A-Z Of British Fibre
This month, we wanted to celebrate the wonder of natural fibre, so here’s the lowdown on everything from Alpaca to Zwartbles!
Alpaca
Soft, hypoallergenic and even stronger than sheep’s wool, British Alpaca creates a fluffy yet resilient yarn with excellent thermal properties and a feeling of luxury with its silky texture.
Bluefaced Leicester
With their trademark long curly locks the Bluefaced Leicester has a fleece that is perfect for handknitting. This is wool that has the ability to create a gorgeous drapey knitted fabric. Bluefaced Leicester sheep have quite a distinctive look as their name suggests!
Corriedale
Corriedale are a sheep known for their dense fleece made up of medium-fine wool. With a high yield producing wool and good length and softness this is a yarn perfect for spinners. Originally bred in Australia and New Zealand, they are now firmly a British favourite and their fleece is used in the new John Arbon yarn, Yarnadelic.
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Dorset Down
One of the oldest breeds of native British sheep, Dorset Down sheep have a white, springy and extremely high-quality wool. The short fibred fleece of the Dorset Down is often used in the blending of other wools in order to give crispness and improved handle.
Easy care
It has never been easier to care for your wool. With delicate wool wash, superwash wool options and many natural fibres to choose from it is always possible to tend to your garments with ease and at a moment’s notice.
Fair Isle
By using a variety of differently-coloured fine yarn a knitter is able to create the traditional, beautiful and intricate patterns originating from the Fair Isle. Fair Isle gained global popularity in the 1920s when Prince Edward VIII first began to sport Fair Isle jumpers in the public eye.
Grading
The process of grading fleeces to ensure only to best quality fleece gets the highest price is essential to ensuring quality. Fleeces are graded into “types” rather than specific breeds in order to provide the right fleece for the right product.
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Herdwick
The native breed of the central and western Lake District and regarded as the hardiest of the British sheep breeds, Herwick are born with a black fleece that becomes grey with age and this wool is used primarily used in carpets and rugs or rugged knitwear.
Indie dyers
Whether from a dye studio or even a home kitchen, indie dyers bring the best out of yarn with inventive and ingenious colourways and dying techniques. Quality, fun and a sense of personality are all abound in the wonderful world of the indie dyer! We love these shades from Eden Cottage Yarns.
Jacob
Popular with spinners, and filling a special niche in the market due to its naturally coloured wool, this is a fleece used in a wide range of textiles including garments and carpets. The unique colour of this sheep’s fleece makes every garment special.
www.site.jacobsheepsociety.com
Kerry Hill
A sturdy and adaptable sheep, their wool is perfect for upholstery and furnishing fabrics. With a short, dense fleece and distinctive head markings these sheep are mostly found in Wales and Central England. Fleece from Kerry Hill/Bluefaced Leicester cross sheep is used for WYS’s Re:Treat chunky yarn.
Llama
With an inner coat that is the perfect softness for garments and handicrafts, a Llama’s outer coat is rough and used mostly for rugs, wall-hangings and even ropes. Closely related to the Alpaca, their fleeces are less fluffy than their long-necked cousins.
Moordale
This beautiful British yarn is made up of Bluefaced Leicester combined with Alpaca makes this yarn soft and tender, yet strong and robust meaning this is a great yarn for any garment. This yarn comes in gorgeous complimentary shades and has fantastic pattern support.
Naturally coloured fleece
Naturally coloured fleece contains intriguing hues and fascinating textures that make it perfect for a unique garment. Ideal for those spinners, weavers and knitters who want to feel closer to the source of their wool as well as add some gorgeous natural tones in their work.
Oxford Down
Formerly classified as an at-risk breed, this lovely sheep is growing in numbers, with support from the Rare Breed society. You can buy a limited-edition aran weight Oxford Down yarn from Blacker Yarns.
Prince Charles’s Wool Week
In recent years, Prince Charles has been one of the greatest champions of real wool. He initiated the Campaign for Wool, in order to raise awareness amongst consumers about the unique, natural, renewable and biodegradable benefits offered by the fibre.
Quality
At Knit Now, we’re often asked how knitters can be sure of the quality of wool. One way is to look for the British Wool crook mark logo, which tells you the fleece your yarn is spun from comes from the UK and has been graded by the BWMB to ensure consistent quality.
Renewable
One of the very best things about using natural British fibre is that it’s renewable! Manmade fibres are often made from oil or other unsustainable products, but wool, mohair and alpaca grow naturally and the animals can be shorn year after year!
Shetland
Our editor Kate’s love of Shetland yarn is no secret, so we couldn’t miss this breed out. The sheep are tiny and adorable and their fleece is incredibly fine and soft. It’s available in a huge range of shades from Jamiesons of Shetland (www.jamiesonsofshetland.co.uk) and Jamieson & Smith (www.shetlandwoolbrokers.co.uk).
Three Bears Yarn
This great company has brought British-spun cotton back to the handknitting market! All of their yarn is spun and dyed in the UK, and their Bluefaced Leicester wool is grown here too – we used it for the Kallax Cowl in Issue 92.
Uist Wool
Based on the Isle of Uist in the Outer Hebrides, this mill’s purpose is to ensure a legacy of wool production in the area. The mill produces warm and lofty hand-knitting yarn in a range of natural shades in 4-ply, DK and aran.
Valais Blacknose
They’re known as the cutest sheep in the world and although the hearts of the Knit Now team belong to our native Shetlands and Wensleydales, we have to admit they are pretty adorable! Originally from Switzerland, there are now several flocks in the UK.
www.valaisblacknosesheepsociety.co.uk
West Yorkshire Spinners
This lovely brand has become one of the leading lights in British hand-knitting in recent years because they champion British fibre. All of their yarn is spun and dyed at their own mill and we love knitting with it!
X-breed
In recent years, lots of new cross-breeds of sheep have become popular, such as the North of England mule which has a Bluefaced Leicester father and a Swaledale mother. This is the UK’s most popular breeding ewe, due to its hardiness and renowned mothering ability.
Yeavering Bell
This stunning yarn from Whistlebare is a blend of fibres from their own angora goats Wensleydale sheep. It’s truly unique and one of our favourite British yarns.
Zwartbles
This sheep breed originates in the Netherlands. The fibre is springy and has a lovely natural brown hue. It can be blended with other wools to create an interesting yarn, such as Daughter of a Shepherd Ram Jam Worsted. www.daughterofashepherd.com
Free Garment Patterns - Perfect for British Yarn
Have we inspired you to knit with a new fibre? Why not make one of these gorgeous garments? All of our garment patterns include plus sizes. You can dowload all of these patterns for free here.