New Tools

Working with RECYCLED New Zealand RIMU, these knitting needles have been hand-turned and carved from old railway sleepers, then ebonised for this beautiful blackened finish. Each pair is unique. Essential tools for Construction Knitting. Available in Sydney from Shelf Life and The Society Inc , in Melbourne at Cottage Industry, Craft Victoria and Pop Craft.

WOOLI

My new bespoke yarn arriving into stores very soon - next week in fact. Ahhh boy, its taken months to develop this yarn, nothing's ever easy! It is a very clever yarn if I must say so myself; it's made from recycled fibres from factory remnants - but this is no rubbish; it's CASHMERE, SILK, ALPACA, WOOL, & being New Zealand, a bit of POSSUM. I was beside myself when I spied a rainbow of waste yarn sitting there at the spinning mill, I have no idea where it would have ended up otherwise, but I'd like to think that I've rescued it from being landfill or becoming a removalist blanket (although I think these are pretty cool).






These beautiful fibres have been mixed together and spun into a bulky roving style yarn. It's a bit tweedy where its got these little specs of multicolour dotted through a heathered GREIGE colour, which is all the colours mixed together. This WOOLI yarn has all the beautiful characteristics of each natural fibre; the luxurious softness of CASHMERE, the lustre of SILK, the warmth of ALPACA, the spring of WOOL, and the lightness of POSSUM. I have dyed colours too; black, grey, & burgundy; the multicolour specs are still prominent in these colours. Now here I know I'm revealing myself to be a yarn nerd, but I am so &*^#@$#% excited about this yarn, I hope you are too.







This is a bulky yarn for chunky knitting and you can knit CONSTRUCTION NO1 & CONSTRUCTION NO2 with it, but I have designed also a Construction No 3 for WOOLI, so I will unveil this shortly too. The yarn will come in Jumbo balls for CONSTRUCTION NO3.

New Knitting Construction

Construction No 3. Knitting Pattern and a new Bespoke Yarn UNVEILED SOON......

Knitted Joanie Lamp

Great Design Files post on Lightly, including pics of our recent collaboration on the knitted Joanie lamp.

Knitting Symposium

Made a presentation at Auckland University Knitting Symposium ; keynote speaker was the eponymous author Sandy Black. Sandy is from the London College of Arts; amazing woman, she has a wealth of knowledge of knitting and was a true inspiration to meet. So at the symposium many issues were discussed, about industry, innovation and education; and how these can be improved for the future. With representatives from all of these, there were some really interesting insights. There were discussions that went round and round the issues of technology advancing beyond the innovation applied to it, which leaves a big gap in creativity meeting industry; and why?!
In my opinion one of the key points that was raised was "why do we not train our knitwear designers to program the machines, and shouldn't it be part of the curriculum?" True; I mean to get a graphic design degree, one has to know the design programs, right!? I hope, truly hope; that whatever changes are implemented over time, that the perception of knitting is changed too, and for it to be considered as a valid design discipline that takes just as much enquiry as any design process.

Portman's Window

If you're on a Melbourne city tram one of these rainy days (sigh! I miss you Melbourne) and you think you just spotted in the corner of your eye a lot of cozy looking fluff hanging in the Portman's window; you weren't imagining it. I've made them plenty of wooli pom-poms, braids and tassels to drape their windows for the launch of their knitwear collections this week.

Urbis Design Day

Urbis Design Day is a big industry event in Auckland; collaborators of fashion and furniture designers transform showrooms into installation soirees of experiential design that involves an extravaganza of food, wine and object. Taylor paraded my knits with her winter collection, and I quote here from Thread: "The highlight of the Taylor clothing was the Nikki Gabriel handknits which were our best pick fashion wise for the whole day. NZ design at its best."
- woah!

Joanie's Lamp

A new collaboration with Lightly - working on cozy-ing up the Belle Lamp Frame , I've designed a knitted wool-angora lampshade that reminisces Swedish 70's craft. Using circular knitting technology the product chews up some knitting time so its still quite a limited edition production in that it's a slow production. First featured at Life-In-Style in Sydney 2 weeks ago, Joanie is it's name and you can see it at Lightly's new retail premises in Collingwood.

Taylor Boutique

2 big cartons of Winter Knits went out to Taylor Boutique yesterday; ready to be racked for the In-Store Launch at the Ponsonby store this Saturday. I'm looking forward to meeting some Aucklanders over some champagne and nibblies.

Fashion Quarterly

New Zealand's Fashion Quarterly magazine celebrating my trips out to the farmers fields looking for sheep and wool. And a few pages later the lovely Nga Waita reveals her wardrobe secrets, wearing one of my new winter cardigans upside down, and Zambesi of course.

Work

These Winter pieces are taking on their own celestial-like forms as they consume the studio; I can barely move in here its like sharing a space with lots of winged creatures.

Dictionary of Dyeing

I received this awesome present from my husband. A first edition print (1862) of 'A Dictionary of Calico Printing and Dyeing' by Charles O'Neill. This out-of-print book he found at the Antiquarian Bookshop, which for me is one of the most amazing places to spend time in in Melbourne.

I love the references to the guilds O'Neill was member to; Fellow of the Chemical Society of London, Member of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester. I think it was the fashionable thing for the 'free thinkers' of this time to be part of a guild; the early 1900's Arts & Crafts community was abuzz with new research & discovery, disbanding superstition for science.

My favorite part of this book so far is the 4 page description of BLACK,
"In a philosophical point of view black is not a colour. It is the abscence of colour, or the extinction or absorption of all the coloured rays of light, ........ There is no purely black body; such a body would be perfectly invisible, since it would neither emit nor reflect any rays of light by which it could be seen.".... it goes onto describe how to achieve black..... "The famous family of the Gobelines, whose success in dyeing was imputed to supernatural assistance, produced their best blacks by a mixture of the elementary colours - red, blue and yellow."
So the cloth was dipped first with red (pure madder), then blue (pure indigo), then yellow (weld), apparently producing a very perfect, but expensive black.

I'ts got me intruged - invisible cloth! - Although I might not be able to find the ingredients for some of these recipes, eg:
'DEEP HAT BLACK' for Silk without Galls.
2lbs. fustic chips,
1 lb, quecitron back
6 oz verdigriz,
6 oz copperas

Doesn't matter, I'm still finding it fascinating reading; and what a treasure to have, all wrapped in plastic in a protective acid free box.

Darker Work

Hair and Make-up by the lovely Cushla Bower, and photography by Chiappin.

Work

sneak preview of winter11.

Play and Rest....

Urewera National Park in New Zealand: The turangawaewae of the Tuhoe People, overlooked by the celestial Mist Maiden Hine Pukoku Rangi.


4 days of walking and camping through this amazing part of New Zealand. It was soooo still here that it felt otherworldly at times. I learnt after the walk that " 'The Patupaiarehe' - the fair-skinned fairy people, are believed to be everywhere in the Urewera forests - mystical spirits that shadow intruders who invade their sacred haunts..... and one can hear their feint singing above the sighs and murmurs of the breeze." Paul Rush, Herald on Sunday 26 Dec.
I couldn't help but stop and touch as often as I could; delicate wispy mosses that cascaded off little branches. Oh the inspiration for knitting textiles from this mesmerizing vast place. If I had a needle and thread on me I could have made some little dresses from all the petite foilage found on the forest floor and left them as gifts. I didn't hear any singing but sometimes wondered if we were being watched.