Thursday, December 15th, 2005
You guys must be in the holiday shopping spirit! All the sock yarns are gone already. Phew. I’m off to dye some more this weekend… and then attempt to clean the house for the holidays at home. It has been so crazy busy these past few days with both work and shop stuff that I’ve decided not to go to the guild social tonight — plus, I’d have to bake something which means I’d have to leave work early… Bah. I’m going to go home and watch the Chrismakkuh episode of The O.C. instead. Michelle, want to join me?
But here’s the real content today:
Silky, gorgeous Blue Face Leicester
This is some of my most recent spinning. It’s 100g of handpainted Blue Face Leicester spun up into a two-ply about sportweight. I was so good and precise with this one, splitting the roving into perfect 50g piles, keeping the orientation correct so that when plied, I could maintain the colour blocks. Orange and orangey-red are definitely not my colours but I can’t stop looking at or touching this yarn. Can you tell I’m attached to it?
So, I’ve been thinking about this quite a bit since returning from San Francisco. While shopping at Carolina Homespun, I happened upon a beautiful, gleaming stack of old Spin Off magazines. Of course, I bought one of each issue. In one of the old issues from 1994, there was an article entitled “Why spin?” and profiled several handspinners who specifically did not sell their handspun. One of the spinners even likened selling handspun to prostitution. That’s a pretty heavy duty statement, wouldn’t you say? Well, it left a big impression on me.
Of course, here I am critiquing an article that’s over ten years old, but I think it would have given a more representative picture if the writer had profiled spinners that sell and don’t sell their work. Balance — it’s a good thing.
It (kind of) offended me because I just started selling some of my own handspun a few months ago. Even Paula Simmons in her “Handspinners Guide to Selling” mentions that if you are going to sell your handspun, you should start before you are a fast spinner. And I just recently received a comment from kitkatknit reminding me that it’s only been a year since the first day that I saw someone spinning, ever! But it got me turning this over in my head — why do I spin and why do I sell my handspun?
A couple months ago, I was commiserating with fellow designer, Paula of Black Olive, about how I left a career in pharmacy to do something more creative — something like run my own graphic design studio. Funny how a “creative” career is not so creative on a day-to-day basis. A lot of it is administrating, managing, maintaining… and not creating.
For me, I don’t spin to necessarily make wearable items (Hell, I have enough clothes already!), for relaxation (although it is relaxing), or even for the tactile pleasure of feeling the fibres twist together (although it’s a very nice feeling!). For me, spinning and dyeing gives me the immediate and tactile sensation of designing and creating something. Pushing and pulling colours and textures around until they are just so… making creative decisions about how and what to colour… how thick, thin, smooth, coarse, soft… these are the kinds things that pushed me into design in the first place.
Sometimes, I think I was rescued by spinning.
In 2003, I attended the HOW Design Conference in New Orleans (which was beautiful and amazing) and sat in on a lecture by David Baker (his job is to teach design principals how to manage their studios). He plainly stated, “Your job is not to pick the projects that you find interesting or creative. Your job is to pick the projects that are profitable.” That’s tough love for a girl like me. But, of course, it’s good and sage advice. Then he said, “If you need a creative outlet, find yourself a hobby.” (Hmmm…. mental note…)
Then a couple months ago I started to feel trapped by the whole commercial yarn and pattern industry. Every time a new Rowan/Phildar/Rebecca/IK mag came out, I’d think “OMG, I have to knit that”. Really? What it really meant was that I had to shell out $100 per pattern per magazine for yarn every couple months. And why? To look like everybody else? Gee, I can do that by shopping at Banana Republic for much less effort (not a dig, I love the BR). Call me a rebel, but I think I’d like to create something beautiful, timeless and unique with my time and energy.
Why do I sell my handspun? Because it’s a fire hazard if I leave it around the house? To subsidize my increasingly expensive hobby? To collaborate with a knitter in the creation of something unique? All of the above? Or maybe it’s so that I can become a better spinner. Constant practice. Somewhere I read that it takes roughly seven years, working eight hours a day, to become a master at what you do. I’m working on it.
How about you? Why do you spin? Do you sell your handspun and if you don’t, are you offended by people who do? I hadn’t intended this to be a new meme or anything, but I’d love to hear your thoughts.
