Category: Posts of Note
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Elizabeth’s hands
We’ve just heard that one of Tom’s photographs has been shortlisted in this year’s EEF Manufacturing Photo Competition! The theme of the competition this year is “Made by Britain, Loved by the World” and surely few manufactured products speak better to that theme than Shetland wool? A fibre raised and processed in a particular locale;…
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season of mists
I’ve probably said this a few times, but it often strikes me as curious how, in the past few years I’ve been transformed from someone for whom Autumn was her most detested season to genuine enjoyment of this time of year. As a city-dwelling lecturer whose mood disorder had developed seasonal associations, I utterly loathed…
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then and now
Last week I was in a bookshop in Glasgow, perusing the outdoor bookshelves, and became absorbed in a tome about the West Highland Way. “Is this you getting ready, then?” asked a friendly assistant, assuming I was preparing myself for a 96 mile walk. “No,” I replied, “I actually walked the West Highland Way back…
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Scottish Smallholder Festival
Last year I had the very great pleasure of meeting Rosemary Champion. As well as producing wonderful local yarn and meat from her own Rosedean Ryelands, Rosemary is a huge source of inspiration and advice to folk all over Scotland (and beyond) as The Accidental Smallholder. If you have any sort of interest in raising…
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A short film from Malin Head
Good morning! I thought you might like to see a short film Tom shot at Malin Head last week. I really hope you like it! One of our hopes for this year’s club was to be able to introduce you to the Scottish landscape which inspired my collection – and with that aim Tom has…
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ashbery
We’ve been away and when I returned I learned that John Ashbery had died. I’ve long enjoyed his work. Aged 17, I’d decided that American poetry was my thing, and was away to University to study it. The teenage me was a little obsessed with Ashbery – initially taken in by his conversational tone, by…
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Jenny Jones
Over the years I’ve gathered a small collection of knitting ephemera. This includes a few different styles of the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century sticks, wisps and sheaths (used throughout Britain for supported knitting) and different kinds of representations–largely photographs or prints–of knitting all over Britain. Such representations do not afford some sort of transparent window onto…
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representing my local landscape (a post from Tom)
Hello. It’s Tom here. Kate is sat outside knitting a new design (and muttering something about modified raglans), so I thought I’d chip in here for once. When I’m not busy taking photos or handling day to day business matters, I’m responsible for the graphic and design work here at KDD – creating everything from…
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Blidö weekend
What would your ideal weekend involve? Picking and eating delicious wild strawberries? Discovering a beautiful landscape on foot? And getting to spend some quality time with its inhabitants? (The Roslagsfår sheep are so sweet . . . as are their characterful piggy neighbours!) Visiting an exceptionally well cared-for wee museum and hearing all about island…
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all aboard!
Hello! I’ve just returned from a fantastic week in Sweden. I was primarily there to conduct some research for my new book. This went very well indeed, and I’ll say more about it another time, but, thanks entirely to the warmth and hospitality of my new friend Kristin, the week turned out to contain so…
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Ottar
Working on a book can be full of surprises. I did not think, when I set out to write a chapter about tools and objects and the way my attitude to the material world changed after my stroke, that I would end up being inspired by an amazing feminist anarcho-syndicalist . . . but weirdly…
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Odradek
Thankyou for all your comments on the Albert Anker post. I have to say that I find his work deeply moving – as someone who knits and makes, as well as someone who knows what it means to recover their creative abilities following a stroke. I should also mention that I too was very interested…
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working hands
I’ve recently been writing about teaching my left hand to work again following my stroke. Because of this, I’ve been thinking very carefully about braiding hair, and knitting socks, about how it felt, and what it meant to re-instruct my hand (whose memory of habitual movement had been completely lost) in those activities. I’ve also…
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are you domesticated?
Without doubt the best thing about this whole blogging thing is the dialogue it enables. Under its first name of “needled”, I started this blog ten years ago, and over the past decade I’ve met some of my best friends and colleagues through this online space. Many of you correspond with me, and though it…
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paying attention
Tom and I are currently working hard on separate projects. Tom is developing some of his studio techniques, exploring different ways of depicting the textural qualities of vegetables and flowers. I’m writing about my recovery from stroke, and for the past fortnight have been working on a chapter specifically about my left hand, and the…
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patients and doctors
I have been doing a lot of reading and writing of late. It feels like a total luxury to be spending my days with books and words and I am enjoying it immensely. As well as writing a good chunk of my own book, I have enjoyed reading a lot of other people’s work. I’ve…