Mandy Moore's Blog, page 3

WWW: Woolaid; Great London Yarn Crawl; Jaquard by Google

Woolaid: Merino Wool Bandages. ♥

(via Clara Parkes)

This year’s Great London (UK) Yarn Crawl takes place on 1st – 8th September, 2019. It will take a different tactic: the week-long event will allow participants to choose their own routes and shop combinations, and to spread their visits over multiple days, extending the yarn-y celebration! Tickets are on sale now.

Oma Space Studio, Chloe Bensahel, and Amor Muñoz have been selected to participate in the the Jacquard by Google and Google Arts & Culture residency program. Note it’s not a Jacquard loom, but Jacquard by Google, a new form of wearable technology.

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Spinning at TNNA

Amy, Kate and I attended The National Needlework Association convention in Cleveland, Ohio a few weeks ago. This is the wholesale show where knitting shops go to buy for the fall season. I’m always on the lookout for spinning things. This year there seemed to be a little less spinning than in the past, but the show was smaller overall.

 

 

 

Schacht!

Of course, Schacht was there in full force, celebrating their 50th anniversary. I need to buy the 50th anniversary shuttle before they are all sold out!

Ashford was there too. I saw lots of demos of their newer e-spinner. I’ve tried it and it’s very, very, good. If you are in the market for an e-spinner, be sure to give this one a try before you make your decision.

 

 

 

Fiber Sprite Yarn Control Cards

 

A company new to me, Fiber Sprite, was there, They have fiber and the most adorable (and useful) yarn control cards that have a twist angle gauge on them too. Attention dyers and other skein lovers, they are working on an electric skein winder that breaks down and stores in a very small footprint.

 

 

 

 

Corriedale!

 

The folks that bring me my core teaching fiber, DM Fibers, were there with new colors of two of my favorites, Corriedale and Merino/silk.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Frabjous Fibers

 

It always makes me so happy to stand in the Frabjous Fibers booth and marvel at all of their fiber in person. Sigh, I tried not to drool. If you’re taking a class with me in the next year, you’ll be spinning some of their new colors. I’m also adding different fibers and blends to my teaching mix.

 

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WWW: Maureen Rose of Taylor’s Buttons; Dangerously Close to Weaving exhibit; Super/Natural: Textiles of the Andes Exhibit

Meet Maureen Rose the woman who runs London’s oldest button shop, Taylor’s Buttons (London, UK).

“Every button tells a story and I have no idea how many there are in the shop. Some are more than 100 years old, but most I make to order. You send me the fabric – velvet, leather or whatever – and I’ll make you whatever you want. We used to do only small orders for tailors: two fronts and eight cuff buttons for a suit. Nowadays I do them by the hundred.”

Photo of Maureen Rose by Sarah Ainslie

Dangerously Close to Weaving Is a Proud Celebration of Textile Art

The all-women exhibition is on display now at The Rymer Gallery (Nashville, TN, USA). It is an ambitious showcase of fiber arts that features works by nine women. The work is anchored in identity and the desire to eschew gender expectations, but more than that, it’s a celebration of textiles.

Photo: 32 Hours of Negotiations Between the World and Me by Quinn Hunter

Super/Natural: Textiles of the Andes was on view until 16 June 2019 at the Art Institute of Chicago, 111 South Michigan Avenue (Chicago, IL, USA).

The website shares a few works from the museum’s collection that show similar design and patterns for textiles and ceramics that developed in different areas of the Andes.

Photo: A work made of wool (camelid) and cotton, plain weave of discontinuous single interlocking warps and wefts.

Fragment, 200 AD–500 AD Nazca

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Knittyspin First Fall 2019: Combos Cross Pollinated

Combo spin (left) and combo draft (right) singles, ready to play.

Have you been spinning combos after reading my Knittyspin Column?

Which combo intrigues you right now, combo spin or combo draft? I’m just happy to finally see the difference between the two up close and swatched!

Of course, as soon as I finished swatching the two combos I wanted to know what yarn and cloth would look like if I combined one-ply of combo spun yarn and one-ply of combo drafted yarn.

 

 

 

One ply of combo drafted yarn and one ply of combo spun yarn.

 

Luckily, I had leftover singles on both bobbins. I plied them together and knit a swatch.

It’s exactly a combination of the two yarns. There are speckles of color from the combo drafted single and color stripes from the combo spun single.

 

 

 

 

 

Combo mix yarn

 

If you look at the bit of loose yarn in this photo you can see yellow running through it all, and blue, purple and turquoise spiraling around it. The yellow is from the combo spin bobbin and the multi colors are from the combo draft bobbin.

It makes such interesting knitted fabric. I wonder what a 3-ply with two combo drafted singles and one combo spun single would look like? Or two combo spun, and one combo drafted?

Every time I think I’m done experimenting I get a new idea!

 

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WWW: some Craftivism links from the archives

Women in Berlin knitting for soliders, 1914. Library of Congress/LC-DIG-ggbain-18341The Feminist Power of Embroidery by E. Tammy Kim (Dec 29, 2018)

The Politics of Knitting by Shannon Okey (Holiday 2018)

Stitch by stitch, a brief history of knitting and activism by Corinne Segal (Apr 23, 2017)

The Wartime Spies Who Used Knitting as an Espionage Tool Grandma was just making a sweater. Or was she? by Natalie Zarrelli (Jun 01, 2017)

Many books have been written on the subject, here are a few:

Women’s Work: The First 20,000 Years – Women, Cloth, and Society in Early Times by Elizabeth Wayland Barbert (1995)
Knitting for good : a guide to creating personal, social & political change, stitch by stitch by Betsy Greer (2008)
Threads of life : a history of the world through the eye of a needle by Clare Hunter (2019)
Guerrilla Kindness and Other Acts of Creative Resistance: Making A Better World Through Craftivism by Sayraphim Lothian (2018)
No Idle Hands : the Social History of American Knitting by Anne Macdonald (2010)
The Subversive Stitch, Embroidery and the Making of the Feminine by Rozsika Parker (2019)
Craft activism : people, ideas, and projects from the new community of handmade and how you can join in by Joan Tapper; Gale Zucker (2011)

Previously on the knitty blog

Note: this is not a complete list!

WWW: Knitting and WWII; Men and Knitting; Pockets (April 2014)
WWW: Knitted Glass; Thoughts On Knitting for Charity; Craftivism (October 2014)
WWW: On Being Expensive and Not; UK Wool Week; Craft, Creativity and Activism (October 2014)
WWW: Yarn documentary; on Craftivism; Kate classes in Austin, Texas (March 2016)
WWW: Knitting and activism goes way back; FiberCrafty; creating an ocean liner by hand; Yarnit on Funderdome this Sunday (July 2017)
WWW: knitting as record, textile exhibit calendar, power your knitting (January 2019)

This is an incomplete list, and it is mostly a Western-centric list. I am sorry. Many thanks to those who commented on Woolly Wormhead’s Twitter thread, from which I drew many of these links.

If you have links you’d like to see included in future knittyblog posts, please fill out this form. Thank you.

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Knittyspin First Fall 2019: Bremen Library Bag

Bremen Library Bag, doing it’s thing!

 

When the Bremen Library Bag came ins as a submission for First Fall Knittyspin, I knew I would publish it. The Bremen Town Musicians was one of my favorite folk tales when I was little, I even have a set of stuffed animals that stack.

Then I read the pattern. The fibers used in the bag are all were all gifted to the designer, Stefanie Johnson, which gives the bag instant happy thoughts every time she uses it.

The spinning and the construction are so smart. She uses black alpaca spun worsted for strength and smoothness. It also showcases the multicolored yarn. The multicolored fiber is a batt, that she plied to with wooly nylon to keep the colors from mixing and to have maximum yardage.

The bag is knit in a combination of double knit and linen stitch. It’s not a pretend library bag, it will really hold books!

A clever pattern, and a great project for the summer.

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WWW: where was that sweater knit; evolving tapestry; pattern sale

That Iceland wool sweater may have been knit in China.

Photo: Egill Bjarnason / AP

(Via Clara Parkes)

These Artists Are Changing our Expectations of What Tapestry Can Be

Photo: Diedrick Brackens, unicorn kente, 2018.

Donna Druchunas (Our Knitting Roots Columnist) is having her semi-annual sale. All her single patterns on Ravelry are only $1 through the end of the month. No coupon needed!

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Getting Ready for Tour de Fleece

Nest, BFL, Chasing Deer colorway.

This year I won’t be spinning for the Tour de Fleece. I’ll be be between teaching gigs, unpacking and repacking. I will be spinning, but not at a TdF level or with much focus.

I love the massive amount of spinning, or just focused spinning I can do in three weeks. I like to not stress about it, including not watching actual bike racing.

Some years I spin pounds, some (most) years I spin a skein of yarn. Last year I spun one skein of thick-ish sock yarn for a pair of shorty socks.

I am always happy with what I get done, and I always learn something.

 

 

Here are some suggestions for a smooth and fun TdF:

Baby your wheel. Make sure your wheel is clean, oiled and has fresh drive and brake bands if it needs it.
Empty all of your bobbins. Get your storage bobbins out and set up your bobbin winder (if you use one).
Make a plan, even a little one. Are you spinning down your stash by two pounds? Spinning one perfect skein of fingering weight singles? Swatching for a sweater? Practicing worsted draft everyday for 15 minutes? Write it down somewhere, so you don’t get caught up in other people’s goals.
Prep your fiber in advance. Make your rolags or batts, unchain and fluff your braids. If you are doing a combo spin make all of your nests.
Spin something new. If you think you’ll need a distraction, make sure to have something new in your basket of fiber. You don’t have to buy anything new (though lots of dyers have TdF colors), do some swapping with your spinning pals.
Watch or listen to something, and it doesn’t have to be the bike race. I always set aside shows or movies that I’m excited about watching and only watch them while I’m spinning.
Spin with friends. online or in person. You don’t have to join a team if you don’t want to, but it helps to have a group of friends to cheer each other on.
Keep track of what you accomplish; you will be amazed.
Post on your social medium of choice about your spinning. It can be the push you need to keep spinning for three weeks
Don’t compare. Don’t compare your goals, spinning, fiber, or yarn to anyone else’s. Have fun and celebrate every inch spun!

I can’t wait to see what everyone spins. I am always inspired and amazed!

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www: saving an ancient craft, micro knitting, good moths

Weaver Porfirio Gutierrez, has returned to Mexico to protect his Zapotec weaving heritage. You can learn more about Porfirio at his website, porfiriogutierrez.com

Pictured: Porfirio Gutierrez weaves a textile with a traditional Zapotec design using a nine-thread-count-per-inch comb loom. Photo by Javier Lazo Gutierrez.

“Saving an Ancient Craft: Porfirio Gutierrez Returns Home” by Justin Mugits. National Museum of the American Indian, Spring 2019 / Vol. 20, No. 1

Many knitters fear moths, artist Max Alexander has embraced them, by knitting their likeness. This article from a few years ago resurfaced and is a great introduction to her amazing work.

Visit Max’s World at maxsworld.co.uk

Pictured is the Zamarada Moth (Zamarada scintillans).

I am a “tiny knitter” (in that I enjoy 2mm and smaller needles) but I have nothing on the work of Althea Crome who is a Micro Knitter! Wow.

Learn more about Althea at her website, altheacrome.com

Pictured is her Sheep Farm trio (2018).

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Clara & Her Wool Pillow

The Woolroom pillows

Do you follow Clara Parkes on Instagram? She is a font of knowledge for all things wool, and lately, all ways wool as used in everyday objects. It’s from her that I learned about All Birds shoes, which I love. I’ve never worn a silkier feeling pair of shoes. Did you know there are wool coffins? I guess we can take it with us! I also find them beautiful.

She wants everyone to use wool as much as they can. The more we use wool in the US or anywhere in the world, the more we need sheep. She wants people beyond spinners, knitters and all the fiber folk to discover how amazing and versatile wool is. An excellent way to do that is for us, the all ready wool-obsessed, to use it beyond our craft work.

My latest fascination via Clara are wool pillows.

The Woolroom in the UK has a whole range of wool bedding products, and they have pillows that are stuffed with 100% Down wools. If you don’t know about Down breeds, they are resistant to felting and crushing, they have mighty, mighty disorganized crimp and spring. The wools used in Woolroom products are superwash.

Down breed wool pillow fill

One of the genius things about wool pillows is getting the firmness right. If you find your pillow too firm, open it and take out some of the fiber, too soft, add fiber, too flat, open and fluff the wool. It’s so smart and logical, and uses a lot of wool, from breeds of sheep that aren’t Merino-level popular.

I, sadly, won’t be trying out the pillow anytime soon, though I’m following Clara’s adventures. My husband has developed an allergy to wool near his face.

If you try a wool pillow, or if you use wool bedding of any kind let me know what it’s like and how it’s different from feathers or poly fill.

This post is not a sponsored nor is it an affiliate post. I just think these pillows are cool. If you want to give them a try they are on sale now.

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