Folk of all trades Story by Poppy Fitzpatrick. Photography by Jason Porter.
Above: Dani Austin and Sam Ryan refer to themselves as ‘apocaloptimists’ – acknowledging that our environment is suffering, but having faith that everything will turn out okay.
Many people emerged from last year’s isolation period having rediscovered longlost skills. Backyards overflowed with produce, friends exchanged crusty loaves of sourdough, and a sense of traditional community values seemed to return to our lives. For Sam Ryan and Dani Austin, this period epitomised the ethos behind their educational business Folk of All Trades, as well as the sustainable lifestyle they’ve always sought to embrace. Sam and Dani met in a biodiversity and conservation lecture at a Canadian university while on study exchange – Sam from South Australia and Dani from the UK. They soon bonded over similar environmental interests and a shared nostalgia for the soft narration of 50
David Attenborough heard throughout their childhoods. After some time living in England, Sam and Dani made their way to Australia, armed with a unique assortment of new knowledge and ideas. With no immediate jobs to go to upon their arrival, there was plenty of time to experiment and fuel one another’s enthusiasm, drawing inspiration from their learnings at the Low-Impact Living Initiative in Redfield Community, UK. Dani began making plastic-free beeswax wraps, before being asked to host a workshop for Adelaide Sustainability Centre, after which she became the go-to person for wrap-making classes. While continuously developing their own sustainability skills, Sam and Dani felt compelled to impart each useful discovery with others following low-impact journeys of their own. Their natural knack for teaching saw their repertoire of ad hoc workshops grow quite organically, before they officially established Folk of All Trades in 2018. Sam and Dani run an ever-changing selection of in-person and online workshops that teach ‘skills for the planet’, such as caring for
