Lauren & Kass Hernandez From Crossing Threads
Lauren and Kass Hernandez are the artists behind Crossing Threads, a Sydney textile studio where sisterhood, Australian–Filipino heritage and a shared language of texture are mindfully woven together.
Photos CROSSING THREADS
Kass (Left) and Lauren Hernandez, sisters and artists of Crossing Threads.
UNDERTOW by Crossing Threads: jute, Fairtrade hemp, linen, mulberry and tussah silk, banana silk, cotton, merino wool, bamboo, sari-silk, upcycled handspun linen, wire and metal chain.
‘Our work is incredibly labour-intensive, and so much of ourselves is transferred through our hands into what we make. Perhaps that belief that actions can speak louder than words has been woven into our practice all along,’ Lauren Hernandez.
“There’s something incredibly reassuring about building a creative practice alongside someone who knows where you’ve come from, understands what matters to you and is equally invested in where you’re going.”
REEDLESS CURTAIN by Crossing Threads in the making. GOTS-Certified Egyptian cotton, Fair Trade Hemp, resin beads, wooden rod.
AZURE ART CUSHION by Crossing Threads as part of the Rainbow Studios THE OBJECT SHOW at The Eve Hotel. GOTS-Certified Egyptian cotton, mixed natural fibres, boucle, linen, 100% feather insert.
Hello Lauren & Kass—can you introduce yourselves?
We’re Lauren and Kass Hernandez, sisters and fibre artists living and working on Wangal and Gadigal Land in Sydney. Together, we’re the artists behind Crossing Threads, our textile studio where we create one-of-a-kind woven artworks for private collectors and commercial spaces.
At the heart of our practice is handwoven storytelling. Each piece is created entirely by hand, with thread becoming a record of time and energy. Our work is shaped by experiences of transition and human connection, as well as our Australian-Filipino heritage. While these ideas often begin from somewhere personal, we hope the finished works leave space for others to find their own connection and meaning within them.
Crossing Threads began as a passion project back in 2015 – what first drew you both to weaving, and when did you realise it could become something more?
KASS: I bought Lauren a beginner’s weaving workshop for her birthday. We’d always had an affinity for arts and crafts, and I thought it would be a fun sisterly activity we could bond over. Four hours later, we’d caught what we jokingly call ‘weaver fever’ and didn’t want to stop. What started as a workshop quickly turned into regular crafternoons together, where we’d spend hours experimenting and teaching ourselves new techniques. I think that was the first sign that this was more than a passing hobby. Weaving became a creative outlet for both of us, but more importantly, it became something we could share.
LAUREN: The beginner’s weaving workshop may have kick-started our journey, but the needle and thread had always been in our periphery. We danced from the age of four through to early adulthood, and with that came costumes. We have vivid memories of visiting fabric stores to choose fabrics, sequins and embellishments, then watching our parents tag-team at home to bring our costumes to life. That early affinity for colour, texture and material has undoubtedly followed us into our weaving practice today.
When we started the Crossing Threads Instagram account, we began sharing what we were making simply because we loved it. Over many days of trial and experimentation, we gradually carved out our own aesthetic and approach to weaving. People began to take notice, and eventually commission enquiries started coming in.
What began as a passion project slowly became a side hustle, and then a part-time business. For close to a decade, we balanced our day jobs with Crossing Threads, building the practice until we knew we wanted to give it our full attention.
In August 2025, we finally took that leap and became full-time artists. Looking back, it feels like something we had been working towards for years without quite realising it. Now that we’re here, it feels completely right. We can’t imagine going back!
You’re sisters as well as creative partners… what do you each bring to Crossing Threads, and how does that shape the way you work together?
KASS: I have a background in finance, having worked in financial technology across client services, implementation and consulting. We’ve naturally learnt to play to our strengths, so I tend to focus on balancing the books, cash-flow projections, operations and project management - alongside my favourite part of all, production!
Although we’re both driven and highly organised, I’m definitely the dreamer between the two of us. I’m not afraid to back ourselves, put ourselves out there and network unapologetically. Our strengths are quite different, but that’s ultimately why the partnership works. We each have areas we naturally gravitate towards, while still coming together on the creative decisions that define Crossing Threads. Underneath it all is the unconditional support that comes from being sisters, through the wins, the challenges and everything in between.
LAUREN: I came to Crossing Threads with a creative background in advertising, having worked as a Senior Designer and Art Director for many years. That experience taught me how to take a creative idea from its earliest stages, shape it, execute it and ultimately put it out into the world.
Within Crossing Threads, I naturally take the lead in many of the areas where we show up - how our work and brand are presented across our website and social media, our marketing and art direction, and the overall experience we create for our clients and collectors. I also lead much of our commission process, ensuring the experience feels considered, professional and memorable from the first conversation through to the finished artwork.
If Kass is the dreamer, I’m probably the realist. I’m able to zoom out and see the bigger picture, but I’m also thinking about what it will actually take to get us there. Being artists is obviously about the work we create, but running a creative practice also means considering how that work is communicated, positioned and experienced by others. I’m often connecting those dots and figuring out how the ideas we dream up can become something tangible, while still feeling unmistakably like us.
Being sisters also means there’s a shorthand between us that’s difficult to replicate. We know each other’s strengths, we’re comfortable challenging one another, and there’s a level of trust that allows us to move between the creative and business sides of Crossing Threads quite naturally.
What do you love most about working creatively with your sister, and what does that partnership give you?
KASS: What I love most is feeling completely comfortable and secure enough to express myself without filtering who I am. Whether we’re weaving together or throwing ideas around, there’s no fear of judgement. Lauren has always been my sounding board and an honest mirror, and that openness has played a huge part in my growth, both personally and professionally.
But my favourite part is being able to celebrate the wins together. Her success feels like my success, and vice versa. We’ve also learnt so many lessons along the way, and being able to navigate the highs and lows together means the journey has never felt lonely. If anything, it’s made it a lot more fun.
LAUREN: When I look back at the past 11 years of our partnership, I feel incredibly thankful that I’ve been able to share this creative life with my sister. It really is a gift, and I don’t take for granted that not every sibling relationship works this way!
We often say we’re “cut from the same cloth.” We share the same upbringing and many of the same fundamental values, so there’s an unspoken language between us that I don’t think I’d have with a typical colleague or creative partner. Sometimes we don’t need to explain why something feels right or wrong - we just get it.
Of course, being sisters means we can also be very honest with each other, but underneath that is the certainty that we always have each other’s backs. There’s something incredibly reassuring about building a creative practice alongside someone who knows where you’ve come from, understands what matters to you and is equally invested in where you’re going.
How has your own Australian–Filipino background shaped the way you design?
KASS: Our parents immigrated to Australia in the late 1980s, and growing up, we witnessed their incredible work ethic and resourcefulness. Those qualities have inevitably found their way into how we approach our practice. We’re constantly experimenting and refining what we do, whether that’s working with natural fibres or evolving our commission process. We’ve become very comfortable with failing frequently and failing fast, knowing there is always something to learn or improve.
Being first-generation Australians of Filipino heritage has also involved a lot of rediscovery. As we’ve grown older, we’ve found ourselves looking more closely at our identity and what it means to exist between cultures. That experience has gradually found its way into the work, influencing our material choices and our dedication to craftsmanship. There is an incredible amount of time and energy embedded into everything we make, and perhaps that devotion to the act of making is something we’ve inherited too.
LAUREN: Watching our parents build a life here in Australia undoubtedly shaped the work ethic and tenacity we both have today. People who know us personally know that we’re doers by nature. If there’s something we believe in or want to pursue, we don’t tend to sit on it for long. There’s a strong sense of agency behind how we approach life and our work.
I think that has given us the confidence to create quite fearlessly. We’re willing to follow an instinct and figure things out along the way, rather than waiting for someone else to tell us we can.
I also think about the way love was expressed in our family. Much of it came through acts of service rather than words. Love was in what you did for someone and the effort you were willing to put in. There’s a parallel there with weaving that I’ve only really recognised as I’ve grown older. Our work is incredibly labour-intensive, and so much of ourselves is transferred through our hands into what we make. Perhaps that belief that actions can speak louder than words has been woven into our practice all along.
REEDLESS CURTAIN by Crossing Threads in the making. GOTS-Certified Egyptian cotton, Fair Trade Hemp, resin beads, wooden rod.
Concept Development and fibre samples for a current Crossing Threads commission project.
REEDLESS CURTAIN by Crossing Threads as part of the Rainbow Studios THE OBJECT SHOW at The Eve Hotel.
AZURE ART CUSHION by Crossing Threads. GOTS-Certified Egyptian cotton, mixed natural fibres, boucle, linen, 100% feather insert.
DALAWIN by Crossing Threads. GOTS-certified Organic Egyptian cotton, Fair Tade raw hemp, leather, linen, bamboo, vintage yarns, abaca and wire.
UNDERTOW by Crossing Threads. Jute, Fairtrade hemp, linen, mulberry and tussah silk, banana silk, cotton, merino wool, bamboo, sari-silk, upcycled handspun linen, wire and metal chain
UNTETHERED by Crossing Threads, GOTS-certified Organic Egyptian cotton, Fair Tade raw hemp and linen. Framed in Tasmanian Oak with Estapol finish
THE VESTIGE CHAIR by Crossing Threads. Chrome, mixed premium leather and roping.
What does weaving give you that other forms of expression don’t?
KASS: Weaving, to me, is a meditation. I get locked into the repetitive motion and enter a flow state that calms my nervous system and gets me out of my head and into my body. It gives me a way to process whatever I might be carrying mentally or emotionally, and creates the bandwidth to find clarity and acceptance in where I stand at that moment.
Unlike yoga or running, I can become so engrossed in the weaving process that hours pass without me even realising. It has become a way for me to release anxiety in a way that feels productive, but also forgiving.
LAUREN: Working with my hands and immersing myself in weaving is truly cathartic. Everything else seems to fade away and I’m drawn back into the present. For me, it has become a form of self-practice. If I haven’t touched the loom for some time, my mind and body seem to know it. Something beckons me to touch fibre again.
Sitting at the loom allows me to distil my thoughts and find clarity. There’s a quiet resolution that comes through the process of making with my hands, something I don’t think our fast-paced, digital lives can quite accommodate in the same way.
Are there particular fibres, found materials or techniques you find yourselves returning to?
KASS: I love Merino wool for its natural properties such as softness, warmth and strength. I love using botanically hand-dyed raffia because it offers a tactile texture that demands mindfulness when weaving with it. I love and am drawn to the frame-loom weaving, the static picture-frame-like loom that can span 3-4m wide and 1.5-2m tall. Working at this scale, allows my body to physically exert my creative energy in a way that brings me gratitude and grounds me.
LAUREN: I work primarily with natural fibres and often return to Fair Trade hemp. I’m drawn to its raw tactility and the way it feels in the hand. There’s an earthiness to it that I find really grounding.
Unlike Kass, I keep coming back to the SAORI loom, a Japanese floor loom and weaving philosophy that encourages you to work intuitively, without being bound by preconceived ideas of what weaving should look like. Funnily enough, one of the very first images of weaving I ever pinned to Pinterest was a SAORI weaving, although I had no idea what SAORI was at the time. Looking back now, it makes complete sense that I was drawn to it. There was something about its freedom and irregularity that beckoned me then, and it’s still what keeps me coming back today.
You’ve recently started exploring what your practice can look like beyond the wall, including furniture and sculptural objects.
KASS: It has always been on our vision board to express our textile practice in a three-dimensional format and explore how we can apply our techniques in innovative ways. I led the production of our recently completed VESTIGE CHAIR, applying reclaimed commercial leather offcuts to a vintage chrome chair, thereby realising that long-held idea. Hand-cutting the individual leather strips and meticulously applying each to the chair was a laborious but incredibly rewarding experience.
We see this as a natural extension of our practice in a functional format that allows people to interact with our work in a different way. Showcasing the chair within a high-end hotel room was the perfect motivation and opportunity to bring this transition to life and see how our work could exist within an interior setting.
LAUREN: We’ve been in operation for 11 years now, and for a large part of that time we were working on Crossing Threads in a part-time capacity. Time was a resource we lacked, so we had to be strategic about where we put our energy.
Since going full-time, we now have a little more time up our sleeves to explore long-held ideas that have been brewing in the background. Our lives are surrounded by textiles, and we wanted to explore how our fibre art could move from wall-based works to objects that can be viewed from every angle and interacted with more actively.
It feels exciting to consider how textiles can become part of everyday living, rather than something experienced only on the wall. For us, this feels like a natural progression of our practice and an opportunity to see where else our ideas can take us.
Crossing Threads was part of Rainbow Studios’ THE OBJECT SHOW at The Eve Hotel – what did the opportunity allow you to explore beyond your woven wall works?
KASS: For me, it was a challenging but equally fun experience. Being able to elevate a functional object like a vintage chrome chair while simultaneously celebrating the ‘new life’ we created by repurposing commercial waste was incredibly fulfilling.
The fact that VESTIGE CHAIR was exhibited outside of a traditional gallery setting also meant visitors could experience it differently. It sat naturally in the hotel room alongside other furniture and design objects, giving people a chance to imagine how a one-of-a-kind piece like this could fit into their own space. The response was really encouraging, particularly as it was something quite unexpected from us.
LAUREN: It was the perfect opportunity to flex our creative muscle and showcase the breadth of our practice, especially in a setting that felt closer to how collectors and buyers might experience our work in everyday life, outside of a traditional gallery. The hard deadline was also a big motivator. Sometimes you need that immovable date to force you to seize the opportunity, dig deep and get to work, pronto!
For THE OBJECT SHOW, we created four new Crossing Threads objects: THE VESTIGE CHAIR, REEDLESS CURTAIN and LIMINAL SCULPTURAL FRAME, alongside the debut of our very first ART CUSHION. It gave us permission to bring several long-held ideas to life at once and show that our textile practice can take many forms beyond the wall.
How did The Eve Hotel’s interior influence the way you approached the pieces?
KASS: For almost a decade, we have worked closely with interior designers throughout our commission process, so placing art within the context of a lived setting has always been part of our practice. Working with Jade Gillett of Rainbow Studios, who curated the INTERIORS room of THE OBJECT SHOW, allowed us to push this further and blur the boundaries between fine art and functional design.
Our REEDLESS CURTAIN, for example, fundamentally changed the way light was gently filtered into the room. Its tactility brought a sense of warmth and retreat, transforming the atmosphere of the hotel room in a way that went beyond simply placing an artwork within it. The work became part of how the space actually felt.
LAUREN: Debuting our first Crossing Threads AZURE ART CUSHION gave us an opportunity to champion the ‘mark of the hand’ in a functional object. With the bed sitting at the centre of the hotel room, we wanted to maximise that opportunity by creating an exaggerated, super-long lumbar cushion that played with proportion. The woven face is highly tactile, with textures that naturally draw you in and invite you to reach out and touch it. The electric blue fringe brought an unexpected hit of colour and dialled up the drama, which felt at home within The Eve Hotel and its own distinct approach to interiors.
Across all four objects, we were conscious of striking a balance between the room's existing visual language and the need to create a sense of coherence among our pieces. We were also working within the constraints of the hotel room’s dimensions and fixed layout, but that became part of the creative challenge. The REEDLESS CURTAIN is probably the best example of how those constraints pushed us in a new direction. Rather than seeing the architecture as something we had to work around, we saw it as a catalyst for growth and transformation within our practice.
Who or what are you looking to right now for inspiration, inside or outside design?
KASS: We recently travelled to the Philippines for a family holiday, and I found myself particularly inspired by the limestone caves of the Underground River in Palawan. The incredible textures, shifts in colour, and majestic rock formations have stayed with me and are beginning to inform the three-dimensional panels we’re continuing to explore in our practice. We’re especially interested in where this technique might take us as we develop our new body of work for our upcoming solo exhibition at Jennings Kerr Gallery in March 2027.
Inspiration can really strike from anywhere. I find myself noticing patterns in nature just as much as the unexpected colours and line work in my daughters’ drawings.
LAUREN: Yes, our recent trip back to our motherland stirred a lot of memories, while also creating new ones. As first-generation Australians of Filipino heritage, we have always felt like we were living between two cultures, and returning to the Philippines at this point in our lives and practice made us reflect on that in a different way.
Right now, I’m particularly interested in how we can introduce mediums beyond fibre into our practice and what those materials might allow us to express. That exploration is very much at the forefront as we develop our new body of work for our solo exhibition at Jennings Kerr. We’ve already started some preliminary experiments in the studio, and we’re excited by what’s beginning to emerge and where it could take us next. Keep your eyes peeled!
Where would we find you on a typical Saturday?
KASS: I have my favourite Spin Beats class at 6.30am, where I can get in a good cardio workout to tunes that remind me of a very different type of clubbing now that I’m in motherhood! I love spending time with my daughters painting at home, going to their favourite park with my partner or eating out at our favourite eateries in Burwood Chinatown.
If I’m not out on an occasional date night or girls’ night, I’m usually in bed by 8.30pm, either reading books to my girls or listening to their latest favourite Disney princess movie soundtrack as they fall asleep.
LAUREN: In my family, Saturdays are known as ‘Lauren’s self-care day’. I have a window of time where my partner takes our daughter out for the day, giving me the time and grace to do whatever I want! Sometimes I might be in the studio, savouring some solitude at the loom, or out and about catching up with friends. If time allows, a walk along the Bay Run is a blessing!
What's coming up for you that you're most excited about?
KASS: We are still riding the high off the back of THE OBJECT SHOW at The Eve Hotel and all the networking and commission opportunities that have come from it. We’re currently completing bespoke commissions for collectors in Canada and regional NSW, which are shaping up really well. We’re also in production mode, creating a new body of work for our solo exhibition at Jennings Kerr Gallery in March 2027 followed by a major commission for a client in South Australia. On the horizon, we’re also about to release another CT Frames collection through our online store.
LAUREN: We received such a positive response to our AZURE ART CUSHION, so we want to ride that wave and release our first-ever collection of CT cushions in time for the festive season. We’ve had people and previous collectors asking us for cushions for some time now, so we’re finally bringing them to life!
By the end of this year, we’re also eagerly awaiting the installation of our first large-scale public commission, which will be located in a prominent thoroughfare in Western Sydney. We can’t reveal too much just yet, so stay tuned for that!
This August, we also celebrated our first year of full-time practice and one year in our Summer Hill studio. There have been so many milestones to celebrate, but we’re most excited about continuing to pursue new opportunities and potential collaborations. We like to think of it as planting seeds one at a time and trusting that, with time and care, they’ll come to fruition.
Stay up to date with Crossing Threads here or follow @crossingthreads
