Sunday 1 August 2010

Tales from a Knit Nation


Yesterday I left the Mr in bed with Flo and took a trip across town to the latest knitting show on the block, Knit Nation. At first I was a bit concerned that it was only going to take me 10 minutes to get round as the room looked a little small, however it was a case of small but perfectly formed. There was just the right amount of stalls, all carefully picked to bring us the best yarns, notions, designers and accessories from around the world. Some of the bigger shows can get a little messy with random hair clips and glitter glue on sale in between the yarn stalls but there was no such fluff here, only fluff of the wooly kind.

It was so lovely to catch up with many of the vendors I’ve got to know over the years from being a visitor and volunteer at various knitting shows. Andy from Bluefaced.com was the first one I saw as I walked in and he was so glad to hear about Florence’s progress that he gave me a ball of pink Baby Rooster merino yarn to knit Flo something pretty with. What a fantastic start! I’m thinking I’ll maybe make a hat from the Wee Wooly Toppers book that my mum bought at her stall. Did you know the cute as a button boy in all the photos in this book are Wooly Wormhead’s son? He’s so adorable and she assured us that he loves to wear hats, which is probably a good thing when your mum’s a hat designer!

I had a lovely chat with Emma, the editor of Knitting Magazine and took a sneaky peak at Perri Lewis’s article which has taken over my spot at the back of the magazine while I’m on my break. Hopefully I’ll be back on the pages of Knitting magazine next year.

Over at Yoslda’s stall I acted like a massive stalker and generally said the wrong thing. I think she thought I was a bit of a nutter. Despite this, or maybe because of it, she signed both copies of her books for me and we had a photo taken her cute photo booth, with me wearing one of her designs.

I met the nice ladies from Denise needles, picked up some sock yarn from a stall I can’t remember the name of (sorry!) and made it down to the stand everyone was talking about Rohrspatz & Wollmeise. Apparently, because their yarns are not usually available in the UK there was a full on stampede when the doors opened on Thursday night. I hear there was screaming... scary! The stall was beautiful and the yarns were very lush.


On the other side of the room I chatted to Robin at Purlescence and met the nice people at Sparkle Duck (great name). I had a lovely long chat with Dixie from Nicols buttons, who was reluctant to let me take a picture of her. Eventually I manage to get the back of her head.

There were some amazing and inspiring kids deigns from Millamia a Swedish company. I caught up with some of the S&B London girls at the Knitting and Crochet Guild stall and then with the fabulous Eirwen from Knit Witches. Finally I stopped off at the Loop stall where I saw Meghan wearing a cute creation from Susan Cropper’s latest book of vintage gifts to knit. Whilst there I bought a ceramic button with a spool of thread printed on it a) because it was cute and b) because it has my name on it. How vain.


Finally I saw Ravelry creators Jess and Casey and felt very embarrassed to ask them for a photo. I was glad I did but didn’t realise they’d be so tall!


So in my opinion Knit Nation was a successful and really enjoyable day. All my pictures of the show can be found here including stalker-ish shots of all my favourite yarny people.

2 comments:

  1. So good to hear that you had a lovely day out. Thanks for sharing your photos, I see why you like the Millamia so different.
    Congratulations on being so restrained with what you bought, don't think I would have been so good with all those lovely yarns around!!

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  2. It was fab to catch up with you , I was so pleased to hear that Florence was home with you
    x

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