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winter woollies KAL
The weather is beginning to cool down and things are beginning to feel very wintery in Shetland, so we've decided to run a fun KAL (knit-a-long) with a winter theme! The Jamieson & Smith Winter Woollies KAL 2015! we know people all over the world are often interested in our Colourbox Challenge we hold with the local agricultural shows in Shetland, this is your chance to get involved with something similar, we have chosen a group of wintery/chrismassy shades and we want you to create some winter accessories using this curated group of shades of 2ply Jumper Weight - it can be headwear,neckwear,gloves,mittens,mitts,socks,legwarmers etc etc.... rules: you can use any pre designed pattern or create your own. item must be a accessory as described above. use at least four colours but up to eight from the selected shades: 1, 203, FC34, FC41, FC43, FC38, 65 and 9113 - to be eligible only these shades can be used. item must contain some stranded colourwork/Fair Isle techniques. the KAL runs from now until 15th December There will be a ravelry thread in the Jamieson & Smith Ravelry group and for easy searching you can use the hashtag #winterwoolliesKAL on instagram and ravelry. If your not on Ravelry or Instagram you can still take part, just send your final photos of your projects to mailroom@shetlandwoolbrokers.co.uk. We will choose a winner after the 15th of December and they will receive a fun J&S prize! We cant wait to see what you come up with, happy knitting!
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wool week friday,saturday and sunday
On Friday we had another class with Felicity, this time the class were working from another set of inspiration pictures and different shades of 2 ply Jumper Weight. Lots of brilliant swatches again! In the afternoon we had Deborah Gray in doing some drop spindling, we always try and offer at least one spinning class although it is tricky for the space, using the combed tops very quickly everyone was spinning away! All through the week Oliver was also giving his sorting and grading demonstrations which was busy as always! On Saturday morning Kharis and Amy held the fort at the shop and I went for a look at the Marts Flock Book sale I then headed to the Wool Week Hub at Islesburgh Community Centre, where the Makers Market was being held beautiful pouches by Julia Traditional knitting by Patricia Doull Scarves and Snoods by Fraser Knitwear All through the week the Hub was the base for Wool Week and it worked brilliantly as there was plenty of space for people to sit and knit, spin or whatever! This map shows all the far flung places people come from to go to Shetland Wool Week, its amazing! Yesterday to finish off the week we attended the Shetland Guild of Spinners, Knitters, Weavers and Dyers Sunday Teas at Tingwall Sunday Tea's is Shetland are a classic and they didn't disappoint! As well as the cakes and fancy's there was a great display of the Guild Member's Work So that wraps up the J&S coverage of Shetland Wool Week 2015, it is a crazy week for us but we always enjoy it and look forward already to next year! Happy Knitting xx
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wool week 2015
The shelves are stocked and we are ready for Shetland Wool Week 2015! The event starts today and goes on until next Sunday. We have classes everday in the shop and there will be lots of people in shopping! As it will be so busy there may be delays in us getting back to you and dispatching orders so please bear with us. If you are here then enjoy Wool Week and if not dont worry we will be blogging here throughout the week showing what has been happening at Jamieson & Smith! Til then happy knitting!
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Vintage Lace Collection Volume 1
We often speak about Gladys Amedro here at Jamieson & Smith, the reason we do so is her patterns continue to be some of our best sellers since they were released over 20 years ago. Together with her we published many patterns in the best way there was at the time - in magazines! My Weekly, The Peoples Friend, Bella.. to name a few. A collection of Gladys' patterns were sold in a book called Shetland Lace which was published by the Shetland Times for many years and went through a few reprints. The Shetland Times currently publishes a few lace books, The Unst Heritage Lace book and A Legacy of Shetland Lace so they have decided at present to not reprint Shetland Lace. As you may know we sell our kits with the patterns, and every day we have kits and yarn going out to knit one of Gladys designs. We have always had our patterns printed here in Shetland using the Shetland Times because we feel its important to support our local businesses so we decided that together with them we would put together smaller selections of Gladys Lace patterns into Volumes, so we present The Gladys Amedro Vintage Lace Collection Volume 1! This first Volume contains the patterns for The Gibbie Shawl, Lace Christening Robe, Fine Lace Stole and Scarf and My Weekly Baby Knits Shawl. We have reproduced the patterns as they were in the Magazines so they are written out line by line, rather than charted. All the patterns are written for either 1ply Cobweb or 2ply Lace but they would work equally well with Shetland Supreme 1ply or 2ply Lace, in the introduction we give yardage to help with substituting. You can buy a copy on our website here!
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Cunningsburgh Show 2015
On Wednesday Me (Ella) and Oliver headed down to Cunningsburgh in the South End of Shetland for the annual Show, Oliver was Judging the Wool, and I was judging the Colourbox Competition we hold each year with some of the shows. When we arrived we had a peerie look around and then headed into the tent where the Wool Judging was to take place and Oliver begin judging the wool people had entered into the show. Beginning in the late 1980's they developed a Judging sheet for the wool, there are 5 or 6 categories which Oliver Judges each fleece against and gives them a mark out of a set amount. This is beneficial as it gives the entrants some explanation as to where they placed and how it can be improved for another year. As well as the trophy fleece seen above, Oliver also judges a few other categories such a most commercially saleable fleece, which may be different to the best fleece! While Oliver was doing the most of his judging (I took these photos at the beginning and end of his part) I headed over to the shed where the knitwear and crafts were For the best few years we have done a competition with the rural shows where we chose a group of 8 shades of 2ply Jumper Weight to be used in Fair Isle knitting, the entrants then must knit an item using at least 5 of these shades. It has its own category and that's what I was there to Judge! The entries as ever were extremely strong and it's always great to see how people have put the colours together, some colour selections are more popular than other years but as always we like it to be a challenge! Unfortunately due to poor weather the Voe Show was cancelled this year, very kindly the Cunningsburgh Show committee decided along with the Voe Committee to show the Voe entries also so I Judged that too, there are always some extremely beautiful pieces of knitting in the Voe Show so I am really happy they were able to be in the Cunningsburgh Show! Of course alongside the Colourbox Challange there is a huge amount of knitwear entered into the showFrom Lace to Fair Isle there was a huge range of items to be seen The fineness and skill in knitting Shetland Lace never ceases to amaze me and I was happy to see a few of our patterns knitted up, I spotted a Sheelagh and a Gibbie Shawl. Understandably the knitwear was very busy with people coming to see how they and their friends had fared as well as just coming to see the skills on show. Of course as it was a rural show there were lots of animals there too, obviously we spent a fair amount of time looking at all the sheep! But as well as the sheep there were dogs, cattle, horses, ponies and poultry to name a few! It was a very busy but great morning, as judges we were also treated to a lovely dinner at the hall! Of course I always have my eye out for nice knitwear.. I hope you enjoyed this peek into the Cunningsburgh Show! Til next time, Happy Knitting! PS. remember there is still time to vote for Jamieson & Smith in the Best Brand for British Yarn category in the British Knitting Awards, if you like what we do at J&S you can vote for us here
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Vintage Shetland Project
"Fashion and history intertwine in the Vintage Shetland Project as Susan Crawford recreates and explores cherished pieces from Shetland's rich knitting heritage" Here at Jamieson & Smith we are lucky to know and call lots of designers our friends, one of these designers is Susan Crawford. Her latest project as you probably know is the Vintage Shetland Project. In this unique book Susan will recreate and publish the patterns for a number of designs featured only in the collection of the Shetland Museum and Archives. For the past 4 years Susan has painstakingly reknit and de constructed (mentally not physically) the pieces to find out how they were made. photo: Susan Crawford Susan has used crowdfunding website Pubslush to help raise the funds to publish this book herself, at the time of writing this post the amount raised is nearly double what the initial target was of £12,000 but in this last few weeks of the campaign we would encourage you to contribute if you can. For £15 you can get a digital copy of the book and for £25 you will get a signed copy of the print edition as well as a host of other goodies depending on how much you put in. photo: Susan Crawford We have been trading since the 1930's in buying wool and making yarns since the 1950's so it is quite possible and extremely likely that a number of the pieces were knit using J&S yarns. Luckily as a part of this blog tour we are able to share some of the pieces that will be in the book. Today I'm going to talk about this piece: photo: Susan Crawford This short sleeved jumper is a lovely example of a 1940's piece of Shetland knitwear and features nice little puffed sleeves, the jumper would have been knit in the round to the oxters (armpit) and then extra stitches cast on for the neck and sleeves to allow it to be knit in the round, the back neck has also been steeked so a zip could be inserted, you can see the maker or owner has written their name on the zip tape I asked Susan about what she found out about the piece, she said the yarn is most likely worsted spun (like the Shetland Heritage range) especially as the gauge is quite small at 34 stitches and 34 rounds. This means the yarn is combed before its spun, resulting in a very soft but also strong yarn. As you know from our post on the heritage range we based the colours on traditional knitwear and although this piece is from a bit later than we were looking at some of the colours are still a good match: L-R: Mussel Blue, Indigo, Berry Wine, Auld Gold and Fluggy White The Indigo shade is a bit brighter than the original but as Susan pointed out the piece may have faded over time and it could have been brighter when first knit. You can see from the first picture of the whole garment how well these yarns last over time, apart from the wear under the arms the yarn is incredibly well preserved. photo: Susan Crawford This book will be a welcome addition to anyone interested in Shetlands textile heritage, here at J&S we work very hard to keep this strong heritage alive and well so we are really excited to see the book when it comes out! The full blog tour schedule is below so go back and have a look at some of the posts from our knitterly friends! Thursday 9th July KnitBritish Saturday 12th July By Gum By Golly Monday 13th July Hazel Tindall Wednesday 15th July Ella Gordon Friday 17th July Jess James Saturday 18th July Jen Arnall-Culliford Sunday 19th July Maja Karlson Monday 20th July Karie Westermann Tuesday 21st July Rachel Atkinson Wednesday 22nd July Woolly Wormhead Friday 24th July Deb Robson Saturday 25th July Julia Billings Sunday 26th July Helen Magnusson Monday 27th July Tom Van Deijnen Wednesday 29th July Kate Atherley Friday 31st July Jamieson & Smith Sunday 2nd August Donna Druchunas Monday 3rd August Felix Ford aka knitsonik Tuesday 4th Aug Ysolda Thursday 6th August Donna Smith Friday 7th August Susan Crawford
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Wool Season 2015
At long last we have had some fine weather in Shetland which has spurred on the shearing and we now are well and truly into our wool season. All manner of vehicles roll up to our large green doors and unload their wool clip, so far we have shipped 2 loads, over 40,000 kilos, and are well through grading and packing load 3. We would encourage our crofters and farmers to take great care of their wool clip, especially avoiding shearing damp wool, as this can affect the financial returns to the producer. Our prices remain very high and this season we are pleased to say we are increasing the price of our Super Fine white grade by thirty pence per kilo. We are able to maintain and in the case of our Super Fine grade increase it due to our various products using all the grades of wool. As the main buyer of the Shetland wool clip handling approximately 80% of Shetland's Wool from between 600 /700 crofters and farmers, it is our responsibility to seek out new products and marketing opportunities to ensure a secure and fast payment to all our customers. Our registered brand the three sheep logo guarantees the user of our products of the authenticity and traceability of our Real Shetland wool. In the Woolstore Derek, Jan and Scott are working at baling up the clips coming in everyday in the large baler, we also have a smaller baler in the middle store which Oliver is currently using, in the middle store we also have some of the oldest pieces of equipment at Jamieson & Smith, our wicker wool baskets. These baskets are now nearly 100 years old, we took ownership of them from another Shetland Textile company, Pole & Hoseason of Mossbank in 1960 and their sturdy construction, flexibility and durability make them ideal for grading and sorting wool. Prior to the mid 1960's there were many rural and island shops in Shetland that would also trade in Wool, now there are only 3 other handlers of the local clip who deal with the remaining 20%. This photo from the Shetland Museum and archives shows one of the same baskets in use in 1958. photo courtesy of the Shetland Museum and Archives As technology improves in the industry its interesting to see how although many things move forward because we still hand grade and hand sort all the wool that comes in we still have a need for these timeless items. I hope you've enjoyed this glimpse into the Woolstore in the wool season, til next time.. Happy Knitting! x
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Yarn Series - Shetland Heritage
Following on a few years after the successful launch of our Shetland Supreme Lace Yarns as featured in the last post, which was a joint collaboration between Jamieson & Smith, The Shetland Museum and Archives, The Shetland Amenity Trust and our parent company Curtis Wool Direct we developed the yarn we are talking about today, the Shetland Heritage Range. We were approached by Carol Christensen, Textile Curator of the Shetland Museum in 2010, to create a 'wirsit' worsted yarn reminiscent of some of the yarn used in their historic knitwear collection, of which some pieces date back to 1870. We were invited by Carol to view some of their collection held in the museum store at the North Staney Hill. On show was a mixture of distinct Fair Isle 'keps' caps, scarves, all-overs and slipovers all laid out on tissue paper. a piece from the museum collection. Our first impression was the distinct rich colours and how the Fair Isle patterns stood out and were crisp and well defined. Many of the articles were very old, Carol explained the yarn was hand-spun, the wool was combed and not carded, and the dyes were natural dyes. There was little or no wear visible in these garments, testifying that worsted yarn has different wearing properties than woollen spun yarns, a stronger smoother yarn, which retains its elasticity despite being washed and rewashed. We were allowed to handle these precious articles and were immediately impressed by the smooth soft handle. a piece of Fair Isle knitting in our Heritage Yarn Carol asked if it would be possible for us to produce a similar 'wirsit' worsted yarn as used in the construction of their garments. Carol said could we judge the thickness of the yarn by sight and handling the garments, a big ask to get the finished article correct. Having only worked with a woollen spun yarn and also in the days of the Gala cut, a woollen spun count system that was used by our old spinners Hunters of Brora. We settled on a 2/22.5 cut, which was a 2ply woollen spun yarn used by Hunters of Brora. This yarn would be slightly thinner than our present woollen spun yarn 2/8 nm. We passed on the images and information to Martin Curtis at Curtis Wool Direct, who put the process into action, firstly preparing the superfine Real Shetland wool, which they buy from us. Then combing and dyeing and finally having the yarns spun by one of the few remaining worsted spinners left in the U.K. The resulting yarn has a beautiful soft handle, much softer than traditional Shetland or Shetland type woolly yarns. It is perfect for traditional Fair Isle but becuase the yarn is slightly lighter than Jumper Weight this also means it works well for lace. Initially we launched 6 traditionally inspired shades: Indigo, Madder, Fluggy White, Peat, Auld Gold and Berry Wine. We then added Coll Black, Snaa White, Mussel Blue, Moss Green and Silver Grey to round out the palette in 2013, the non marled and matte colours give the yarn a lovely sheen when knitted which looks very traditional. detail from the Fair Isle V-Necked Jumper kit, available here The yarn was described by Carol as perfect, yet again we proved that partnering with local bodys like the Shetland Museum and Archives and the Amenity Trust helps us in recreating our living past in Shetland. The finish of the yarn makes it a diverse fibre and the Coll Black colour way was used by the 2014 Jarl Squad of which Oliver our manager was a member. we have the suit on permanent display in the shop so you can see the heritage yarn used in the Kirtle, the tunic worn underneath the breastplate. You can see from our post about that day here it was a horrible rainy day but according to Oliver they didn't feel cold! There is no doubting the luxury of our Heritage yarn, however most people encountering it today as well as being impressed they have not seen this type of yarn made from Real Shetland Wool, this in itself makes our job of marketing the yarn all the more difficult as it was lost in the age of time and only now has been resurrected, you can buy the Heritage yarn here.
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Yarn Series - Shetland Supreme Lace Weight
Of all the Shetland wool products produced over our long history, this yarn marks the beginning of a new era of yarn development in which we aim to recreate a very important part of our Islands culture and heritage. True yarn for knitting Shetland lace which has played such an important part in Shetland’s knitwear and textile industry. women carding and spinning, Shetland. Photo courtesy Shetland Museum and Archives In 2007 we were approached by the General Manager of the Shetland Amenity Trust, a public body and amongst their responsibilities is to preserve our heritage, culture, and environment. Jimmy Moncrieff, the general manager of the Trust wanted to try and further and develop the one of Shetland most well known crafts - Shetland Lace Knitting. He approached us to see if we could help in developing the main ingredient - the lace 'wirsit' (yarn) used by our predecessors. This product aims to replicate the traditional worsted effect of hand spun Shetland Yarn on a more commercial scale. In order to replicate this intricate yarn, we started by grading and sorting the finest fleece as we have always done - by hand, making sure there was no guard hair in the blend. We has to ensure the fleece had all the characteristics required: a superb handle (softness), strength, fibre fineness and uniformity of quality. The next task was to source a worsted spinner, who were very scarce in present times. When we settled on a spinner in West Yorkshire the next task was to produce a similar yarn to the original hand spun. With the help of local experienced knitters Mary Kay and Mary Eunson of Lerwick alongside one of Myrna Stahmanns groups at a knitting retreat in the USA settled at 16s worsted count for the single 1ply and 2/16s for the 2 ply. Worsted spun yarns differ from Woollen spun (1ply Cobweb and 2ply Lace are Woollen spun) in that the fibres are combed rather than carded. This process aligns the fibres but also removes short and coarse hairs as well as any vegetable matter left in the fibres. This process creates a yarn which is extremely strong but also soft as the fibres are quite aligned and not sticking out (these tiny fibres are what makes wool 'itch') What makes this yarn so perfect for lace is that the worsted spinning process makes a yarn which has very good drape. The 1ply Shetland Supreme is available in 6 shades, Optic White, Natural White, Fawn, Moorit, Grey and Black. The Optic White is a lovely bright white which makes it perfect for traditional lace items like veils, shawls and scaves. The 2ply Supreme is currently only available in the 5 natural Shades, as we explained in our last post this helps strengthen and further the Coloured Shetland clip, by offering the natural colours in more than one weight of yarn this means it can be used in lots of different ways and the strength of the yarn means it can be knitted on a knitting machine at different gauges and be used in weaving. You might wonder why we keep the 1ply Cobweb as well as the Shetland Supreme but we feel they both have something to offer depending on what you are looking for from your 1ply lace yarn. For more information about the cobweb see here. The Woollen Spun nature of the Cobweb makes for a crisper, more cotton like feel whereas the Supreme has more of a halo and drape. It is confusing we know, but we are always able to help you make a decision. We are very proud of the Shetland Supreme Lace Yarns and we hope you like them too, you can see them on our online shop here Til next time, happy knitting!
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