I'm bön tae Shetland

Which translates as I've been to Shetland ... and I loved it. We, the we being Lorna a fellow local knitter, and I stayed in Lerwick for 9 days. Lerwick is a small town of about 8 thousand people and has at least 7 yarn shops. Our kind of town, the perfect town to hold a knitting conference in. The trip there was trouble free, the trip back home was extended by fog at Sydney, a detour to Melbourne for refueling, back to Sydney for an unforeseen 12 hour stop over and arriving home a day latter than planned. All that leaves me happy to be home and tired, today the post is a summary of the trip .. next post I've cover the conference and update you on my knitting. Its been 2 weeks since the last post so there is a lot to write about and report on.


On our first day there, we decided a little grocery shopping was in order .. so we headed off to town to search for food, we needed to as we were staying in a self catered flat. The town is old, the building very old, our flat was only 2 minutes walk from the main post office, this was the walk that faced us every morning. The first morning we found our bearings and about 9am headed off to town to search for provisions .... it was sunny, and warm and there was hardly any wind.

While we headed off at 9am it was in fact around 3pm before we found a grocery shop ... we were distracted by at least 5 yarn shops, the visitors center and coffee. With a knitting conference in town we were on the look out for 'others like us', knitters, and at the visitors centre we spotted some and made our introductions, Annemor and Kirja. We meet them again at at a coffee shop latter in the day .. and they discussed their plans to rent a car and drive out to the Jamisons factory the next day, which was a few hours from Lerwick. During coffee we all decided to split the cost of the rental car and head off the following day. We checked that Kirja's and my phone could talk to each other, worth checking when traveling internationally, and Annemor gave me her card.


Then we headed of again to look for groceries, the next yarn shop we found just before we found the grocery shop ..... outside there was a workman shifting fleece from bales into a wicker basket.


Beside him the name of the shop ... a factory shop, Jamisons and Smith.


Inside it was like a magic cave ... lace and 2ply yarns in so many colours, and shetland fleece to spin.I didn't buy anything that day .. now we knew where the shop was I wanted to spend some time thinking and selecting carefully rather than rush in. I knew we had 8 more days to visit and shop, and I knew my suitcase had to weigh less than 23kg when I left so I had to be careful adding to it. (on a latter visit we discovered the amazing lace display in the basement .. if you are ever there, remember to ask to see it).


Later that night, back at the flat with stocks of food, we unpacked and went over the plans for the next day. I dug out Annemor's card and realized who she was .... Annemor Sundbø, author of one of my favorite knitting history books, Treasures from the Ragpile. Oh my .. it took me a wee while to calm down, and probably was much better that I didn't know that earlier or I would have been tongue tied in awe.


So the next day we met up with Annemor, Kirja, and Anne (a lecturer from the Rhode Island School of Design), and headed off to the Jamison factory. Here in New Zealand factory visits mean signing health and safety forms, going thru a checklist of dos and don'ts, and being restricted to areas that are safe. At Jamisons they asked if we wanted to wander around the factory first, or visit the shop first ... being slightly sensible adults we elected to wander the factory first, knowing the shop would distract us.


The factory was like no other I've been in, a mix of fleece, raw and dyed, at least two cars undergoing restoration, each with a sofa near by to sit and admire the work from, a large flat screen tv above one car, working looms and working mill equipment. We were allowed to wander, free access every where, and we did. We were adults, we didn't fall into the machinery or damage ourselves or it ...
I knew that much of the Sheltand knitwear was produced by machines, sophisticated colour work machines .. but seeing the huge piles of colour work knit fabric ready to be made into garments was still a surprise. This is Lorna my travel companion, as hand knitters the scale of the pile of knit fabric just awed us both.



Near the dye room there was the obligatory sample storage, where yarns of different colours are stored and kept to use in matching each batch to the right colour. Little skeins of tagged yarn sit in each cubby ... guiding the dyer.It is one of those places that looks old and exciting, the original wooden shelves, and the little trial skeins of yarn .... one of those images that one expects to see in a book about yarn, or as a designers inspiration on their workspace.



Then in the factory shop, those same colours reappear in lace, and spindrift and aran weights ...... waiting for hand knitters to turn them into garments and accessories. I can not lie, some of these came home with me ... but there were so much to choose from and my suitcase was only so big ... the selection was hard.

After leaving the factory we made our way back to Lerwick, via a beer in Scalloway(we were looking for a cafe for coffee but found a local museum and pub first), and visited some local historic buildings ...

and found ourselves close enough to eyeball a shetland sheep. There was of course knitting, and knitting talk, then the day after the trip to Jameson's the conference started ... all of that I will catch up with and cover in the next few posts.

take care
I'm off to do family things, cook meals and tidy up ... I'm already back to being a parent after 2 weeks away, but its all good.