Hilbre island

Today, we welcome our colleague Maylin, who is here to tell us about how she found inspiration in her local landscape for her own colourful Painted Cave . . .

When Kate first showed me her Painted Cave design and explained the inspiration behind the Davaar collection, I immediately thought of a favourite walk out to the tidal islands closest to where I live.

Across the Mersey river from Liverpool is the Wirral Penisula, and on the other side of that is the Dee River.  And just where the two start to flow into the Irish Sea are a series of three little tidal islands – Little Eye, Middle Eye and Hilbre Island.  You can walk to all three when the tide is low from West Kirby; the distance is just under two miles.

The main geological feature of the islands is red sandstone and this influenced my choice of the Backen shade of Milarrochy Tweed for the main colour of my version

For the yoke, I wanted to highlight two blues: Ardlui and Lochan . . .

. . . recalling not only the water that surround the islands, but also the colour of the crushed seashells you’ll be crunching on during your walk.

Around these tidal islands, there are small caves to explore, just like at Davaar. . . .

. . . including Lady’s Cave, so called because legend has it that a woman on her way to Wales and an unwanted, arranged marriage, threw herself overboard upon hearing that her true love had been killed, and was washed up in the cave.  The caves were also used for smuggling in the nineteenth century.

The islands are currently uninhabited but there were monks living there during the eleventh and twelfth century,  a telegraph station with keeper’s cottage was built in the early nineteenth century, and it became a nature reserve and bird observatory in the middle of the twentieth.

Fossil footprints have been found in the rocks of vertebrates from the Triassic era, but these are likely to be from smaller creatures than dinosaurs. 

It’s a great spot for bird watching – oystercatchers, curlews, terns and storm petrels are common and other breeds use the islands as stopping points in their migration towards more northern islands.  

You can also spot grey seals at certain times of the day and you have a wonderful view towards North Wales and the Great Orme, with the Snowdonia range of mountains in the distance.

I like to think that maybe Archibald MacKinnon, who worked for a time at the Birkenhead shipyards on the Wirral after leaving Campbeltown for reasons outlined in Kate’s essay, also made the walk out to Hilbre Island and maybe it reminded him of his regular trips to Davaar.

Thanks, Maylin, for sharing your walk to Hilbre, and these photos of your gorgeous sweater!

You can find all the details of Maylin’s sweater on her Ravelry project page

We will be closing pre-orders for the Davaar book this Saturday – but it’s available to order until then!