This video, produced with funding from Australian Wool Innovation, is part of the Fabric of War creative Research Project, which is shared by Trish FitzSimons and Madelyn Shaw. Fabric of War is a transnational commodity history that explores the strategic dimensions of wool. For 150 years wool was Australia's main export commodity and it continues to be the world's largest wool producer.

Fabric of War: Why Wool explores the history of how wool as a fibre became so strategically important and the chemistry of why its properties made it peculiarly suited for this task.

This history becomes a vital complement to the story of Australia as the nation that 'rode on the sheep's back' by providing an account of why so much wool was necessary, how this was a crucial underpinning to the growth of mass cold climate warfare in the twentieth century and how this relates to diplomatic and economic histories of Australia and other nations.