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Selvedge Magazine Vol. 98

"If you have ever taken out your knitting on a train you will have first-hand experience of the magnetic pull of a ball of wool. There is something about knitting in public that attracts people; their curiosity overwhelms them and before you know it a conversation has connected you.  As we have learned over the last year textile making can be a wonderful solo occupation, calming and almost meditative, knitting lowers the heart rate more than any other hobby. It is the connection textiles have to the community that Selvedge is concentrating on in this issue. The relatively low cost and simplicity of the equipment and materials needed for textile work make them an ideal catalyst for group projects; everything from a quilting bee to the ambitious furnishing of the iconic Timberline Lodge undertaken by Margery Hoffman Smith and a team of untrained volunteers during the great depression in 1930s America.

We see the textiles at the heart of lively communities around the world from the Icelandic Réttir to the tentmakers in Sharia al-Khayamiya, Cairo. When communities are isolated we see the level of sophistication increases exponentially, for example in the weft-faced backstrap weaving practiced by the Q’ero in Peru and in the namesake knitting produced in Fair Isle. Textiles work is an ideal medium for cooperative activity as Aïssata Namoko explains in our article 'Out of a Clear Blue Sky'. " - Polly Leonard, Founder & Editor of Selvedge Magazine

Dimensions: 9.37" x 9.37" x 0.25"