From fleece to yarn
The particular wool we are working with comes to us from Christine Crofts. We have been very privileged to be invited to visit Christine at her home and wool workshop, and learn a bit more about the processes involved.
The Herdwick fleeces are purchased from farmers by the Wool Marketing Board. They in turn sell fleeces to the mills for spinning into yarn and other processes such as felting.
Christine gets her Herdwick yarn from a mill in Yorkshire, which supplies batches to her own specifications (as well as standard rug wool, she has been experimenting with a 'super-twisted' yarn, which quite different characteristics). Each batch may comprise wool from several flocks - it is all graded and blended for processing - but being Herdwick, it comes in four natural colours: EXTRA DARK, DARK, MEDIUM and LIGHT.
Most of the wool is used in its natural colours, but Christine gets enormous pleasure from producing unique shades by hand-dyeing the wool. Given the variety of dyes available, and the fact that there are four natural shades to start with, the colours she produces are numerous, subtle, beautiful and vibrant. Knowing that the colours you can handle and wear have been produced by hand in the open air in a beautiful garden-setting in the heart of Cumbria, using only pure rainwater collected on site, adds enormously to their piquancy.
Christine showed us the whole dyeing process: she made it seem so totally straightforward and simple that we could tell it has taken years of practical hands-on experience to achieve the effects which she so obviously enjoys!
She dyes her yarns in 1kg batches. Given that a ball of rug wool is about 100g, that means only ten balls of each particular shade. And of course she dyes primarily for her own rugs. So that hand-dyed HerdwickyTIE of yours is pretty much unique....
And the funniest thing of all? The Wool Marketing Board used to regard Herdwick as 'poor wool' as it could not be dyed. True, we suppose, if you are after a solid, consistent colour, but where's the fun in that??
