Yarnscapade: Vogue Knitting Live, 2016

Two years ago this January, I was freshly arrived in NYC, young, naive, with stars in my eyes.  I hadn't yet found a job and decided to spend my day poking around the legendary Vogue Knitting Live.  Back then I didn't even know how to knit- I was just an enthusiastic crocheter with big, big dreams.

Two years and six jobs later, I'm staring down the barrel of 30 years old and I can not only drive around Queens without a map, but I can also knit the heck out of just about anything.  So, needless to say, it was a very different Miss Mersy that wandered into this year's Vogue Knitting Live festival in Times Square.  Plus, this year I had a friend to go with me!  That's an improvement if ever I heard one! 

We reveled in the colors and the textures!  How fantastic to hear the folks tending the booths say, "Please, touch the yarns- give them a good squish"!

We cuddled merino wools, angora threads, silk yarns blended with milk fiber, even something called sisal.  There were also displays from yarn artists, and we saw needle felted armadillos, knitting needles as big as a person, crocheted tennis shoes, and a  7-foot tall knitted portrait of David Bowie.  

One of the themes that seemed to be quite prevalent this year were a new type of variegated yarn: 

The spinners that we spoke with were saying that it is an excellent way to make pieces with smooth color gradients rather than having too many color changes all throughout leading to color blocks and general color confusion.  The sample knits were really beautiful.  We even saw tiny yarn cakes like this, each one wound so that two identical striped socks could be knit with a single ball of yarn each- how brilliant is that!

It was pretty cool to be surrounded by people who enjoyed stitching- it seems to be a really pleasant crowd.  Relaxed, polite, cheerful.  And with an adorable sense of humor, to boot!

(My personal favorite!)

One of my favorite sights was the Lionbrand summer window display that had been relocated to the festival lobby: 

How completely charming!  Those pineapples are just fantastic!  And it's that kind of joy, cheerfulness, beauty, and touch of humor that makes me happy to be a stitcher!

Have a lovely evening, one and all!

Lots of love,

~Mersydotes