Our newest design, Hybrid was inspired by the partnership and community that is created and maintained by the vendors and attendees of fiber festivals all across the county. It pairs yarns from different producers to showcase the inherent beauty of each. (You can read more about the pattern here).
When Kate approached Kimber and Karida with her initial concept of a sweater design that would pair their vibrant yarns with Green Mountain Spinnery’s rustic and lofty skeins, both responded with delight and enthusiasm. They all agreed that the differences between the yarns would make the combination a winning one. This partnership started at a fiber festival, and was solidified with a few moments on the floor of the booth spreading out all the colors and finding the perfect combination. Super fun right from the start!
One of our favorite parts of the many fiber festivals we are lucky enough to attend, is the opportunity to meet and reconnect with festival friends. These are folks from all walks of life who share a common passion of ours, making things with wool. There are teachers, knitters, people who crochet, weavers, dyers, fiber producers, and shepherds. They are people we typically only see once or a few times a year, and yet we look forward to each visit.
But this year has turned all that on its head. With the fall festivals transforming into virtual gatherings, our typical reunion has to be re-imagined as well. Instead of relying on the convenience of catching up at the show, we’ll need to seek them out in a way that feels as real and connecting as our annual hugs did.
In the spirit of sharing that love, we want to invite you to reach out to someone who you were looking forward to seeing at one of this year’s fiber festivals. Send a postcard, letter or message, give your friend a call, or schedule a video conference so that you can see one another and catch up as you were planning to do before the festivals were cancelled.
We hope that this opportunity to re-establish the bonds that have knit this community together over the years, offers you a chance to connect with a fiber friend you’ve been thinking about, but have not yet reached out to. Let’s take some time this month to share some fiber love.
If you’d like to share your story of how you’ve reconnected, or how met, how often you’ve gathered over the years, or photos of your reunions at festivals of years past, post them on social media with the hashtag #reknittogether or send them to us at spinnery@spinnery.com.
We’d love to see your Rhinebeck sweaters, your favorite group meet-up photos, or an update you’ve received thanks to your recent conversation. Each message we receive, as well as each post on social media with the hashtag #reknittogether will be recorded as an entry.
With your permission, we will share and repost them over the course of the month and on September 1st, we’ll select one of those submissions at random and gift both you and your friend all the materials you’ll need to make Hybrid sweaters of your own. You both can pick a sweater quantity of Spinnery yarn and a contrast color yarn of either Neighborhood Fiber Co.’s Studio DK or one of Fiber Optic Yarn’s Unified Gradients.
We hope that this invitation helps launch our new pattern with all the love we have for each of you. Our fiber community is a generous, funny and wildly creative one. We are deeply grateful to be a part of it and to participate in the work of helping it flourish.