a collection, emerged at a later stage in a very natural way. A slogan runs through the entire collection, “I demand poetry”. This became the heartbeat of the garments and accessories and led us to put our attention to the tiniest details: which materials are the buttons made of? How much can we fray the edges of a particular fabric?
Image by Harry Miller
What materials, techniques, applications or methods are you exploring in your recent works?
From the beginning, we’ve been fascinated by imperfection. Things that are not classically beautiful, or others that present an edge to the human eye. This can be a patchy print, or a distressing of a leather, seam allowanced that show towards the outside and edges that are enhanced by fraying. Especially the fraying-part became a story of its own, we quilted contrasting fabrics together, manually turning them under the sewing machine, stitching an ancient botanical motive. We then sliced the upper layer open and distressed this part with the edges of scissors, hard brushes and sometimes the rim of our finger nail. Often the pieces turned out a mix between precious and raw, which is an essence we often seek in clothes in general.
Image by Kaj Lehner
Last time we talked with you we asked you if you see a future for botanical dyeing within your label. Do you continue to work with botanical dyes, and how has this practice remained?
The course we were able to do with Karin and René through the programme of NOoF was highly impactful and inspired us significantly. We did start a little dye garden right away, and continued with it this year, slowly enlarging the amount of plants as well as the plant range — a lot of trial and error. It is very different to work for yourself than working with a mentor who is by your side with every step and has such big knowledge. Our goal is not to make entire collections using plant dye, but use it in small, yet impactful dosages that enhance elements of the collection and surprise the viewer. This year we worked with a fabric that was still created in the workshop, but never put to use: An over-dyed fabric, a quite dark green and brown jacquard made from linen and silk, which we changed into a dark blue with reflexes of purple and petrol.
Image by Kaj Lehner
While we are still using materials of the workshop, we are growing and harvesting our own blossoms to hopefully start new batches of dyed fabrics later this year.
What does regenerative fashion mean to you?
It can be challenging to find meaning in many buzzwords that circulate around the topic of sustainability and regenerative fashion.
Eventually, it is a designer’s personal topic and depends on the the pieces that are made, on the environment they live in and what particular mission is close to their heart. We love what natural materials offer to the wearer: Not only incredible comfort, but also a long life span as they have the ability to age beautifully, getting a particular patina that only time and wear can create.
Of course there are many decisions to be made int he design process, but we believe the ’thinking ahead’ and the consideration of time is for us the most powerful pillar that we base our practices on.
Image by Harry Miller
Do you work towards regenerative fashion in your label? And if so how can you tell us how?
Ultimately, what we try to do is bring poetry and beauty into the closets of our customers. We believe that beauty (in all it’s facets) is an underrated factor in the sustainability discussion. It is what binds people to their items, makes them feel something, makes them love the garment, care for the garment and mend it if necessary. This is always our starting point when designing a new piece of clothing or an accessory. Anything we can do to come closer to a regenerative choice of material, dyeing technique, usage of scraps, fabric manipulation, is an immense bonus in the design and it is something we are always considering before making our final decisions.
Image by Harry Miller