“I am a really average embroiderer, but I really love doing it. That’s one of my hobbies. In the last year, I started embroidering climate science data, the kind of data that the scientists I work with use and report on. Sometimes, it’s the Scientific Visualization Studio (SVS) visualizations that we put out. I will copy and recreate those using embroidery. Sometimes, I do graphs, line graphs, and different charts. This is mostly because I am surrounded by it all the time for work, and it’s something that I am interested in. I think there’s a really cool confluence between traditionally women’s crafts and also the STEM fields.
“It’s a good way for us to reach people who aren’t thinking about climate all the time. There is never a time in the back of my mind when I am not thinking about climate change a little bit, for better or for worse, but that’s not the case for a lot of people. I do social media, so that’s one way of trying to reach people who are not traditionally in the STEM and science fields. And I think there is a huge crafting community of people who are really interested in crafting and art, and I think that’s another good way to share that message. It’s also just fun. I love embroidering something and sending pictures of it to one of the scientists I work with being like, ‘Hey! I put your data in fabric.'”
– Katy Mersmann, Producer and Social Media Co-Lead for NASA Earth Science, Goddard Space Flight Center
Image Credit: NASA / Rebecca Roth
Interviewer: NASA / Tahira Allen