A Garden That Grows Art Supplies

At SMFA at Tufts, five raised garden beds along Museum Way produce something more unusual than tomatoes or zucchini: They’re growing art supplies.

The fiber and dye garden brims with plants that, come fall, are harvested as pigments, inks, paper, and textiles. These include orange cosmos, Hopi black dye sunflowers, safflower, St. John’s chamomile, and rhubarb. Last year, art students also grew indigo and flax, which can be processed into linen or used for papermaking.

The plants themselves are surprisingly versatile. For example, Safflower flowers produce a warm yellow dye through one process, but an alkaline extraction can produce carmine red. 

Last summer, Jamie Atchinson, A26 (BFA), was the garden’s primary student caretaker, watering plants, planting seeds, picking flowers, and keeping a meticulous gardening log. 

For Atchinson, an aspiring art educator, the field experience of watching the process unfold from springtime seeds to autumn harvesting was invaluable.

A pollinator stops on an orange cosmos flower. Photo: Alonso Nichols

“It’s important to me to have my hands involved in as many steps of the practice of making as I can,” Atchinson says. “That’s one of the things that has been particularly rewarding about this garden: getting to see it grow, from start to finish.” 

Assistant Professor of the Practice Leslie Rogers oversees the project, which began in spring 2025 as a way to cultivate sustainable art materials and to offer students hands-on experience in community arts—creative, collaborative projects rooted, literally, in local settings.

To her, the garden reflects a broader revival of traditional craftsmanship in an art world long captivated by technology. 

“The large and non-optional role of screens and computers in our lives has left a certain deficit,” Rogers says. “It’s exciting and relieving to learn that you can live well and do magic with little to no cooperation from robots. I’m so pleased to be able to bring a group of students over to the garden and share knowledge with that type of value.”

Expand

In the spring, students bottled madder, indigo, and other natural dyes in a botanical inks workshop. Photo: Courtesy of Leslie Rogers

Collapse modal

In the spring, students bottled madder, indigo, and other natural dyes in a botanical inks workshop. Photo: Courtesy of Leslie Rogers

Undergraduate and graduate students act as caretakers, which Rogers calls a “student butterfly” position. This year’s primary butterfly is Soleil Yoder Salim, A28, A28 (BFA), who studies psychology and studio art. Salim’s artistic practice focuses on fibers and papermaking, and they were excited about the garden since Rogers first mentioned it in a freshman fibers class.

“It’s been a great opportunity to better understand the origins of these processes, and to connect the materials we are using to their source,” Salim says.

Last fall, Rogers hosted a series of community quilting workshops, using dye yielded from the plants. Students, many of whom were new to the world of sewing and dyeing, “became obsessed with quilting,” Rogers laughs. They made 14 quilts and sold them at the SMFA annual art sale: Proceeds paid for student gardening stipends, a new trellis, and gardening supplies.

The garden is also supported by the Office of Sustainability’s Green Fund, which provides resources for sustainability projects for the Tufts community. The project relied on substantial support from the sustainability committee overseeing the grant and from facilities staff, whose work helped turn a seedling of an idea into a functioning garden.

“Truly, this has been a community effort through and through,” Atchinson says.

Students have unearthed community at the garden, too. Lin Xu, A28 (BFA), had experimented with natural dyes since middle school and arrived at SMFA with journals documenting that work. After seeing the journals during a student review, Rogers invited her to work in the garden. In an Introduction to Fibers class, Xu harvested plants including marigolds, cosmos, sunflowers, and indigo for natural-dye demonstrations. An international student, Xu says the garden offered a sense of place.

“Here, I found a sense of home, and Leslie has been so supportive in helping me do the things I love,” Xu says. “It’s given me a sense that I belong here.”

Expand

A quilt made with dyes yielded from the plants. Photo: Courtesy of Leslie Rogers

Collapse modal

A quilt made with dyes yielded from the plants. Photo: Courtesy of Leslie Rogers

That feeling extends beyond students. Passersby, tourists, and MFA staff often stop by the garden to ask questions, offer compliments, and sometimes provide running commentary on the plants’ progress and vivid color.

“There’s something about gardening outside that’s extremely disarming,” Rogers says. “The garden strengthened our community connections.”

Even people who didn’t know what a dye garden was were intrigued, inquiring about the unusual plants and the SMFA program more generally.

“They come so starry-eyed, they want to talk about it, and they express so much love and appreciation for it, walking by every day on their commute, watching it grow all year. They say: ‘I’ve been waiting all summer to thank you.’ I’ve been shocked by how positive the response has been—even from people who aren’t artists,” Rogers says.