Candace Christiansen grew up in the Hudson River Valley. Educated at the College of Saint Rose and Cornell University, she became interested in weaving and fiber arts while living in South Westerlo, New York, where she raised four children and forty sheep. She has been a teacher of chemistry, math, weaving, and spinning at the Hawthorne Valley School for 20 years and is currently the head of the Fiber Department at Sugar Maples Center for Creative Arts.