Roadside Beanie kits.

Posted by Julia on April 15, 2019

The shop is buzzing with excitement about the “Roadside Beanie,” Shetland Wool Week’s featured pattern for 2019. Nancy will be teaching a class on it, and we’ve just made up kits in several colorways with Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift.

The pattern shows the hat in four different Shetland yarns, including one in Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift. I’ve made up several kits in the suggested Shetland Spindrift colorway, another in shades similar to the Jamieson & Smith colorway, and two more of Anne’s design – shades of gray with pops of blue or purple.

Come by the shop to pick out a kit, or select your own color combination – we keep over 100 shades of Shetland Spindrift in stock, so the possibilities are plentiful.

See you there!

Back in stock, show and tell: Shetland Spindrift.

Posted by Julia on April 8, 2019

The appetite for Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift and colorwork knitting in general seems to be growing, if our frequent Jamieson’s orders are any indication. This weekend brought another big box of Shetland Spindrift our way, a classic fingering weight 2-ply shetland wool.

We usually keep around 110 colors in stock, an awe-inspiring selection that we display in big trays, so you can see them all clearly. Because the yarn is so well-suited to stranded colorwork knitting, Jamieson’s makes a staggering 220 colors, and we are happy to special order any of them for you if you don’t see what you’re looking for on our shelves.

We have several patterns in stock for Shetland Spindrift, like Sandy Blue’s “Autumn Tam” and “Midnight Sun Tam,” Churchmouse’s “Wee Wooly Sheep,” and Janine Bajus’s “Redbud” vest.

This yarn is also popular for Gudrun Johnston’s “Bousta Beanie,” a featured pattern for Shetland Wool Week in 2017. This year’s SWW pattern also calls for Shetland Spindrift, and we’re busy putting kits together to make it – more on that soon!

Now for a bit of show and tell – here’s Nancy’s “Efflorescent” shawl, knit with Shetland Spindrift as a sample for a class she offered here at the shop last year. The pattern is from Felicity Ford’s KNITSONIK Stranded Colourwork Playbook, which is bursting with colorful inspiration, along with techniques and patterns. Nancy has graciously lent us the shawl for display, so you can see this work of art in person at our shop.

Kathryn wove this incredible guitar strap on an inkle loom, using Isager Bomuld and Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift.

Kate came in recently wearing her newest sweater, Leila Raabe’s “Stasis” pullover, knit with Shetland Spindrift in the colors Eggshell and Teviot, a charming combination. She made a few modifications for a perfect fit and is rightfully pleased with the outcome – well done, Kate!

Thanks to Nancy, Kathryn, and Kate for sharing their handiwork, and to everyone who starts their projects with a trip to our shop! Look for Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift in the fingering weight section – we can’t wait to see what you make with it!

Marie Wallin’s Shetland.

Posted by Julia on March 15, 2018

Happy to report that Marie Wallin’s Shetland is back in stock!

This exquisite book is full of intricate fair isle designs in a kaleidoscopic array of colors, all knit with the quintessential Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift.

Wallin is a British designer known for her rich colorwork designs, inspired by traditional fair isle knitting, but applied to modern, wearable shapes and styles.

We’ve actually sold out of this book twice now – each batch we’ve ordered has disappeared before I have a chance to snap a photo or write about it here on the blog. Our third batch is half gone as I write this, but fear not – another is on the way!

Look for Shetland on the teacart here at the shop, amidst piles of new books and magazines, full of inspiration for new projects. See you there!

Wool Journey: Shetland.

Posted by Julia on June 24, 2017

Another beautiful new book has arrived! Let’s take a look inside Wool Journey: Shetland.

Wool Journey: Shetland came out of a friendly trip to Shetland taken by designers and yarn shop owners Amber Platzer Corcoran, Jaime Jennings, Malia Mae Joseph, and Stephen West.

This little book is from Pom Pom Press, the folks who bring us the delightful Pom Pom Quarterly, so you wont be surprised to learn that it is beautifully photographed and produced. It’s part travelogue and part travel guide, with a few knitting patterns in the mix, of course. Flip through it to daydream of Shetland.

Look for Wool Journey: Shetland on the teacart here at the shop, surrounded by the latest books and magazines!

A new kind of color card.

Posted by Julia on February 27, 2016

By now, you likely know how we feel about Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift: how perfectly suited it is for colorwork knitting, the vast selection of colors, and my fondness for knitting sweaters with it, in spite of–nay, because of!–its rustic texture.

I’ve loved watching our one little basket of Shetland Spindrift grow into three over the years, as more and more knitters work with this classic yarn and ask for more and more colors. We are only too happy to oblige!

Anne recently ordered a set of Shetland Spindrift mini-skeins, one in each available color. We’re not selling these mini-skeins; rather, they’ll live here at the shop and function as a kind of interactive color card.

We can’t keep all 200+ colors in stock, so we keep the Jamieson’s color card on hand to give you a sense of all that’s available for special order.

While the regular color card is a thing of beauty, and very useful indeed, one gets a better sense of any given color when one can see more of it. You may love that heathered green when you see just a little sliver of it, but find that en masse, it’s just a little too yellow for you. The mini-skeins are small, but they’re still bigger than the snippets on the color card, so when you’re picking out a color that we don’t have in stock, ask for the mini-skeins and get a bigger picture before you place your order.

The other nice thing about the mini-skeins is that you can move them around, line up the five colors you need for your colorwork tam or striped vest and see how they look together.

Here’s an example from Kate Davies’ Colours of Shetland, a book I often flip through, daydreaming about sweaters like this “Ursula Cardigan.” First I pulled a set of mini-skeins that resemble what’s shown in the pattern, just to see how they relate to one another. From there, I began playing with alternate colorways, making a couple with a gradient-like trio of contrast colors, and many more that my camera didn’t capture.

This is a very fun game to play, indeed. Next time you’re planning a colorful project in Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift, let us pull out the mini-skeins so you can play, too!

Shetland show and tell.

Posted by Julia on July 23, 2015

Here’s another bunch of show and tell! All of these projects started their lives as yarns here at the Hillsborough Yarn Shop, and all those yarns have something in common: they’re all composed of 100% Shetland wool, the somewhat prickly stuff that I love so much. It’s not merino-soft, but Shetland wool maintains its shape over time, even as it softens with washing and wearing. Let’s see how these Hillsborough Yarn Shoppers are using it.

Paula came in recently with her finished “Solo,” knit from a Hanne Falkenberg kit. Those of you who have tackled Falkenberg kits know what an accomplishment this is; Falkbenberg’s signature Shetland yarn is a fine gauge, all in garter stitch, which can feel tedious after a while. What’s more, her designs are cleverly, unconventionally constructed, and it’s important to have a good system for tracking row count, increases and decreases. Paula worked diligently on the knitting and the note-keeping, making her “Solo” a real success!

Paula had another bit of Shetland show and tell with her that day, a fair isle tam knit in Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift.

The pattern is from Mary Rowe’s Knitting Tams, a collection of fair isle tams that Paula is finding somewhat addictive. She left the shop after this visit with the makings of at least two more tams, which I hope I can share with you here on the blog as they’re completed.

I recently finished a Shetland sweater, myself, which you wont be surprised to learn is from Kate Davies’ Yokes, a book I can’t stop talking about.

I knit this “Cockatoo Brae” cardigan in Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift, which behaved perfectly in the colorwork and showed no inclination to unravel after I cut the steek.

My only modifications to the pattern were a change in colorway and in buttonband construction. I used Anna Zilboorg’s “perfect buttonhole” technique, from her Knitting for Anarchists and Splendid Apparel books, which was somewhat fiddly but entirely worthwhile. I practiced reinforcing and cutting the steek on my swatch, then picked up along the cut edge to work a few practice buttonholes, which helped me get the hang of it.

A few months ago, I wrote about our ever-expanding selection of colors in Shetland Spindrift, and how each new group of shades reminds me of a particular knitter and project they were special-ordered for. I was so delighted when Anne sent me this photo of one of those projects, now completed. Here’s Stan in his striped sweater, a self-designed recreation of a favorite, well-worn sweater. He dropped in the other day with process swatches for another Shetland project in the works… I can’t wait to see what he makes next.

A hearty thanks to all the fiber artists who start their projects here and share their work with us! We love to see our yarns grow up into finished garments, and are so inspired by the work you do. See you at the shop!

Baa-bles and pom-poms.

Posted by Julia on June 18, 2015

While we were at TNNA, in between swatching new yarns and meeting with vendors, I worked on a colorwork hat. In spite of the long, busy days, the hat was quickly completed, due to the thick, quick-knitting yarn, and the adorable, addictive nature of the pattern.

Here’s my “Baa-ble Hat,” a free pattern designed by Donna Smith for Shetland Wool Week 2015. I knit it in four shades of Jamieson’s Shetland Heather Aran, which has all the wooly charms of its fingering weight cousin, the beloved Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift.

I topped it with this delightfully oversized pom-pom, which I made using what looks to be the largest pom-pom maker available.

I trimmed a good inch or so off of the pom-pom after removing it from this gadget, and still, it’s a rather significant pom-pom.

Anne and I have been getting some serious pom-pom practice of late, making colorful pom-poms for our summer shop window display. We used all different gauges of yarn, from fingering weight to super bulky, sometimes working with two different colors or multiple strands of yarn in any given pom-pom.

It’s a motley group of pom-poms, but now that they’re hanging neatly in the shop window, we’re really quite fond of them, and the whimsical atmosphere they’ve lent the place.

Come by the shop to pick up a pom-pom maker or two–we just got the full range of sizes in stock!

More and more new colors in Shetland Spindrift.

Posted by Julia on April 13, 2015

It’s been about a year since I last wrote about Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift here on the blog. Our little basket of Shetland Spindrift has grown over the past year, as interest in the yarn and in colorwork knitting has grown here at the Hillsborough Yarn Shop.

Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift is a classic fingering weight 2-ply shetland wool. It comes in little 25 gram balls to accommodate fair-isle knitters and their many-colored projects, for they don’t always need much yardage in any one shade.

Shetland Spindrift comes in 200+ colors, and though we can’t have them all in stock, we’re more than happy to order whatever colors you like, in whatever quantity.

We’ve expanded our selection of colors one special request at a time, and now I associate these shades with particular knitters and their projects: a palette of undyed shades for a “Sheep Heid” tam, rich blues and greens to recreate a favorite striped sweater, a few bright shades to perk up a growing stash of Shetland wool for colorwork knitting, autumnal rusts and mossy greens for a series of slip-stitch scarves, and so on.

We’ve seen lots of finished projects in Shetland Spindrift, too. Here’s Ruth in her “Mitered Cardigan,” from Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Knit One, Knit All. With guidance from Nancy during last year’s class on the subject, Ruth knit this unusually-constructed cardigan in record time for such a fine gauge yarn.

One of Shetland Spindrift’s many lovely qualities is the structure it brings to knitted fabric, which is critical for a good-sized garment mostly in garter stitch. I’m certain Ruth’s sweater will look as lovely years from now as it does in this photo.

Here’s my “Puffin,” from Kate Davies’ Colours of Shetland, a sweater that you’ve likely seen on my person if you’ve been by the shop in the past several months. I loved knitting it, love wearing it, and anticipate making another Kate Davies sweater with Shetland Spindrift sometime soon.

Amy brought in her “First Footing,” an elaborate pair of colorwork socks designed by Kate Davies. This half of the pair is currently on display at the shop, so you can get a good look at it while you browse our baskets of Shetland Spindrift.

I know there’s plenty of Shetland Spindrift out there on the needles; we’d love to see what you’re making with it! Come by the shop to share your progress and plan your next project. See you there!

Hanne Falkenberg Trunk Show.

Posted by Julia on October 23, 2014

We’re thrilled to announce that the Hanne Falkenberg Trunk Show arrived early, giving us more time to enjoy these ten beautiful garments!

Hanne Falkenberg is a Danish designer whose patterns come in kits with her signature Shetland yarn, and are often made in garter stitch with flattering short-row shaping and colorful stripes. They are always constructed in surprising ways to intrigue the knitter and compliment the wearer.

Over the years, we’ve had a few Hanne Falkenberg Trunk Shows, each time getting different designs in different colorways. This group includes Falkenberg’s very newest, “Ypsilon,” a short sleeved cardigan decorated with flattering vertical stripes.

We always have a handful of Falkenberg kits in stock at the shop, though the selection changes from time to time.

As I’m writing this, we have “Lascala,” “Luna,” “Lastrada,” and “Mariager” on the shelf, and now “Ypsilon” joins the ranks, in three different color combinations.

There may well be another Falkenberg design you like, or a colorway you prefer; we’re more than happy to order it for you. In fact, during the Trunk Show, we’re offering a 20% discount to those who prepay for their Hanne Falkenberg kit orders!

Come by the shop before November 9th to admire these clever garments, try them on, and place your order!

Just a reminder–all sales are final on discounted items; there can be no exchanges and no returns. Discount applies only to in-store purchases. Thanks!

Fair isle tams.

Posted by Julia on May 31, 2014

If you’ve visited the shop in the past month or two, you may have noticed our stash of Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift front-and-center in the second room. We’ve recently replenished our supply of the stuff, inspiring us to plan some colorwork projects.

I finished knitting the “Autumn Tam” just before we left for TNNA, where we serendipitously encountered its designer, Sandy Blue. I had so much fun knitting it, not only because of the clear, engaging pattern and well-reasoned color combination, but also because I just love this yarn. I’ve already picked out enough for a sweater: “Puffin,” by Kate Davies.

I’m happy to announce that Nancy Cavender is offering a class at the shop on knitting fair isle tams, giving students the choice of Sandy Blue’s “Autumn” or “Midnight Sun” tam patterns. Head to the “Classes” page on our website to sign up now!

We also got a new book on the subject, Mary Rowe’s Knitting Tams: Charted Fair Isle Designs, published by one of our favorites–Schoolhouse Press.

Most of these patterns, like the “Autumn Tam,” are knit in Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift, though a couple of them call for heavier yarns. Anne snapped up a copy of this book the day it arrived, and I can’t blame her; these are exciting patterns for lovers of colorwork.

I’m equally excited about our newly-acquired Jamieson’s color-card, which shows all 200+ shades of Shetland Spindrift. We can’t stock them all here at the shop, but if you’re looking for any colors in particular, do let us know and we’ll be happy to order them for you.

Come by the shop to see our sample “Autumn Tam” and plan a fair isle tam of your own!