Lab Goddess Fibre Club April 2016

I've managed to get more or less back on schedule with the fibre club, and packages should now be at most of their destinations, so I excited that I can now share this colourway with everyone.

This colourway is inspired by Rachel Carson, an American marine biologist and conservationist best known for her popular books on the environment, particularly her 1962 bestseller Silent Spring, which is credited with jumpstarting the modern environmental movement, and led directly to a ban on the use of the pesticide DDT in the United States.

I wanted to counteract the bleakness of Silent Spring with a lively springtime colourway - this one used a lot of colour mixing to get some more complex hues, as well as some unexpected juxtapositions of colours for something exciting. And since it's dyed up on one of my all-time favourite bases, I've already spun mine up!

I split my 4 oz into three equal pieces, then spun one without any further prep, split one in half and spun them end to end and split the third piece into fourths and spun those end to end. This type of fractal spinning is one of my favourite techniques for tops that are highly variegated and have lots of contrast. I'm hoping my resulting chunky/bulky skein will knit up with some more subtle blending of the colours in the final fabric, but I've got to decide on the right project. It's nice and soft so maybe a cowl or a hat for next winter.

If you're in the club please share your spinning and projects as you go along, and if you've missed out on this quarter's sign ups, they'll open back up again on 1 July!

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Lab Goddess Fibre Club March 2016

The March club colourway was inspired by Virginia Apgar, an obstetrical anaesthesiologist who pioneered the testing of a newborn's transition from life inside the womb to life outside after birth. In addition to developing the ubiquitous Apgar Test, she was also the vice president and Director of basic research for the March of Dimes, and a strong advocate for vaccination in the fight against mother-to-child transmission of German Measles (Rubella), which was pandemic in the United States at the time.

The name of the colourway comes from the Latin word for birth, breaking out or originating. Given that March is the month in which my eldest daughter was born, this seemed like an apt name! The colours come from obstetrics - greens for the surgical scrubs worn by doctors and nurses in the delivery room, and for the tiles that are everpresent in hospitals, with a bit of mauve and dark blood red for contrast.

I've been away for the Easter holidays for the last week or so, and I took along my Cortus and a spindle to get a bit of work done on it. And I was struck, once again, but how much I like spinning Wensleydale. This fibre is certainly the polar opposite of last month's Corriedale: from a very straightforward easy-to-spin medium fibre, we've gone straight into longwool territory this month, and I'm finding it to be a lovely change! The Wensleydale is much more slippery to spin then a lot of other wools that we've used in the club, due to its lack of crimp, but the shine and lustre of the singles are amazing. I think I'm going to keep this one as a singles yarn, both to emphasise the drape of the yarn and to keep the colours from getting too muddied. Which means it's going to have to become some kind of lacey something to keep from biasing...anyone have any suggestions?

There is still some space left in the second quarter of the 2016 LGFC, if you'd like to join in the fun. Club membership gets you three monthly shipments of 4 oz/113 g of an exclusive colourway inspired by a female scientist, and also includes a brochure with information about the scientist, the development of the colourway and the fibre base. We'd love to have you join us!

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Lab Goddess Fibre Club February 2016

As I was finalising the March shipment of the Fibre Club this morning, I realised that with all the hubbub of the last few weeks, I completely missed showing off the February club colourway - so here it is!

When I dyed this fibre, it had been very grey for a very long time in London, and I was desperate for something blue! This colourway is inspired by Eugenie Clark, a world-renowned icthyologist (i.e. shark addict) who was one of the first marine biologists to use scuba diving as a major research tool.

In addition to her research, Clark was a bestselling writer who's first book, Lady with a Spear (1953), based on her Fulbright Scholarship experiences studying sharks on the Red Sea in Egypt, brought her to the attention of the wealthy Vanderbilt family, who built her a laboratory in southwestern Florida, where she continued to research sharks, with studies ranging from fish test tube babies to training sharks to press targets to shark repellents.

This colourway is a more abstract one, rather then inspired by a particular concept; its my interpretation of what the ocean must look like from underwater, looking upwards – bright shades of blues and greens, those tropical colours of the ocean under the shining sun.

February’s fibre is one that I recommend to any beginner spinner – Corriedale. The Corriedale sheep is a dual purpose breed, and is used for both meat and wool. It is the oldest of all the crossbred breeds, and is derived from Merino ewe and Lincoln ram crosses in New Zealand and Australia. The aim in crossing these breeds was to develop a sheep that would thrive in drier climates and produce longer stapled wool. The Corriedale is now raised all over the world.

Corriedale could best be described as “medium”. It has medium staple length, medium softness, and medium crimp. But it’s not a boring spin by any means, just very straightforward. It won’t take a lot of attention and won’t do anything tricky, so it’s the perfect fibre for some truly relaxing spinning.

If you'd like to join the Lab Goddess Fibre Club for April through June, slots are now open - we'd love to have you join us!

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Edinburgh Yarn Festival, Skyesong and Fibre Club updates

*Quantum Dots, which will be available at EYF on some super soft Falkland merino*

Well. It seems like the last almost four weeks since Unravel have flown by in a blur of wool and dye and chaos. It seems that way because they have! I've been full on prepping for Edinburgh Yarn Festival, which opens for classes today and for vast and fantastic stash enhancement on Friday. I've sent off five (!) boxes of fluff, have crammed a pile more into my luggage, and will be on a train northward in just a few hours, just in time to set up.

However, a few other things have happened in the last few weeks that I'd like to highlight. First off, slots are now open for Q2 of the 2016 Lab Goddess Fibre Club. The club runs £45 plus actual shipping cost (depending on location), and will include three monthly shipments of an exclusive colourway inspired by a woman scientist, either past or current. Check out the Fibre Club page to see past colourways and to book your space now.

Current fibre club members: parcels will ship out next week, and I hope you like this month's instalment!

Secondly - I have a new pattern out! Skyesong is a lace shawl designed for handspun, and I'm super thrilled that it's been published in the new issue of Knitty. The body of the shawl is worked in a garter lace pattern (knit on every row - woot!) until it is the desired size, and then the edge is finished with a border worked sideways and attached to the live stitches.

One important thing to mention: this is proper lace knitting, with things happening on both the right and wrong side rows. However, the body repeat is only four rows long, so it's not too difficult to get into a rhythm. The edging is more complicated and longer (20 rows), but the stitch count changes on every row, so it's pretty straightforward to figure out where you are in the repeat as you go on.

The pattern includes two sizes - the small version was knit up in fingering-weight yarn spun from some gorgeous wool/flax sliver that I got at Spunky Eclectic a couple of summers ago, in the Lobster colourway. The larger version was worked in my own 60% merino/40% flax top, dyed in the Broadbean colourway.

I'll have plenty of the merino/flax top at EYF this weekend, in both semisolid and variegated colourways, so if you're inspired for a little lacey shawl project, please stop by!

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Getting ready for Unravel

It's that last minute press to finish off bits and pieces of prep before packing up on Thursday and heading to Unravel. There's been a lot of final dyeing and prepping and labelling of fibre around here. Want to see some of what's coming with me this weekend?

I'm also super excited to be able to offer kits for my newest hat design, Ironwork.

*Handspun undyed Shetland, with Crystal Violet, Coomassie Blue and Xylene Cyanole for the contrast colours.*

The pattern is written with handspun in mind, and includes tips on how to spin the yarn. It's also got a handy chart to determine the finished size of your hat based on your preferred gauge with your particular yarn and needles. The gauges included run from 4-7 sts/inch, so the pattern can work with anything from fingering to worsted weight.

*Undyed natural brown Shetland, with Congo Red, Ethidium Bromide and Yellow Fluorescent Protein as the contrast colours*

The kits will include 3 oz of main colour and three 0.5 oz bundles of the contrast colours. I'll have the two sample versions kitted up ready to go, but if you want to swap out some of the colours on the day, that's no problem! Kits will also include a printed version of the pattern, with a download code for the electronic version.

I'll be in the Barley room, next to the Yarn in the City booth (which will have copies of the London Craft Guide and yarn for the projects!), and I do hope you'll come by and say hello! And if you're around on Friday afternoon, please come to my talk on "Dyeing Science" from 4:00 - 5:00, where I'll share a few of the stories behind some of my more science-inspired colourways.

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Porpoise Fur