The Long Thread Podcast
The Long Thread Podcast features interviews with spinners, weavers, needleworkers, and fiber artists from around the world. Each episode offers inspiration, practical advice, and personal stories from experts in the fiber arts. Hosted by Long Thread Media, the podcast explores the creative processes and lives of artisans. Listeners can expect to learn about various fiber crafts and connect with a community of makers.
Episodes
Melissa M. Littlefield, Reinventing Wool
How could you possibly improve on wool, the perfect fiber? In the 20th century, scientists thought they could do just that. Some of their innovations have disappeared . . . but some remain.
In the middle of the 20th century, with technology promising a modern lifestyle that would be newer and better in every way, wool fiber began to look old-fashioned. The incredible demand for wool up t
David Richie, Green Mountain Spinnery
A small group of Vermonters wanted to improve the environment and preserve the rural character of the state. Along with two friends, David Richie and his wife found a way: they founded the Green Mountain Spinnery.
David Richie and his wife, Diana, wanted to keep their home state and region green and farm-friendly. Believing in thinking globally and acting locally, they joined a reading g
Karen Elting Brock, PieceWork
A love of words, stories, and cloth led Karen Elting Brock around the world and back to PieceWork.
”All This by Hand” appeared on the first covers of PieceWork magazine, intended to capture the scope of material between the covers. Stitching, lacemaking, and other needlework, certainly, but other handwork, fashion, and the artisans who created the work all found their way into the pages
Lir Shilton, Ribblr
As a budding crochet designer, Lir Shilton ran into obstacles and annoyances that many beginning crafters face. But instead of learning to live with them, she and her partner decided to make a platform that offers a different approach.
Lir loved to crochet, and she especially loved creating designs to share with other makers. But crochet patterns vary significantly depending where you
Emily Whitted, Texile Historian
A pair of silk stockings, mended again and again below the ankle, set Emily Whitted on the path of discovery that has led her through archives and museums of early American history. The stockings belonged to Philadelphia’s Stephen Girard, who was one of the wealthiest men in America. Museum records didn’t mention the mends, though the socks had been repaired several times, making them as
Books off the Beaten Path: The Yarn Barn of Kansas List of Hidden Gems
Book Club Podcast: What lesser-known treasures do Yarn Barn fiber artists love to share? Susan and Melissa share some of their favorites in weaving, spinning, and knitting. Liz Gipson drops by to talk about one of her books that Susan and Melissa adore.
Book-loving crafters generally have a few special titles tucked on the shelf between the major must-have references: a self-published mo
Loretta Pettway Bennett, Gee's Bend Quilter
A fifth-generation quilter from the legendary community of Gee’s Bend, Alabama, Loretta Pettway Bennett turns well used cloth into her own expressions of color and community.
Loretta Pettway Bennett began her quilting journey as a child, threading needles for her mother as she sewed scraps into bedcoverings. The women in the town of Gee’s Bend pieced quilt tops and got together to hand q
Diana Wiley, Handspun Hope
With no background in fiber but a calling to help women in need, Diana Wiley built a thriving organization on handspun yarn, needlefelted gorillas, and a holistic community for over 200 women.
Stepping into the Handspun Hope booth at a fiber festival feels like entering a luxury boutique filled with natural fibers, colorful yarns, handmade buttons, and whimsical sculptures. It would be e
Pamela K. Schultz, Spin Off
As Spin Off nears 50 years old, editor Pamela K. Schultz sees herself as the host of a wonderful spinning party that welcomes one and all.
Taking a day off from the grind of law school, Pamela Schultz visited an art fair and saw a spinner with a spinning wheel. A longtime knitter, she had resisted suggestions that she learn to spin, but the rhythm of treadling and drafting offered an an
Reweaving Marguerite Porter Davison’s Handweaver’s Pattern Book
Among four-shaft weavers, A Handweaver's Pattern Book is commonly referred to by just the author’s name—Davison—or as “the green book,” a reference to the iconic cover of many of the book’s printings. Since Marguerite Porter Davison first published it in 1944, it has been a foundational reference, the first book that many weavers buy and the one they keep close at hand. Packed with drafts
Kate Larson, Farm & Fiber Knits
Editor, teacher, and shepherd Kate Larson makes the case that every knitter is already part of the farm-to-fiber story—whether they know it or not.
Kate Larson is the editor of Farm & Fiber Knits and a beloved teacher of spinning, knitting, and weaving. She took time out from lambing season to talk about the magazine’s goals.
Kate Larson isn’t making a magazine only for farmers an
You Need This Book! The Yarn Barn of Kansas Required Reading List
Book Club Podcast: Fiber art veterans Susan Bateman and Melissa Parsons compare notes with host Anne Merrow about the books every weaver, spinner, knitter, and crocheter should have on the bookshelf—plus big news about a classic weaving directory.
They’re the first books you reach for, the ones you’ll never part with, and the first thing you recommend to every new crafter. If you have
Angela Tong, Multidisciplinary Maker
Knitters and crocheters know Angela Tong as a designer with hooks and needles, while weavers recognize her work in rigid-heddle and pin looms. Visitors to galleries and artisan markets know her as a potter. Angela thinks of herself simply as a maker, always drawn to creating beauty with her hands.
Her first professional job set the tone: after earning a degree from the Fashion Institut
Amy Sadler, Knitty
Before Ravelry, before knitting podcasts, before the internet fully found its craft obsession, there was Knitty. Amy Sadler shares the inspiration and evolution of the online knitting phenomenon.
In the early 2000s, as the internet became part of daily life for millions, Amy Sadler began a knitting blog. The blog movement connected knitters around the world (whether newbies or longtime s
Coming Soon: The Yarn Barn of Kansas Book Club
What new craft books are can't-miss? Which are the classic reference books that every crafter should have on the shelf? In the Yarn Barn of Kansas Book Club, teachers and book lovers talk about the books they wouldn't be without.
Sponsored by Yarn Barn of Kansas
Learning how to weave but need the right shuttle? Hooked on knitting and in search of a lofty yarn? Yarn Barn of Kansas has b
Curtis Gregory, George Washington Carver National Monument
Best known for his work with peanuts, renowned agricultural scientist George Washington Carver had a lifelong passion for needlework. Park Ranger Curtis Gregory shares stories about Carver’s interests in handwork and natural dyeing.
Born in 1865 near Diamond, Missouri, George Washington Carver is one of the best known and most respected agricultural scientists in the history of the Unit
Heather Torgenrud, Pick-Up Bandweaving
Gudrun Johnston, The Shetland Trader
Gudrun Johnston has a deep legacy in Shetland knitting: her father’s family comes from the islands, and her mother founded a knitwear company that blended contemporary silhouettes with Fair Isle motifs, a business she called the Shetland Trader. But although Gudrun grew up wearing her mother’s designs, she didn’t learn to knit from her. Growing up largely elsewhere in Scotland, she learne
Christina Garton, Little Looms
Christina Garton didn’t get to be the editor of Little Looms by taking weaving too seriously.
First introduced to weaving in a class post-college, she joined Handwoven as assistant editor in 2011. She developed her passions for editing and weaving while working on both multishaft and rigid-heddle looms. Although she still loves working on her four- and eight-shaft looms, she was surpri
Chick Colony, Harrisville Designs
Small textile towns were once common in New England, with stout brick buildings harnessing the power of the region’s water to mill yarn and cloth. The Colony family had been owners of a mill in Harrisville, New Hampshire, since before the Civil War, but by the mid-twentieth century, such factories had begun to disappear. In 1970, 53 mills closed in New England, the Colony family’s among t
Jane Cooper, The Lost Flock (classic)
The picture of a flock of primitive-breed sheep, the last of their kind, living on an island off the northeast coast of Scotland, has a certain romance to it. Plenty of knitters, spinners, fiber artists, and citizens of the modern world might idly dream of living on such an island and tending such a flock. With no background as a farmer and only a few years as a shepherd, Jane Cooper deci
Elena Kanagy-Loux, Lacemaker & Historian (classic)
When you picture lace, what comes to mind: an old-fashioned once-white piece of Victorian embellishment? The elegant, possibly itchy decoration on a wedding gown? If you are a needleworker, you might picture an array of bobbins leashed to a cluster of pins and arrayed on a pillow, or a tatting shuttle, or a steel crochet hook. All of these images would be correct—but capture the tiniest s
Laverne Waddington, Backstrap Weaver (classic)
Laverne Waddington discovered weaving by accident—bike accident, to be precise. Recuperating from a mountain biking crash in Utah, she discovered a book on Navajo weaving and was immediately intrigued. A local exhibit of Diné textiles enthralled her, and she set about learning to weave in the Navajo style. Returning to Patagonia, where she had been living, she built a simple loom and expl
Masey Kaplan & Jen Simonic, Loose Ends Project (classic)
When Jen Simonic and Masey Kaplan’s friend lost her mother, she had the challenge of going through her mother’s things while grieving her loss. Among her posessions was something almost every crafter has at least one of: a work in progress. Jen and Masey had each finished projects for bereaved family members before, but neither of them could take on this one, a pair of crocheted blankets
Amy Oxford, Oxford Punch Needle
As a college student and weaver, Amy Oxford fell in love with the punch-needle method of rug hooking almost by accident, a surprising benefit from a babysitting gig. She followed her interest from doing piece work on existing designs to creating large commissioned rugs in her own business. In 1995, she started the Oxford Company to sell supplies and education for punch needle crafters wor
Jordana Munk Martin, Tatter
At an unexpected juncture in her life, artist Jordana Munk Martin turned to the legacy of her grandmother’s trove of textile books. Edith Wyle founded the Craft and Folk Art Museum in Los Angeles in 1973, curating unconventional exhibits and instilling a love of art in her family. Her granddaughter found inspiration and comfort in the books, then opened the library for other artists to ex
Mary Anne Wise, Multicolores
Fiber artist Mary Anne Wise first went to Guatemala hoping to collect local textiles and inspire her own practice. Just one visit wasn’t enough, and she visited several more times, eventually offering a class in rug hooking to local women artisans. Although the women didn’t have a rug-hooking tradition, they did have abundant material: tons of tee shirts from “donations” that are often sh
Sahara Briscoe, Creative Multicrafter
Sahara Briscoe has a challenge for you: Do more with yarn. Knit your spinning, spin your knitting, rug hook with yarn, paint on your swatches, embroider with yarn, and question your assumptions about what your stash is for.
Working from a compact Bronx studio, Sahara can’t be easily classified under any label ending in -er except New Yorker. She spins, weaves on all kinds of looms, dye
Bea Bonanno, Wooldreamers
In the history of wool, Spain means Merino, the legendary finewool sheep so prized that their export fell under royal control. From their Spanish origins, Merino genetics formed the basis of wool breeds around the world. The foundations of most finewools, especially in Australia and the United States, count Merino as a major contributor. Apart from Merino, the Spanish sheep carried by col
Anne’s Book Club: Anna Hultin, Louisa Owen Sonstroem & Safiyyah Talley, Storey Publishing
This is Anne’s Book Club, a spotlight episode of the Long Thread Podcast where we share conversations about exciting new craft titles. This episode features three new books from Storey Publishing: The Stitched Landscape by Anna Hultin, The Handsewn Wardrobe by Louisa Owen Sonstroem, and Knitting Cowlettes by Safiyyah Talley. You’ll hear a conversation with each of the authors, followed by
Sarah Pedlow, Threadwritten
Sarah Pedlow was enjoying an artist’s residency in Budapest when a museum visit changed the course of her artwork and her career. In the Ethnographic Museum, displays of traditional clothing and dowry goods from Hungarian villages showed an extraordinary variety of skills. Many of the intricately embroidered pieces spoke to an earlier time—although some had been created not that long ago
Nicole Nehrig, Crafter & Psychologist
Most of us crafters know instinctively that working with yarn, fiber, and cloth makes life better. Believing that handwork is good for our well-being has sparked memes about knitting as “the new yoga” and sold tee shirts that read, “I knit so I don’t stab people.” But feeling good while practicing fiber art is only one of the ways that working with thread adds meaning to life.
As a “pa
Anne's Book Club: Swatch Critters & Profile Drafting for Handweavers by Deb Essen (Schiffer Craft)
Anne’s Book Club is a new series of interviews with the authors of new fiber art books that I think Long Thread Podcast listeners will love. This episode features new books by Deb Essen, a frequent contributor to Handwoven and Little Looms.
Deb Essen may weave plenty of blocks and squares, but you definitely can’t put her in a box. Not many weavers would release a book about turning pin
Barry Schacht and Jane Patrick, Schacht Spindle Company
Some spinners and weavers picture the Schacht Spindle Company’s factory as a large-scale operation churning out equipment by the hundreds. After all, Schacht’s products are easily recognized in stores, studios, and guilds around the world. Others see the handmade touches—such as the ladybug on every Ladybug spinning wheel—and imagine Barry Schacht making every piece by himself.
Althoug
Clara Parkes, Bestselling Author and Wool Promoter (classic)
Clara Parkes became many knitters’ guiding light and best friend when she launched Knitter's Review in 2000. One of the early standouts in the early online knitting landscape, the site developed a devoted following for its in-depth, objective yarn reviews and lively forums. Several years after the site's inception, she began writing books, starting with The Knitter's Book of Yarn, which w
Hazel Tindall, World’s Fastest Knitter
Hazel Tindall can’t remember a time before she knew how to knit.
Hazel learned to knit when knitting for sale was the only way that women earned money, when a job outside the home in town was too far to travel. Although her mother found knitting a chore, Hazel liked it, not only knitting sweater yokes for sale but exploring yarns and designs from outside her local sphere. When knitting
Tamara White, Wing & A Prayer Farm
Tamara White always has one eye on the skies. Whether she’s getting her sheep ready for shearing, welcoming visitors to classes and events on the farm, or watching over the yarn in kettles of natural dye, there isn’t a moment when the weather isn’t on her mind. Although rain and heat make hard work of tending a flock of 100+ sheep plus calves, chickens, and other livestock, Tammy sees her
Madelyn van der Hoogt, The Weaver’s School
With Madelyn van der Hoogt’s extensive knowledge of loom-controlled structures and techniques, you might be surprised to learn that the celebrated weaving teacher spent her first years as a handweaver working on a backstrap loom. On a sabbatical in Latin America from her teaching career in Oakland, Madelyn traveled from village to village looking for the style of weaving she wanted to do,
Cecelia Campochiaro, Curious Knitter
When you first learned to knit, you might have wondered why certain stitches made fabric that curled, or why right-leaning and left-leaning decreases didn’t quite match, or why charts didn’t really show what the knitted fabric would look like. Knitting patterns might have seemed completely unworkable. If we stick with the craft, most knitters eventually take these oddities in stride and w
Sara Bixler, Red Stone Glen
At a time when many fiber arts stores are closing, Sara C. Bixler is bucking the trend. With degrees in both fine art and education, she had developed a studio practice as well as a teaching repertoire at the Pennsylvania weaving school where her father, Tom Knisely, had taught for decades. When that store closed, she decided to take the risk of opening a brand-new fiber arts center known
Spotlight: Cashmere on Ice
You know about North Pole and the South Pole, where polar bears and penguins live. Have you heard of a third pole? West and south of the Tibetan Plateau, a mountainous area holds more glaciers than any place in the world outside the Arctic and Antarctic poles. This region has a special significance for fiber artists: it is the home and habitat of the goats that produce much of the world’s
Tom Knisely, Generational Weaver
When Tom Knisely decided to buy his first item in an antique shop, he had two strokes of luck: the spinning wheel that he chose included all the parts needed to make yarn, and he lived not far from the landmark weaving store The Mannings. There, he learned to spin and eventually to weave. Enamored with the crafts, he got a job at the store there as a teenager and eventually built a career
Susan Strawn, Knitting Historian
A lifelong lover of fiber arts, Susan Strawn’s career in textiles began in an unexpected corner: with training as a biomedical illustrator. She found cloth far more exciting than biology, so she turned her eye for detail to illustrating PieceWork magazine. She added photostyling to her duties, bringing textile stories to life and demonstrating the steps of various needlework techniques. A
Sissal Kjartansdóttir Kristiansen on Faroese Knitting
Knitting and wool are so essential in the Faroe Islands that in the early 1800s, exports of sweaters and socks made up about half of the economy. Today, the nation of about 55,000 people has 8+ knitwear brands, 2 active spinning mills, and 70,000 ewes. Sissal Kristiansen, the owner of knitwear company Shisa Brand, started an initiative called The Wool Islands to celebrate the heritage and
Shay Pendray, Stitcher, Entrepreneur, Cowgirl (classic)
When young Shay Pendray told the head of her school that she wanted to learn to sew, he had a prerequisite: He would give her a lamb, and she would learn to process the wool, spin it into yarn, and weave it into cloth, and then she could learn to sew. It was an extraordinary home ec class, but the administrator in question was Henry Ford. Shay was one of the students in Greenfield Village
Robin Lynde, Meridian Jacobs
Some shepherds research extensively and choose the breed that best matches their needs. Others come across an animal or a whole flock and everything falls into place—it becomes clear that these are the sheep they’ve been waiting for. Robin Lynde had a farm with a few sheep in the mix, but when a local shepherd decided to sell her Jacob sheep, Robin jumped at the opportunity to own a flock
Laura Nelkin Knits for Food
Listening to her college-aged daughter making calls for AmeriCorps in 2020, Laura Nelkin was surprised at how many people in her community faced food insecurity and hunger every day. A problem that had seemed far away suddenly felt much closer to home, and Laura wanted to find a way to help. She had a feeling that other knitters would want to help, too, so she dreamed up a group effort: t
Gabi van Tassell, Turtle Looms
One day, while waiting outside her daughter’s weaving class, Gabi van Tassell became fascinated with an old-fashioned quilt. The Grandmother’s Flower Garden pattern combines groups of paper-pieced hexagons, and Gabi found herself wondering how she could weave the shapes. An active and curious crafter, she had explored a variety of fiber crafts, though she wasn’t yet a weaver.
She experi
Lily M. Chin, Knitting & Crochet Rock Star
In the early 2000’s, one episode of the Late Show with David Letterman boasted that a crocheter would make Dave a sweater over the course of the show. It sounded impossible, but their special guest backstage was Lily M. Chin, who held the title of World’s Fastest Crocheter. When the closing music played, Lily presented Letterman with his sweater—it was a bit short, but Dave pulled it over
Jennifer B. Williams, Inkled Pink
A lifelong crafter, Jennifer B. Williams had tried a wide variety of fiber techniques, but she felt something fall into place the first time she sat down to a lesson at an inkle loom. “It was the strangest thing to me. When I started inkle weaving, I started thinking through inkle,” she says. Delicate bracelets, origami fish, flip-flop straps? Absolutely! Joining bands edge to edge, foldi
Louie García, Pueblo Weaver (classic)
Visiting museums and archaeological sites in the American Southwest, Louie García finds inspiration to revive the fiber techniques of the past. He has participated in creating several recreations of ancient textiles, including a replica of the 800-year-old Arizona Openwork Shirt, and is a member of the Cedar Mesa Perishables Project, which studies artifacts including baskets, plaited and
Charan Sachar, Creative with Clay
Like many spinners, Charan Sachar discovered fiber crafts without realizing that they would transform his life. While studying for a masters degree in computer science, he began working with clay, making functional and decorative pieces. He loved the cool, slick texture of clay and the pleasure of working with his hands, eventually making pottery his full-time career. During down times in
Julia Gomez: Colcha Embroidery
When colonists first left Spain for what became Mexico and the American Southwest in 1598, they came with the continent’s first wool sheep. These weren’t the famed finewool Spanish Merinos—export of those was punishable by death—but rougher multipurpose Churra sheep. With simple tools, men sheared the sheep, women spindle-spun wool yarn, and men wove plain cloth called sabanilla.
In th
Irene Waggener, Knitting Researcher
As a knitter in a new place, Irene Waggener looks for knitting as she explores. Not all of the countries where she finds herself have robust yarn-shop networks and textile tourism, so sometimes she needs to get creative in her search.
During a three-year stint in Morocco, her first glimpse of knitting was in the back of a local museum, where a striking pair of black-and-white knitted pan
Spotlight Episode: Louët
In 1974, two young industrial designers in the Netherlands started a company making spinning wheels. Beginning in a family member’s chicken coop, they built a modern wheel featuring an upright castle-style format, a then-uncommon bobbin-lead drive system, and a drive wheel without spokes. Jan Louët Feisser and Clemens Claessen named their company Louët and began building the now-iconic S1
Allan Brown, The Nettle Dress (classic)
The Nettle Dress is available to stream online from November 15–December 2, 2024.
Most of us avoid nettles, thinking of them as weeds whose little stinging hairs can inject a painful toxin into the unexpecting walker. But strolling through the woods near his home in England, Allan Brown was captivated by the tall native plants. Knowing that textile cultures across the world have produced
Melvenea Hodges, Traditions in Cloth (classic)
Melvenea Hodges nurtures a small crop of cotton in her back yard in South Bend, Indiana. Besides beautiful foliage and some of her favorite fiber to spin, she tends her plants to celebrate what she can create with her own hands—not just beautiful textiles but a connection to her heritage and a source of peace.
As a primary school teacher, her working days are hectic, but she and a friend
Anita Osterhaug, Nordic Hands
Exploring the textile traditions of her Scandinavian ancestors, supporting Indigenous Andean weavers in preserving their traditions, or producing material for contemporary fiber artists, Anita finds connection between makers.
From hygge to the trendy Scandi Style, the design influence of Scandiavian countries has never been more popular. But beneath the graphic lines and bright colors, w
Elena Kanagy-Loux, Lacemaker & Historian
When you picture lace, what comes to mind: an old-fashioned once-white piece of Victorian embellishment? The elegant, possibly itchy decoration on a wedding gown? If you are a needleworker, you might picture an array of bobbins leashed to a cluster of pins and arrayed on a pillow, or a tatting shuttle, or a steel crochet hook. All of these images would be correct—but capture the tiniest s
Nanne Kennedy, Polwarth Shepherd & Seawater Dyer
Nanne Kennedy has her feet firmly planted in the soil of midcoast Maine. Growing up on a farm near the ocean, she could smell the salt air and small local factories, and she started saving in her “future farm fund” when she was 12. Eminently practical, she looked for ways that her farm could make her a living. “I'm a New England Yankee, and self reliance is really important,” she says. “S
Spotlight Episode: Knit Picks
When Knit Picks was founded by husband and wife team Kelly and Bob Petkun in 2002, the company began with a mail-order catalog and soon added online purchasing. Buying yarn online seemed both strange and inevitable: knitters began choosing yarns that they could only see onscreen, in the early days of functional search engines, at a time when many people had internet only at the office if
Laverne Waddington, Backstrap Weaver
Laverne Waddington discovered weaving by accident—bike accident, to be precise. Recuperating from a mountain biking crash in Utah, she discovered a book on Navajo weaving and was immediately intrigued. A local exhibit of Diné textiles enthralled her, and she set about learning to weave in the Navajo style. Returning to Patagonia, where she had been living, she built a simple loom and expl
Gale Zucker, Photographer
Embrace the potential of your phone’s camera, choose indirect lighting (not a flash) to show texture, and get your knits off the ground—these are just a few pieces of Gale Zucker’s advice for how to take knitting photos you love. Whether she’s shooting in a studio or a barnyard, Gale uses her camera to bring her subjects to life.
Gale grew up in a family where everyone learned to knit, a
Emily Lymm, Wool & Palette
Have you ever opened a book or seen a photograph and thought to yourself, “I have to learn to do that”?
When Emily Lymm first fell in love with knitting, she wondered casually if she could turn her passion for fiber arts into a profession. Not seeing many successful pathways to a career in knitting, she continued as a graphic designer. She loved the visual problem-solving of her job, bu
Tommye McClure Scanlin, Tapestry Artist
Tommye McClure Scanlin had a choice. To make the images she wanted to create with weaving, she could either pursue complex forms of weaving that rely on dobby, jacquard, and draw-loom technology—or she could go the other way and place every color and pick by hand using tapestry techniques and a very simple loom. Preferring a drawing pencil to a calculator, she made the choice that now see
Rowland & Chinami Ricketts, Indigo Artists
Indigo is a unique dyestuff, no less so for being found in so many different plants. Coaxing the blue hue out of green leaves and onto yarn or cloth requires a combination of chemistry and skill that has arisen across the globe.
Rowland and Chinami Ricketts each found their own way to indigo in Tokushima, Japan: Rowland was looking for a sustainable artistic medium after learning that
Spotlight Episode: Brown Sheep Company
Andrew Wells is the third generation of the iconic American yarn manufacturer Brown Sheep Company. Living near the family business outside Scotts Bluff, Nebraska, he grew up giving tours and sweeping the floors when his parents, Peggy and Robert Wells, ran the business. His grandfather, Harlan Brown, had been a sheep and lamb farmer before deciding to begin processing wool yarns, a busine
Kate Gagnon Osborn & Courtney Kelley, Kelbourne Woolens
Working together in a Philadelphia yarn store, Kate Gagnon Osborn and Courtney Kelley learned how to help customers choose the right yarn for a project, welcome in timid new knitters, and create samples to help move yarn out the door. They learned what didn’t work (donut-shaped balls of yarn that hopped off the shelves and tangled, patterns that used a few yards of a 100-gram skein) and w
Jess Zafarris, Author & Etymologist
If you knit, spin, sew, weave, or follow any crafty pursuit, you will not be surprised that many of our most common metaphors come from textiles. They are interwoven in our vocabulary, and whether you like to spin a yarn from words or fibers, you will recognize many of them.
But then there are the words whose textile roots are less obvious: Rocket. Bombastic. And we’ve forgotten the reg
Masey Kaplan & Jen Simonic, Loose Ends Project
When Jen Simonic and Masey Kaplan’s friend lost her mother, she had the challenge of going through her mother’s things while grieving her loss. Among her posessions was something almost every crafter has at least one of: a work in progress. Jen and Masey had each finished projects for bereaved family members before, but neither of them could take on this one, a pair of crocheted blankets
Eileen Lee: From Quilts to Jeans to Painted Warps (classic)
A career professional at Levi Strauss & Company, Eileen Lee learned about dyeing, weaving, and sewing on an international scale: giant factories full of loud looms weaving 2/2 twill, pattern pieces cut out of four-foot-high stacks of cloth, and no possibility of adding a tuck here or a dart there without retooling. During her years in the industry, Eileen saw major shifts in the mark
Lilly Marsh, Custom Weaver
Lilly Marsh creates blankets, shawls, and other cloth, almost exclusively from local wool. Working closely with farmers and the nearby Battenkill Fiber Mill, she gets to know not only her neighbors but the fibers they grow: the surprisingly lovely wool from East Friesian sheep raised to produce milk, the springy Dorset crosses that are popular in the region, and other fibers of the Hudson
Annie MacHale, Inkle Artist
The call of complexity draws some weavers to more shafts, more structures, more hand-manipulated techniques. For Annie MacHale, refining the techniques and celebrating the artistry of very simple bands has been a lifelong fascination. Starting when she first picked up a shuttle and inkle loom in her teens, Annie has worked in wool, cotton, and hemp, creating practical cloth that’s just a
Alissa Allen, Mycopigments
“Rule number one: Never drink the dye bath.”
Indigo and cochineal may be the most widely recognized natural dyes for many fiber artists, and there’s little temptation of sampling an indigo vat or pot of ground insects. But a simmering kettle of dye mushrooms or lichens? That might smell delicious, but if you’re in a class with Alissa Allen, it’s not soup you’re making—it’s an amazing r
Sally Fox, Colored Cotton Breeder
In a period when agriculture moved toward chemicals, genetic engineering, and monoculture, Sally Fox decided to explore what could happen if she collaborated with nature instead of fighting it. With an academic background in entomology, she studied ways to minimize the amount of pesticides needed to grow crops, and the more she saw the effects of those chemicals, the more she wanted to st
Spotlight Episode: Yarn Barn of Kansas
When Susan Bateman first opened Yarn Barn of Kansas in 1971, a woman starting a small business couldn’t get a credit card in her own name. Weavers like her had a hard time finding yarns, tools, and other supplies, some of which were only available from overseas, and she thought there must be an opportunity to bring fiber artists more of what they needed.
Susan and her husband, Jim, hav
Rebecca Mezoff (classic)
There may be no other type of textile that is more art and craft at the same time than tapestry weaving. Tapestry allows the weaver to create images with simple tools, but the skills and materials in tapestry are generally hard-wearing. You might find a tapestry on the floor as a rug as often as on a wall as a piece of art.
Rebecca Mezoff became a tapestry weaver after a career in occu
Hannah Thiessen Howard, Slow Knitting
For Hannah Thiessen Howard, slow knitting isn’t about the speed of making stitches or finishing projects. Swift and leisurely knitters alike can embrace the purpose and experience of knitting and how it connects crafter to community. Selecting materials, choosing projects, and approaching your work with an open mind all contribute to a meaningful knitting life.
Knitting can offer refuge,
Keisha Cameron, High Hog Farm
Although she grew up in the freezing winters of New York, Keisha Cameron and her husband decided to move their young family to a peri-urban spot outside Atlanta, Georgia, to set down roots and rebuild their connection to the land. They began with raising what their family needed for food and other daily necessities, but over the past decade, High Hog Farm has developed stocks of rare-bree
Justin Squizzero, The Burroughs Garret
Justin Squizzero loves exploring the frontiers of technology, seeing how he can tune a piece of equipment to produce a complex textile. The technology that fascinates him reached its peak before the 20th century. Weaving on an old loom doesn’t mean trying to turn back time, though—it means choosing the most refined technology to create the handwoven fabrics that he envisions. If a modern
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