I got this flax from ‘Berta’s Flax’, a guild set up by Christiane Seufferlein in order to preserve the tradition of flax working and to honour women’s lives. You can find out more about it here. Thank you Christiane. The flax belonged to Rosa Höglinger (Mühel, Sarleinsbach) who was married to husband Max. You can see a picture of her taken in 1949 here. Unfortunately, not much is known about her. This flax would have

I’m not perfect and have a lot to learn, so can only probably claim that I am moving towards more environmentally friendly dyes. The post linked here is probably the best in terms of a lot of reasonably easy to understand information mainly regarding synthetic dyes and mordants: http://www.pburch.net/dyeing/dyeblog/C1307213733/E20120720121139/index.html When using synthetic dyes, I usually use Procion MX. As the article says, compared to some other dyes, these are a lot less harmful for the

I’ve been spinning up this stuff and trying it out to see if it goes through my knitting machine. It is carbonised bamboo, sometimes known as black gold, or black diamond. It’s not the same as dyed black bamboo fibre. It’s made in a different way and feels and looks differently. This stuff is gunmetal grey in colour rather than a pure dark black, it also has a low sheen. When spinning it feels sort

While, on this site I do sell wool which is not connected to the meat industry (that is, not from sheep sold for slaughter nor used for breeding), many people would say that is wrong. Why? A strong argument against using wool at all is made here. Basically, it’s claimed that using wool at all encourages humans think it’s ok to exploit other species. I have a lot of sympathy with this argument but still

I have been trying to spin yarn fine enough to go through my antique/vintage sock machines, and thought I’d try with wool from this young man above. This is Dexter who lives at The Same Star Sheep Sanctuary. The picture is from their Facebook page; if you are on Facebook, check them out and see the amazing work they do. They are a sanctuary in Norfolk and, as they say, providing a safe home for