Meet our Grantee-Partner: Sundress Publications
Mission: Our purpose is to promote education and advancement in writing and the literary arts and literary publishing with a commitment to anti-racist work, inclusivity, and the promotion of underrepresented voices regionally, nationally, and internationally.
The Sundress Academy for the Arts, a division of Sundress Publications, will also fulfill these commitments while working to build connections between writing, outdoor recreation, sustainable living, and the natural world as a whole in the East Tennessee region.
Sundress Publications operates out of Knoxville, Tennessee, serving writers of all experience levels in any writing discipline. Founded in 2000 as a home for online literary journals, it now publishes books in print, runs a writers’s residency, and hosts free writing events, workshops, and reading series.
Sundress Publications is led by more than 60 dedicated volunteers who are guided by the belief in the transformative nature of writing. The nonprofit publisher strives to help writers find audiences for their written work through in-house marketing, design, and media pitching for its publications. It focuses on publishing and developing voices that historically have been underrepresented in American publishing, including writers of color, LGBTQ+ writers, and writers with disabilities.
In 2013, Sundress founded the Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) at Firefly Farms. Nestled in an Appalachian holler just minutes from downtown Knoxville, the picturesque 45-acre farm provides a quiet residency space for writers to hone their craft. SAFTA also runs free monthly virtual workshops centered on writing in all genres where artists of any skill and experience level can work alongside peers and professionals. SAFTA also hosts Poetry Xfit, a free virtual generative writing event, and the award-winning Sundress Reading Series.
Being able to curate a space where writers can be in community with one another both to generate and share work is an important part of our mission. Whether that's at our online reading series, in our generative workshops, or at our residency program, we believe that writers cannot exist within a vacuum, and thus building virtual and in-person spaces for people to collaborate, share, and write together is vital to our survival as poets. –Erin Elizabeth Smith, Sundress Publications executive director
Receiving a Poetry Programs, Partnerships, and Innovation grant from the Poetry Foundation allowed Sundress Publications to support guest writers, pay readers, and continue providing in-person and virtual programming for writers.
Over the course of two decades, Sundress Publications has worked with thousands of writers in a wide range of capacities—as authors, residents, workshop leaders, and volunteer staff. Leadership sees its continued growth as a testament to the belief in the power of literary citizenship.
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