Swedish Knitblogger who loves spinning, knitting, dyeing and yarn. I will do some other roundabouts about life too.

Saturday, October 14, 2006

London Yarn Craze Part 1

So, I just went crazy, and said - what is more important than friends? One of my faithful commenter on this blog is HPNYKnits, (second picture)she said - lets go to London! And If someone can fly from New York to go to the Knitting and Stitching show at Alexandra Palace, I can. I just felt my SAS flying bonus had built up enough to give me two days. Anyhow, It took me a long time to decide to go even if London, even if it is not THAT far away. The reason was that Sticklingarna - my very close knitting-group, had a meet (today), and I already said yes - I will go. Great work situation to sneak of thursday friday! There I was, finally to met her in person, so I met my dear friend - a smiling, kind and very generous and caring person. We grabbed a Java and went to the show, where this crazy Ferrari - Yes - it is knitted! met us at the entrance. I quickly realized that I had not checked up on the Ally Pally enough, and that my dear friend was updated of what to buy and not. She was after yarn that does not exists in US, and I definitely looked twice to yarn from US (I have not seen before!) But, we went quickly to meet this wonderful Ingrid, in her booth, who is a master hand-dyer.
Her yarn (She blogs under Silkwood), and after OOhs and Ahhs, I grabbed sockyarn Nickerjac of her special colouring, and also Exclusive Silkwood hand dyed on Wensleydale yarn - supersoft. I think the Nicerjag sockyarn is avalable from Wollywools. What I really apprechiated was that she had reeled the yarn from two ways, so you could see the different colours working together. (Yes, I will show you later). ANother great thing was that she had prepared a ball of yarn with different kind of yarns. You just knit on to make a scarf, and all colours are matched and the yarn is different. Great for begineers and people lacking creativity. Personally, I just think - Great Idea to mix different yarns in same shade. Excellent for left overs! But look at it?! (Last picture?)
I just snapped so many photos of Ingrid's/Nickerjac's great colourmixes. Do you not agree? And yes, she sells and ships. I heard that she also did great special colours on cashmere. Anyhow, she was great - And that just started two days of crazy bliss. There is just so much to tell. BTW. Not cheap. Sheep ;-) Oh boy, what a place. I was stunned. Can you imagine me speechless? I just soaked it in. Like a cow let out on a field of green grass. My hands were walking, playing, touching and all was soft.
Just look at this party of colours. I went crazy. My synapses overworked, the amount of shops, all hand-dyed wonderful things. AHHH I went to UK Alpacka (and bought fleece) then we run past Sea-silk - really a novelity yarn. And I got to put my eyes on Kogiou yarn for real. Well. the exiting story continues. Now I must run to the kitchen and kiss on my lovely - while he is preparing Taco's for us. I will tell you more about London the next few days....(and the rest you can probalby read at my friend's blog!) Comments (thank you!) are always apprechiated!

5 comments:

BertandFelix said...

Sounds like a wonderful trip!! We had something similar here in Chicago in August...Stitches Midwest. Bought way too much stuff.

Looking forward to seeing more pictures of your trip!

Anonymous said...

Hej på dig!
Det verkar ha varit fantastiska garner i London. Bilderna ger verkligen inspiration till att vilja skapa. Jag har följt din sida sedan i somras. Du måste ha otroliga mängder med garn!

I juli gick jag färgningskursen i bomull och lin hos Margret. Då var jag helt ensam som kursdeltagare!
Har efter det gjort slag i saken och testat hur lång tid det tar att göra en laboratoriefärgning till en färgkroppsserie med Margrets färger.. (84 färger har tagit mig 44 timmar att göra från början till slut- dvs med varpning till 84 buntar med garn á 5 gram, tvättning, färgning, sköljning, upplindning till prover etc. Har hittills färgat med alla hennes * grundfärger i 4 färgnyanser*, **färgvandringar med två färger i kombination - 5 delar också i 4 färgnyanser** samt hunnit med att testa ***tre stycken trefärgskroppar i 5 delar med fyra färgnyanser***. Den sistnämnda blir en färgserie på 84 färger totalt.

Jag är helt facinerad av färgerna nu och inser vilka möjligheter man har att själv kunna färga "just den rätta" färgen som jag behöver.
Nu har jag också fått en lokal för min vävateljé. Får plats med 4 vävstolar i den + ett rum för kursverksamhet med tex färgning. Hantverkare ska göra lite eldragningar, golv och dörrbyten. Så jag räknar med att jag kan vara igång kring årsskiftet!

Jag är glad för din skull att du fick det där nya jobbet som du pratade om! Kan känna känslan som du hade för den gamla arbetsgivaren!

Har du vägarna förbi någon gång så titta gärna in!
Jag har några bilder som du kanske vill se (mina färgpyramider) men då måste jag få någon e-mailadress av dig! Tuula L

Strumpstickan said...

Colour is food for the soul:)

miastick said...

Wow vilken fantastisk resa... nu blir jag avundsjuk. Det är ju faktiskt inte så omöjligt långt att åka till London, man skulle kanske börja läsa engelska bloggar så att man vet vad som är på gång där också. Hade ingen aning. Men det var ganska dyrt alltså? eller fattade jag fel?

Anonymous said...

Garngamen är ett välvalt namn! Ny utmärkt reseberättelse OCH garnbilder som kan få vem som helst (i synnerhet undertecknad) att dräggla ner hela datorn:-)