Summer 2025 | Re-Storying White Mulberries and Civic Arts
Sweet Water Foundation’s practice of Civic Arts is the intentional integration of art, culture, and community into public spaces, flowing with the natural rhythms of the seasons and the ever-changing dynamics of the SWF community. Civic Arts embodies an expansive definition of art, making it accessible to anyone – not just those who identify as artists – through the use of affordable and accessible materials and mediums abundant in our urban ecosystem. By weaving artistic and cultural expression into the fabric of the community, Civic Arts provides avenues for people to practice the essential art of being human.
Throughout the year, SWF invites local residents, neighbors, and visitors to engage with nature through civic arts activities, including nature printing, macrame, nature weaving, natural dyeing, and handcrafted carpentry projects. This summer’s civic arts programming celebrated the “wild” plants that grow in abundance throughout the season. For many years, the White Mulberry Tree has been a special feature of summer civic arts at The Common|Wealth, and this year, the tradition continued with workshops dedicated to painting and dyeing with its berries. Read more about the intersection of civic arts and mulberries during Summer 2025.
SWF Team member with a mulberry-dyed towel using Adire and Shibori techniques | Photo(s) by Sweet Water Foundation
History of White Mulberry Trees in the United States
There are more than a dozen varieties of mulberry trees in the United States, only a few of which are indigenous to the land. White Mulberry trees (Morus Alba), which are the most prevalent in Chicago, are not native plants.
White Mulberry trees were first introduced to the United States in 1733 from China, with the intention of establishing a silk production industry. The production of silk as a textile began in China more than 5,000 years ago, emerging from the natural relationship between silkworms and the White Mulberry tree. Silkworms eat White Mulberry leaves, and their larvae weave cocoons, from which the fine threads needed for silk are harvested. While the United States failed to jumpstart a silkworm industry from the importation of White Mulberry trees, the trees thrived. (Source: Information about White Mulberry trees is summarized from: The Baltimore Orchard Project.)
White Mulberry trees can be found throughout much of the United States and are so regenerative that they are often perceived as a nuisance. The seeds from the berries, spread by the wind and the birds, readily generate new trees, leading some states to classify them as an “invasive” species. Many people overlook the fruit of the White Mulberry tree, having grown up believing they were poisonous. Their purple fruit stains the sidewalks during the summertime.
Berries growing and harvested from White Mulberry trees across The Common|Wealth | Photo(s) by Sweet Water Foundation
At The Common|Wealth, White Mulberry trees can be found across the entire campus and throughout the neighborhood - from the Healing Garden, to the Prairie, to RND Park, to the alley near Think-Do House and Civic Arts Church. SWF re-frames White Mulberry trees as an example of regeneration, an abundant tree that provides shade, an abundance of nutritious fruit, strong branches for a bench swing, and numerous opportunities for civic arts activities.
Re-Storying Mulberries through Civic Arts
Since 2020, the Sweet Water team has been integrating White Mulberries into civic arts activities ranging from culinary creations to natural dyes for textiles, and watercolors for painting. Mulberries from White Mulberry trees offer a deep purple color for different types of creations. Through civic arts, White Mulberries—which can be misperceived as a nuisance or poisonous—are instead restoried as an abundant and rich gift of nature.
Examples of Civic Arts activities and artwork that feature White Mulberries, generated since 2020, from homemade pie to Adire and Shibori tie-dyeing, and watercolor painting. | Photos by Sweet Water Foundation
This summer, White Mulberries were featured in numerous civic arts activities. During the first week of June, the berries were harvested by participants after a Wellness Wednesday meal and brought to the Healing Garden for an easy and accessible watercolor activity. Each person quickly created their own bowl of mulberry paint by mashing berries with a spoon in a bowl and then used a paintbrush to paint pre-made designs on paper. Once comfortable with the technique, they created their own unique designs. This activity showcased how something readily found in nature, often considered a nuisance, can be used to make art more accessible and rooted in nature, sowing the seeds for a dynamic art practice and collection.
Following the initial watercolor session, mulberry painting became a recurring civic arts activity at Neighborhood Markets and was introduced to visitors from the National University of Singapore. To support people’s civic arts practice at SWF and at home, SWF developed an educational one-sheet detailing the mulberry watercolor materials, process and techniques.
June 2025 Civic Arts Work-Shop in the Healing Garden showing the process from White Mulberry harvest to watercolor. | Photos by Sweet Water Foundation
The following week after the first watercolor session, White Mulberries were used to create a natural dye for a more advanced civic arts activity. The SWF team prepared a natural dye bath with mulberries and pre-mordanted tea towels ready to receive the dye. Following a Wellness Wednesday meal, participants gathered in the alley under the shade of the Learning Tree (a White Mulberry Tree that provides a 20 foot span of shade) for a lesson on natural dye. Each person learned and tried Shibori and Adire tie-dye methods. Shibori originated over 1700 years ago in China and was adopted by people in Japan and named Shibori, which means "to wring, squeeze or press." Adire originated and has been passed down through generations of Yoruba women in south-western Nigeria. The West African practice and techniques for dyeing textiles have been recorded from as early as the 11th century in the Dogon kingdom in Mali (over 1000 years ago).
A common feature of both methods is the hands-on technique of binding, folding and/or twisting fabric to form new and varied patterns across textiles. Like the watercolor session, the materials used during the civic arts activity can be readily found in many people’s kitchens and/or nature around us, thus making ancient traditions of Shibori and Adire accessible to many people. Participants were excited to unveil the results at Neighborhood Markets in the following weeks.
June 2025 Civic Arts Work-Shop in the Alleyway using Adire and Shibori tie-dyeing techniques with White Mulberry dye. | Photos by Sweet Water Foundation
Throughout the summer, mulberry civic arts activities generated opportunities for the SWF Community and visitors of all backgrounds to connect with the artist in each person, with the land, and with one another, and with ancient textile dyeing practices. Each mulberry civic arts activity was also an opportunity for people to reconnect with the origin, history, and regenerative lifecycle of White Mulberry trees, thus re-storying White Mulberry trees.
“To no longer see the dye of the berries on the sidewalk and shoe soles as a nuisance, but instead as a creative medium and opportunity, and to know that mulberries are edible, facilitates a greater appreciation of the plant ”
(Left) Photo showing an example of the folding and binding process used for tie-dying with Shibori and Adire techniques. (Right) Examples of the resulting patterns created. | Photos by Sweet Water Foundation
Bibliography
Muhitch, Kevin. Forgotten Fruit: A Brief History of Mulberries in the United States Education.Baltimore Orchard Project, 2023.
