Skip to content
Blog
Birsie Beanny!
On Wednesday we attended the launch for the next Shetland Wool Week! The Birsie Beanny, designed by this years new Wool Week patron, Helen Robertson. As every year, the designer has created a unique pattern in a selection of colourways from Shetland Yarn producers, and we just love the Funky J&S colourway! 2ply Jumper Weight shades 71, 73, 9144, FC14, FC13 and 134 We have paper copies of the pattern available in the shop and online and the yarn pack for the J&S colourway, the digital pattern can also be downloaded directly from Shetland Wool Week: SWW Hat Pattern | Shetland Wool Week Congratulations to Helen on her year of patronage, and we look forward to seeing your versions of the Birsie Beanny, happy knitting!
Learn more
Wirsit Inspo Vol 3 is here!
Hello everyone, we are delighted to tell you that Wirsit Inspo Volume 3 is now available! Continuing our journey of colour and landscape, we are delighted to present the third volume of our #wirsitinspo series. In this latest instalment, we continue to celebrate the connection between our wool and the landscape that inspires it. This collection features over 60 more inspirational images curated from our #wirsitinspo posts. Almost all were captured here in Shetland, with one image taken in mainland Scotland. This time, we have ordered the images as they were taken through the year. Each photograph is paired with shades from our extensive 2ply Jumper Weight range, highlighting the natural harmony between our landscape and yarn. You can also find a bundle here containing all three Volumes at a reduced price of £24, which is a 20% saving on the three individually. Happy Knitting!
Learn more
Digital Patterns
We pride ourselves on stocking a wide range of paper patterns, both in store and online. These are included in our kits to ensure you have the correct pattern to go along with your yarn. We appreciate, however, that a paper copy is not always the best option. That’s why many of our patterns are also available digitally via: Ravelry: Ravelry: Shetland Wool Brokers LTD. on Ravelry - patterns Payhip: Jamieson & Smith - Payhip This applies to our own J&S-branded patterns. We also stock a wide selection of Shetland-based and Shetland-inspired designers, many of whom offer their patterns digitally through Ravelry, Payhip, Lovecrafts or Etsy. Please search the pattern name on these platforms to see if a digital version is available. Please note that when you purchase a kit which includes a physical pattern, a digital version is not included. Happy Knitting!
Learn more
Christmas Closing Dates 2025
As the festive season approaches, we’d like to let you know our Christmas and New Year closing dates. Our shop will close on Tuesday 23rd December at 1pm, and we’ll be taking a short break over the holidays. We’ll be back and reopening as usual on Monday 5th January at 9am. Our online shop will remain open throughout this time, but please note that no orders will be dispatched and emails will not be answered while we are closed. All orders and enquiries will be dealt with when we return in January. Thank you so much for all your support throughout the year, it truly means a great deal to us. We wish you a peaceful Christmas and a happy New Year, filled with warmth, wool, and plenty of knitting time. Warmest wishes,All of us at Jamieson & Smith
Learn more
New Online Shop!
Hello everyone, this is our first post on the blog since we integrated it into our new Shopify online shop! We’re delighted that our blog has found a new home, right here on our updated Jamieson & Smith online shop. Bringing the blog and online shop together means everything you love about J&S is now in one place: stories from Shetland’s knitting heritage, peeks behind the scenes in our Lerwick shop, updates from the wool store, and of course, the latest news about yarns, patterns, and projects. By keeping the blog on the website, it should be easier. When we talk about a new yarn shade, a designer collaboration, or the history behind a picture, you can browse the products mentioned without having to hop between pages. We want it to feels a bit like wandering through the shop, spotting something on a shelf that matches a tale we’ve just told! If you’ve followed our blog for a long time, don’t worry, all the older posts are safely here too. And if you’re new to J&S, this is a lovely place to start. We’re excited to share this new chapter with you. Have a browse, have a read, and as always, thank you for supporting Jamieson & Smith.
Learn more
Christmas Closing 2024
Hello everyone, a quick post for you today! As of now (Monday 23rd December at 1pm) we are now closed for our Christmas break. We will reopen on Tuesday 7th January 2025 at 9am, during this time no orders will be dispatched or emails responded to. We'd like to wish all our wonderful customers, friends, and followers a very Happy Christmas! Thank you so much for your custom and support this year – it means the world to us. We hope your festive season is filled with joy, love, and plenty of knitting!
Learn more
Scadder Fleece
In the wool store last week, we came across a fleece which used to be common here. Now, it is a much more rare occurrence. This is a fleece with markings described as 'scadder'. This is a dialect word to describe a Shetland Sheep with coarse, longer hair down the back from the neck to the tail. In some cases it even has a ruff or mane around the neck, this very coarse and long hair is alongside fine wool in the rest of the fleece: The fleece we got last week has extremely fine and soft wool in most of the fleece. There is just the long, coarse hair down the middle and around the neck. Oliver said this is one of the best examples of this type of fleece he's seen for a long time. Shetland Sheep have similarities with Norwegian Sheep breeds like Spaelsau and Vilsau. You can see in this Vilsau Sheep how similar the long wool is to the Scadder fleece above: Vilsau sheep, Norway Shetland Sheep, Shetland With breeding and crossing over time, this scadder marking is becoming rarer. Every now and then we get an excellent example, although its not seen as desirable for yarn or the breed it is interesting as it is a throwback to the ancient genetics of Native Shetland Sheep. The fleece highlights the importance of sorting wool. The long wool on the scadder fleece is graded as Rough Coloured. The fine wool is Superfine Coloured - These represent two extremes of handle. If this is not sorted, it results in a thick and thin yarn. For more information, see this blog post we did on the Power of Sorting. Oliver also discusses scadder markings on a blog post here. We hope you found this post interesting. To keep up with us, make sure to subscribe to our monthly newsletter. Happy knitting!
Learn more
Laebrack Colourways
The Laebrack pattern, designed by Margaret Stuart is a classic Shetland Lace jumper, featuring bands of colour which due to the stitch pattern - Old Shell, creates a lovely wave effect. Its knit in the round to the armholes then the front and back are worked separately, the sleeves are knit in the round too. Laebrack is shetland dialect for the breaking of the waves on the Seashore and you can really see why! We recently reprinted this pattern and have added a chart for the motif but its also in written form in the pattern too, its a very simple but effective pattern, its made in our 2ply Lace Weight: L-R: L95, L101, L203, L27, L54 The original colourway in the pattern is above, its a lovely mix of greys and pops of pink, but we thought we would share some other possible colourways: Naturals L-R: L1A, L202, L3, L4, L5 Green & Grey L-R: L69, L40, L27, L54, L77 More pinks L-R: L43, L95, L203, L27, L54 Yellows and Naturals L-R: L96, L28, L202, L3, L4 Orange & Browns L-R: L38, L53, L78, L4, L5 You might also remember a few years ago an image from the Netflix drama 'Rebecca' went semi-viral as people looked for the pattern, it is extremely similar to the Laebrack and may even have been made at one time from that pattern, we put together a colourway based on it too!: Rebecca - L-R: L152, L150, L14, L40, L69 for Laebrack we would put them in this order but would always advise swatching: A - L40, B - L150, C - L69, D - L152, E - L14 2ply Lace is a great yarn for lighter weight and more summery garments, its available in 30 shades, many of them vintage inspired and there a great selection of dyed natural shades in the range too. You can find the Laebrack pattern here in a paper copy or here and here digitally, its also in a book which is out of print but you can find it used very cheaply - The Traditional Sweater Book by Madeline Weston (ive linked to amazon but you should be able to find it from many used book sellers) the book contains lots of great traditional patterns from around the UK so its a great purchase anyway! We hope you are having a nice Summer however the weather is beside you, we are in a spell of dull, windy, rainy weather here so we are hoping for an improvement soon, happy knitting!
Learn more
5ply Shetland Cones
Hello everyone! A quick post from us today to let you know we recently got more stock of our 5ply Shetland Cones, this is our newest range of yarn which we launched at Wool Week in 2023. Its a lovely yarn (if we do say so!!) made from 100% Real Shetland Wool and inspired by our maritime history and environment here in Shetland. Although we are rightly famed for our bright Fair Isle and Lace knitting there is also evidence of Gansey/Guernsey type jumpers worn in Shetland which makes sense when you look at our location, we are and have been for many years a main port in the Fishing industry so people often travelled up and over from places with their own Knitting tradition. The 5ply cones are 250g so for an average adults Gansey in 1 colour you will need between 3/4 cones. Cones save you some ends and some money over buying the balls, we currently have stock of all 20 shades so if you are interested this is the time to purchase! You can find the cones in the shop or online here and for more information about the yarn see our earlier post here and another we wrote about the colours in the range here. If you miss our more regular updates make sure you are signed up to our newsletter, we send one out once every month with updates of new products, patterns and news from Shetland. Happy Knitting!
Learn more