Savile Row

Sorry for the hugely out of date nature of this post, a combination of misplacing my camera cable and Andrew hogging the laptop have meant that I've been kept away from blogging!

Last Monday, to celebrate the start of British Wool Week, Savile Row, home of some of the world's greatest tailoring houses, hosted an open day. The street was literally turfed over and two very lovely flocks of sheep were brought in from Devon. It was certainly a surreal place to be;

There was a small flock of about 30 Exmoor Horn (above) and a similar number of Bowmonts. They were very lovely, and very calm, but were clearly not used to people, they would run from outstretched arms reaching for a stroke.

I was fortunate enough to be able to eavesdrop on one of the farmer's chatting to some of the press about the flocks, and he showed me that the Bowmont, although appearing grey, was in fact white underneath;

The most surprising thing about this was how relaxed the sheep seemed about all of this. She lay there, quite calmly, with only a firm hand against her head for about 5 minutes, although once released she ran off to join the flock at a sprint!

The highlight of the day, however, was a total surprise. I'd wandered into Huntsman for the sole reason that they had a video playing on the wall showing the origins of their wool. Upon arrival, I was however offered a free behind the scenes tour starting in 5 minutes! And free champagne! (The best part of this was, of course, being Huntsman, it was probably the most expensive champagne I am ever likely to drink!)

I probably don't need to say that the tour was amazing, but it was. The group was split into two, I was shown around by Peter Smith, the general manager, and the other half of us were shown around by David Wood, a senior pattern cutter.

The tour started on the shop floor. We were shown some of the textile sampler packs, customers have a choice of over 7000 different cloths for the manufacture of their suits. I say cloths, because in the tailoring trade they don't use "fabric", but "cloth". We were shown some of the tweeds that were specially designed by Huntsman, and thus unique to their brand. A new tweed collection is brought out every 2 years, so even this distinguished company, dating from 1849, can move with the times. Recently they have combined some of their old tweeds into this sampler jacket, originally designed for a window display, but of which they have sold four.

The next place we visited was the fantastic "Hanging Room", where all of the patterns are stored. Huntsman store all of the patterns for each of their customers until that customer passes away.

It's difficult to see here, but each of the thousands of hooks corresponds to one customer, some of which may have over a dozen garments made for them, each requiring up to a dozen pattern pieces.

Staff at the company travel regularly, 4 times a year to New York for example, and wherever they go they are visited by foreign customers for fittings. It takes up to 4 fittings to get a suit right, which is certainly worth it when the cheapest bespoke suits cost from £4300! Interestingly, many of the tailoring houses on Savile Row travel together, each booking a room in the same hotel in order for their clients to visit all of their tailors at once. A customer may choose to visit several tailors as each tailoring house has it's own distinctive take on the suit. Huntsman, for example, traditionally make single button suits, that are a bit longer than average, with a very distinctive high armhole. There is a degree of brand loyalty however, and this is due in part to the esteem in which the brand is held, and it's connection to certain well known individuals.

The order book in the shop is held open and protected all times at a page detailing an enormous order placed by King Edward VIII, then Prince Edward, for all manner of items, including shooting breeches, dress coats, dinner jackets, and almost anything else you can imagine. The store possesses one fitting room, a huge place, in which the suit patterns of Gregory Peck and Laurence Olivier hang. On the wall is a photograph of the 1966 World Cup winning England football squad, all kitted out in Huntsman suits. My favorite thing about the fitting room was however, this little touch;

The ornate glass bowls holding tailor's chalk and pins.

The company have an unusual attitude to staff, apparently common amongst tailoring houses, in that staff retention is an important aspect of the business model. Their longest serving member of staff has been working for Huntsman for 56 years. When I asked about their opinion to taking on a traditionally trained pattern cutter (always looking for employment opportunities for Andrew!) they were reticent, saying they like to "train people to cut Huntsman patterns", the implication being that in providing a narrow course of training, their former apprentices are unlikely to be future competitors.

The manufacturing process is highly specialized. I was aware that they trained trouser-makers as a separate discipline, but was unaware of how far this specialization runs. There is a woman who only sews buttonholes, and a man whose sole role is to press the suits, a process that can take up to 3 hours! This being said, they do have a number of young staff, in their early 20s or so, and nowadays have a womenswear cutter also, and I genuinely believe the company is keen to keep pace with changes in the modern world.

As far as the fibres are concerned, all of their wool for suitings is Australian merino, bought at high prices at auction due to its incredibly fine nature (1pp, not sure of the micron count). The raw fleece is shipped to the UK where it is scoured, spun, dyed and woven in Yorkshire. The tweed is spun from lambswool in Isla, Scotland.

I was very grateful to Peter Smith for such a wonderful tour, and such a special surprise treat to my day. I do hope that this somewhat makes up for the large delay in posting this, I promise more soon!

In other news, check out MODOdiva, the blog for MODO, UCL's fashion society of which I am Head of Design this year. Over the next few weeks I will be posting regular updates there on the ins and outs of my adventures with MODO. Also, now that I have begun my PhD proper, I will be posting random notes and musings on my progress at MichaelaDoesScience.

Speak soon!

Knitting and Stitching Show!

As promised, my highlights from the Knitting and Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace. I went on Saturday, arrived at about 11.30 and spent the day heaving amongst the crowds. Fortunately (and I genuinely do prefer shopping this way), I was alone. Crowds are always easier to handle when you're not constantly worrying about the wearabouts of other people, and you can choose much more easily which stores are worth waiting to see and which can be slowly shuffled past.

This was my first year at Ally Pally and I'd never been before. The palace itself is gorgeous and was a lovely addition to my day;

I spent about 2 hours browsing the Great Hall, where the majority of the shopping was. I didn't buy very much at all, just 3 beautiful skeins of undyed angora blend laceweight from Artisan Yarns and some urea crystals for a dyeing experiment I have in mind.

I had fun all the same, had some lovely chats with vendors, in particular at Jamieson's Yarns where the lady very kindly helped me pick out the perfect colours for a MODO project I have in mind - despite them not having nearly enough stock for me to buy there and then.

I particularly enjoyed the knitwear graduate showcase, if for no other reason that it was only here (and embroidery) where photography was permitted! Highlights include this wonderful cardigan from Jacob Oram of Colchester Uni;

The picture doesn't really do the scale justice, a grizzly bear could have worn it! Normally these "giant knits" leave me a bit cold. They often seem lazy and are frequently stylistically and technically dull. But I rather like this, the purl rows to add a fold up to the armpit are a nice touch, and the collar is awesome. I also like that he's used actual yarn, not unspun roving, which makes it look genuinely like a blown up dolls cardigan.

There was also this great piece of texture from Motohiro Tanji (Nottingham Trent);

Inspired by "gothic-techno", but not looking like it came out of Cyberdog. I quite like it. It was at this point I bumped into Louisa and Emma from Loumms, who liked it even more than me! They make awesome bags and have a great series of patterns (as well as being super friendly people). I first met them at a knit night meeting and was very happy to see them again!

I also saw these two dresses from Amber Hards (UWE Bristol) inspired by jellyfish;

And this awesome knitted plane from Claire Platt (Bath Spa):


After I was done shopping and admireing I attended a truely excellent 1 hour introduction to tapestry weaving class run by Philip Sanderson of the West Dean College. For my mere £8 ticket price I was treated to excellent teaching, wonderful handout material, a free fork, all the yarn I needed, and a loom to take away! I've done a little playing since the class;


I'm quite pleased with myself I must say! I can definitely see tapestry weaving being a really fun way of making accessories using up all the scraps of yarn I've got kicking about. I'm so loathe to throw anything away, it's great to have a use to put things to!

New Spindle!

Some pics from the Knitting and Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace to come tomorrow, today I am very excited by my wonderful new spindle!

I've been after a nice quality top-whorl spindle for a while. My wheel is fantastic, but sometimes I want to spin on the move! I first learnt to spin on a bottom whorl spindle that cost £3.50 and was little more than a piece of dowling and a wooden wheel. Unfortunately, the whorl has become loose, and even superglue isn't doing it anymore. A new spindle was required, and after playing with a top-whorl I decided that, for me, I was happy either way up!

I noticed these beautiful spindles from Wildcraft a long time ago now, but was waiting for my birthday to buy it as a treat for myself. The shaft is made from a nice quality cherry wood, but it's the whorl where the beauty really is.

But first, I just wanted to stress the absolutely gorgeous packaging it arrived in, a mere 2 days after I placed the order. It's this sort of lovely attention to detail that means I will definitely order from them again.

First, it appeared in this lovely tube;
Then some pretty crepe paper (which I crumpled prior to photographing);
Then some bubble wrap;

Then some gorgeous Cheviot roving;
Then my spindle;

Isn't it pretty! The flowers are real Cranesbiu flowers encased in resin. The spindle weighs 30g, and spins pretty true, although the more yarn I'm putting on it the straighter it spins. I've spun a little of the cheviot, which is very lovely, and I'm very very happy with my new toy!

Tiny wee things

Just a quick post today.

I've been pretty much furiously knitting for the last week, I don't want to go into too much detail, but some friends of ours have had a beautiful, handsome baby who just happens to have come a little sooner than expected. As someone who always has a massively diverse stash, I've dug out all of my baby suitable yarns and begun making a few bits and bobs for him to wear. Firstly I made some little socks;


There's still loads of this yarn left from when I made the Diagonal Rib Socks for myself, so expect more in this colour. It's Walker Superwash Sock from Spinning a Yarn and I can happily say it has survived the washing machine intact.

Next I made this quick and easy jacket, a top down raglan (my first top down garment), which is far too big, but at least he'll grow into it!


This jacket (which is actually rather asymmetric, rather than just wonky as the picture suggests) is made in the commonly available Sirdar Snuggly Baby DK, and took less than 50g of yarn to make. The buttons are standard John Lewis baby buttons, 25p each. I love this yarn, I've used it several times and it's incredibly soft for something with a fibre content of nylon and acrylic.

The patterns are Preemie and Newborn Socks and Paxton (Preemie and Newborn Jacket), both Ravelry links.

If anyone is inspired to help out our tiny babies, donations can be made to Bliss

Birthday Baking and Some Special Socks

It was my birthday on Saturday, and I was astounded to find that my wonderful boyfriend Andrew had gifted me with a camera - exactly what I need in order to make this blog the type of blog I want it to be. I was also fortunate enough to be given a wonderful recipe book by my friends Sam, Alex and Kate - The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook by Tarek Malouf.


As we had the dreaded viva (a kind of oral exam) for our Masters on Tuesday, I decided to make some cakes for the group. I made the Black Bottomed cakes;

and the Peaches and Cream cakes;


For the Peaches and Cream cakes, I made the minor substitution of fresh plums for peaches, and the added sourness was wonderful. The Black Bottomed cakes were supposed to have a lump of baked cheesecake in them, which didn't really happen, but never mind. Considering that both recipes called for plain flour, they rose well and tasted moist and delicious. I think they went down quite well.


In knitting news, I've been meaning to post about my new pair of socks, made from the handspun yarn I blogged about here. I did make them into the Tatami pattern I discussed, and I have to say I love them. As with when I've knitted socks before from this book (Judy Sumner's Knitted Socks East and West) the heel fits perfectly. I was very pleasantly surprised to find that the handspun was slightly self striping. Isn't it great when little surprises like that happen?

Dyeing Experiments

After finishing off my yellow socks yesterday I decided the time had come to finally get round to the dyeing I had been putting off. I ultimately had 3 aims. 1) To speckle some rather bland looking Rowan Milk Cotton I had bought in the sale. 2) To do something with a skein of undyed sock yarn I had bought from Tall Yarns way back in March at the Stitch and Craft Fair. 3) To make a bit more progress experimenting and playing with the monster fleece I washed earlier in the summer. The dye I chose was a simple, in theory boring, Dylon handwash in colour Tropical, which had an excited looking Macaw on the packet to indicate the colour. As I knew that both the Milk Cotton and the undyed sock yarn had a high cotton content I was expecting the colour to take quite well.

The milk cotton was laid out on plastic sheeting and concentrated dye was spooned over it. Then any excess was "mopped up" using the yarn (which I had skeined, instead of the centre pull ball it came in). This created a mottled effect.

Sorry for the blurry picture, I must have been excited.

The fleece and the sock yarn were tossed in the dyepot as per the instructions, with a bit less stirring to reduce the felting risk.

After an hour it was time to wash out the dye. First I washed the fleece,
Which has actually taken up a lot more dye than it looks like on this picture (sorry about my finger, again I can only blame my excitement!) but which is bizarrely patchy. At first I thought it might be that the brightly coloured bits were leftover yuck from when I got the fleece (and it was minging), but on closer inspection it seems possible that it's the very base of the fibre that has dyed better. Perhaps this part of the fibre lost more of it's lanolin when scoured, as the whole fleece is still pretty greasy. It looks like a felted mess, but I can promise it isn't nearly as bad as it looks, I've been spinning some of this fleece Andrew dyed black a while back, which is in fact purple, and it's coming out nice and fine.

Next I washed all the yarns individually and hung them to dry in the bathroom;
As is immediately obvious in this picture the sock yarn is not happy macaw green, but a rather putrid lime. Andrew of course found this hilarious. Part of me is excited, I've never seen commercial yarn this colour before. Of course most of me understands that there is a very good reason for that. One upside is that any socks I do make from the yarn will be great for the MODO show, as they'll certainly stand out!!

The milk cotton, despite being a little limier than I would have liked, is pretty much as I wanted it. So a successful day all round!

Yellow Socks

Just a quick post today about some lovely ankle socks I've just finished.


The pattern is Diagonal Rib by Anne Budd, which was published as part of a free e-book by Knitting Daily. I've been meaning to make these for a while, as although the pattern is fairly plain and simple, I think the overall effect is rather classic and fun. The heel flap is fairly short, which I prefer, and the only modification I made was to shorten the toe, making 6 sets of decreases with a rest round between them, then 5 rounds of decreases without rest rounds, then grafting the last 20 stitches. I think I perhaps don't have as pointy feet as the average person, as I always find shorter toes fit and look better.

I've been wanting to use this yarn for ages, it was bought at a craft fair at the Tyneside Cinema in Newcastle on Easter Sunday when Andrew and I were visiting my parents. It was bought from Spinning a Yarn, a local indy dyer from the area. In fact, it was bought at the same time as the blue fibre I blogged about spinning last month. I'm 99% sure the yarn is her Walker Sock Yarn, and therefore should be superwash. As our washing machine is currently broken (I'm allowing Andrew the opportunity to stretch his testosterone before calling the landlord, it's only a clogged filter afterall) I won't be washing them just yet, but will let you know if any disasters arise!

Spinning for Socks

I'm very excited to be able to show you some newly completed spinning. My first project using my Knit Nation purchases! I've made 115g of 3-ply sock yarn that I'm very chuffed with. The fibre was Artist's Palette Yarns Superwash BFL, the colourway is not written on the label and is no longer available on the website, but is a gorgeous mix of creams, browns and blues.


The spinning was a dream, the combing of the tops was very open and drafting was very easy. This was by far the finest I have ever spun, and I now feel a lot more like I have control over the fibre I am spinning, rather than the fibre having control over me!

I still haven't learnt how to get 3 singles of even vaguely similar lengths, but fortunately I'd left a bit of fibre just in case, and so lengthened the various singles as they ran out. For this reason the 5 resulting skeins have lengths varying from 141m to 21m, but they seem to be pretty consistent in wpi. The total length of 362m means that the yardage is there for a nice pair of socks.

I'm thinking of making Tatami, from Judy Sumner's Knitted Socks East and West (Ravelry Link here), the pattern was posted on the Etsy How-Tuesday blog here. I've already made Ikebana from this book, a pair of knee high socks with a tree-like pattern. I really like the resulting sock, and the heel fits better than any other sock I've ever made. I'm really hoping that the Tatami socks come out as nice, it will be awesome to have some comfy handspun socks!

Skew Socks

After a frantic last few weeks rushing to finish my shawl in time for the wedding (it's still not perfect, pics once I'm happy with it!), followed by the rush to finish my summer project for my Masters, I've finally got a whole 4 weeks of pretty much holiday time before the start of my PhD! Yay!

I've spent some of the time since finishing on Friday doing some finishing touches to some nearly finished projects. I finally got round to blocking my Skew socks!


I started these in April and finished the knitting for the second sock a couple of weeks ago, but hadn't quite got round to blocking them. Mostly because I was afraid that they would end up different sizes. And I think this picture proves that this is unfortunately the case. I knitted the right sock first, and seemingly have been replaced by a different knitter with a wholly different tension before starting the second sock!

That being said (and I still have faith the fit issue will resolve itself) I do like this pattern.


The whole sock is knit on the bias, with the most amazing heel construction;


The pattern is perfect for self striping yarn (in this case, Lana Grossa Meilenweit 100 Merino) as the pattern of increases/decreases shows this wonderful kink.

And don't they look cute on?

Improving Spinning

Just a quick post today, as I'm elbow deep in finishing my epic Golden Wheat Shawl in time for Vicki & James' wedding next week.

I've been waiting for a skein of handspun to dry in order to take some good pictures, although my phone seems to be playing up so I apologise for the quality of the later ones. It's made from a batt I got from Jan at Spinning a Yarn, although as it was a teaching pack I pursuaded her to sell me I'm not sure of the fibre content, I think it's mostly BFL however.

It started out lookin like this;

Deep blue with white intermixed. Gorgeous. It was a dream to spin, and actually wanted to be finer than I'd done before (unlike the merino top I had to fight with to draft!)

Singles:

Then spun together into a 2 ply;


I don't have a WPI gauge but I'm pretty sure it's about a standard 4-ply weight (US sportweight) and is by far the finest thing I've ever spun. I seem to be getting progressively better at this spinning malarkey!

And as proof of that (taking my scientist hat off with that statement) I've started spinning up some fibre I got from Artist's Palette Yarns that I'm suspicious might be perfect, it is superwash afterall, to make some yummy sock yarn with!