Please tell us about your studio and all the beautiful pieces you make.
Craftwork is a multidisciplinary art and design studio exploring the nature of textiles and technology through installations, storytelling, and material-based research. We (Nicole Yi Messier and Victoria Manganiello) founded Craftwork in 2022. As a studio, our broad-based skillset focuses on creative technologies and textile materials explored through historical and cultural contexts. As a studio, we often work with collaborators and experiment across genres.
What are you working on right now?
This year, Craftwork has wrapped up a few large-scale projects. The National Communication Museum in Melbourne, Australia commissioned us to create a new iteration of Ancient Futures for their exhibition Signal to Noise. We created an interactive textile installation with fiber optics and lights that captures the sentiment of visitors' shared stories. The final piece consisted of five 2'×4' panels with canopies up to 12’ long. In 2026, we are excited to be residents at Praxis Digital Weaving Lab.
Where can we find your work?
You can find Craftwork’s work in a variety of spaces from private collections to exhibitions, as well as through workshops in educational spaces. We’ll be showing work at the San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles for the Woven Pixel exhibition January 28th, 2026 — May 11th, 2026. You can also always find us digitally on instagram @craftwork_collective.
What are you most excited about?
We just began the editing phase for The Domestic Machine, a documentary film we've been working on about domestic knitting machines and the online communities surrounding them. We filmed in 2023, fundraised for editing in 2024, and we’re super excited to start editing!
What do you love about being a creative in NYC?
We love how easy it is to find community in various creative spaces in NYC. The city is so dense that you're always bumping into someone, making it easier to make connections. There's also such a range of creative fields in the city—it's easy to be inspired by peers and friends who work across different disciplines.
