Table of contents for Summer 2023 in Spin-Off

For me, sitting down to mend a small hole in a sweater or reinforce the heel of a sock feels like a breath of fresh air. A hot cup of tea. A good laugh on a dreary day. The few moments of focus and care and creativity might be fleeting, but the results are tangible and lasting. And mending with my handspun makes me feel like I’ve stitched a bit of myself into the textiles that surround me. This isn’t to say that I always found darning and patching to be fast or fun. There was a time when I loved the idea of mending, but it felt complicated and fussy. Once I realized that much of my reluctance was worry that I would “do it wrong,” I had to laugh.…

1 Heels aren’t the only spot where fabrics can wear thin. Silvan Woodturning makes getting into tight spaces simple with the glove darner, handcrafted from beechwood. silvanwoodturning.etsy.com 2 Tackling misplaced stitches is easy with this seam ripper from Papa Jack’s Woodworks. Hand-turned and available in a variety of woods, this tool’s slim design makes it comfortable to hold, and the working end fits into the handle for safe travel. papajackswoodworks.etsy.com 3 Needles are essential to any stitching project. Tulip’s tapestry needles are available in a variety of sizes (assorted set is shown here). These needles have a smooth finish, from the golden eyes to the rounded, blunt tips, allowing them to glide through knitted fabric. needlepointjoint.com 4 This vibrant batt from Chameleon Fiber is made from a blend of recycled…

If you’re interested in yarn and textiles (I’m guessing you are) and spend time on social media, you’ve probably seen a darning loom recently. These helpful little tools have taken the internet by storm as menders share the charm of a palm-sized loom that creates colorful patches. Considering some of the creative mending results, it’s easy to see why they are so popular! A colorful plaid patch on a beloved item of clothing is beautiful, not only aesthetically but also because visible mends often represent a joyful moment of quiet creativity on the part of the mender. I love seeing an increasing number of people make the choice to repair and lengthen the lives of their clothes! Woven patches can be created without a loom, but like most tasks, having the…

As the owner of a fiber arts school and supply center, Red Stone Glen, I see many used spinning wheels pass through our studio. Some have been well loved by a single owner for many decades, earning a patina that speaks of love and commitment. Others are just starting their journey with a new owner; they are perhaps wheels that have stood the test of time and survived potentially hundreds of years of use or disuse. Antique spinning wheels are common here in south-central Pennsylvania and, in fact, the whole mid-Atlantic region, where spinning wheels were first recorded in the American colonies about four hundred years ago.1 Each time a student arrives at one of my beginning spinning classes with an eager face and enthusiastic presentation of a used wheel, I…

If you were part of the fiber community in the mid to late 1980s, you most likely owned or were aware of Kaffe Fassett’s first book, Glorious Knits. About that time, I had just landed in San Francisco and worked part-time at San Francisco Fiber, a retail store catering to knitters, weavers, and spinners. Although my primary work was production weaving, many of us did it all on some level. This book was a hot commodity, and everyone I knew was talking about it. What Fassett offered was a relaxed and joyful approach to colorwork that inspired, regardless of which medium you were working in. I have never been a dyer of highly variegated yarns, but that said, I usually find a solid, levelly dyed yarn boring. I think this…

Despite one’s best intentions as a maker, there is always at least one sweater, shawl, or top that simply doesn’t work for whatever reason(s). An unusually large nemesis for me was an intricately patterned, turquoise alpaca sweater. It was my first sweater that used complicated stitch patterns. You know the type: all cables and lace. I was so proud of that sweater, and yet it looked terrible on me! What went wrong with my sweater? To begin with, it was too big. When I started knitting the sweater, I didn’t realize my substituted alpaca yarn would stretch more during knitting than the pattern yarn. My first learning point was that when planning projects, make swatches that cover several pattern repeats to evaluate how the yarn works. Another problem was that…

On Mending: Stories of Damage and Repair Celia Pym Stroud, UK: Quickthorn Books, 2022. Modern Mending: How to Minimize Waste and Maximize Style Erin Lewis-Fitzgerald Tunbridge Wells, UK: Search Press, 2021. Darning: Repair, Make, Mend Hikaru Noguchi Stroud, UK: Quickthorn Books, 2019. Make Thrift Mend: Stitch, Patch, Darn, Plant-Dye, & Love Your Wardrobe Katrina Rodabaugh New York: Abrams Books, 2021. The Mending Directory: Over 50 Modern Stitch Patterns for Visible Repairs Erin Eggenburg Tunbridge Wells, UK: Search Press, 2021. Spinning Wheel Mechanics Video course Amy Tyler learn.longthreadmedia.com, 2023.…

There are many ways fiber can get sticky, compacted, entangled, or even felted before it is spun into yarn. If you’re washing or dyeing your own fibers, the dyepot might have boiled, too much citric acid could have been used, or maybe you accidentally agitated the fiber a little too vigorously when rinsing—these are all things I’ve learned from experience. Whether you buy wool from an indie dyer, dye it yourself, send fiber off to the mill, or shear it right off the sheep, it can get felted somewhere along the line before you’re ready to spin it. This kind of damage happens even when the fiber just sits around our homes. Fibers in our stashes may be moved from one place to another, and they can get jostled around…

Whether you remake, renew, recycle, or reuse, mending is as important as ever, and spinners have it covered. Visible mending can add a pop of color and a good dose of character to any wardrobe staple or stilluseful object. Whether visible or invisible, we love seeing your mends using handspun! We asked you, our readers, to show us your mends, and here are two of our favorites. Go to LT.Media/Mend-Gallery to see more! Show Your Sweater a Little TLC MIRIAM FELTON I have a favorite sweater that I toss on when I’m a little chilly. I putter around the house in it; I throw it on under a jacket for an extra layer. I shove it in my bag when I’m not sure if my top-floor studio will be cold…

Consider recycled yarns for your colorwork projects. I recently had the opportunity to ravel a pullover that I knitted almost 40 years ago. It had some moth damage over the years and just seemed to need a new life. The yarn was spun from some New Zealand wool that most likely was Romney, Border Leicester, or Coopworth. It was a beautiful gray fleece with multiple shades of dark to silver gray. I just grabbed from different fiber piles without carding to spin into a simple singles yarn. I have begun raveling, rewinding skeins, and rejuvenating the yarn by scouring and blocking on a niddy-noddy. To date, I have used it to knit two hats, one pair of socks, and a pair of mittens. This yarn dyes beautifully, and the sample…

Most sock knitters—especially those who spin to knit—accumulate a stash of tiny balls of precious sock yarn, kept on hand in case an old pair springs a leak. If you’re like me, you may find that these bits and bobs of fiber not only tend to share a similar grist but even feature harmonious colorways! So why not mingle your collection of sock-weight handspun yarn snippets in one project? As little as 4 yards of yarn of any number of plies can create an adorable diamond in the ultimate “make-do” socks. Gather up all your tiny balls and miniskeins and work a leg’s worth of memories together, along with a flat instep. Then you’ll be ready to work a fully replaceable sole: simply pick up stitches on all sides of…

Some suspended spindles (often calleddrop spindles) have hooks to assist with making handspun yarn, while others might have notches or nothing at all. Hooked spindles are very common today, and spinners often find that a well-made hook is a quick and easy way to secure the yarn during spinning. Whether you’re a novice or an experienced spinner, suspended spindles will fall to the floor from time to time as we spin. Our trusty spindles often travel with us, too, so they might get smashed in the bottom of a tote or jostled in a suitcase. As both a spinner and a woodturner, I know how important it is for our spindles to be in alignment. Even a slightly bent hook can lead to an irritating spindle wobble. Hooked spindles may…

Fiber and materials Frabjous Fibers Bluefaced Leicester, Chipotle colorway; 16" pillow insert. Fiber/preparation Combed top organized into strips for a fractal variation. Wheel Schacht Ladybug, single drive, scotch tension. Drafting method Short-forward draw. Singles direction Z-twist. Ply wraps per inch 13. Total yardage About 480 yards. Yarn classification/weight DK/worsted. Yardage used 440 yards. Loom Schacht Flip 24" with an 8-dent heddle. Finished size Woven fabric finished at 161/4" × 40" plus short fringe. Throw-pillow covers are quick and easy projects to weave up and complete with very simple sewing. The envelope style means the cover is easily removable for washing or to change with the seasons. I am a new spinner, and the yarn I spin ranges from a thin DK to worsted weight as a two-ply. This shift in weight isn’t…

1 With hooks that are mounted to a strip of fabric, Lemon Loom’s unique design allows you to secure the mending loom directly to your surface, regardless of the shape, size, or thickness of the textile. lemonloom.com 2 From moth damage to worn elbows, holes come in all shapes and sizes. Katrinkles offers three sizes of darning looms: Tiny, Smaller, and Bigger (shown here). The Bigger measures a generous 4 inches across to tackle large areas in need of repair or decoration. katrinkles.com 3 The original darning loom known as the Speedweve has seen a recent revival, but vintage originals can be hard to locate. Alexonver’s take on this vintage design is a lasting addition to any crafter’s toolbox. alexonver.etsy.com 4 Bohin has been making fine needles in France since…

Swiss darning is one of the easiest mending techniques to learn and one that you’ll use often if your life is full of knitted fabrics—handmade or otherwise. The technique is essentially working a new yarn over the top of a row of knitted stitches, which is how it earned its other name: duplicate stitch. However, I will use the term Swiss darning here because I turn the rows in a way that greatly aids in creating a smooth, strong mend. There are many mending and darning techniques, but what makes Swiss darning special is that the new knitted stitches stretch in the same directions as the knitted base. Adding a woven darn to a knitted fabric creates an area with less elasticity. Choosing the right mending method depends on what you…

When I finally had room in my life to learn to spin, I wasn’t surprised at how much I loved it. What did surprise me is how much I would come to rely on it. Since I retired from my work as an art therapist, spinning has become my go-to self-care activity for all kinds of challenges. When I spin, I feel better. Grief lightens, worry calms, and loneliness subsides. My spinning experience has been so profound that I decided to talk to others who spin to cope, collecting many touching stories in the process. I also decided to turn to my therapy profession to find research that explains what is happening in our bodies and our brains while we spin. With these insights, the possibilities for managing life challenges…