Un-Convention 2020 is the Knitting & Crochet Guild’s first virtual convention. Running from this Wednesday 9th September to Tuesday 15th September 2020, the convention has a broad range of free events across the seven-day schedule, including speakers familiar from KHF conferences. Videos with closed captions (subtitles) will be available on Youtube and you can also join in on the Guild’s Facebook group, Ravelry KCG or follow the hashtag #unconventionkcg on Instagram. Visit the Un-convention 2020 website to see the exciting programme in full.
Knitting History Forum AGM and Conference 2020
Saturday 7th November 2020
In order to recognise the extraordinary circumstances of the 2020 global coronavirus pandemic, the Knitting History Forum has decided to stage an online event on Sat 7th November. This event will be free to attend and open to all, following registration, and will comprise speakers, discussion groups/show and tell and opportunities for research students to give short presentations or present posters online of their current work-in-progress.
Watch this space for further announcements!
Knitting History Forum AGM & Conference 2020
This has been an extraordinary year. Many have been affected by the events of the past ten months and it seemed in poor taste to continue posting. Indeed, mentions of the date of the next conference here and on social media received some objections and though made last year, were removed to avoid giving offence. Now as we return slowly to the new ‘normal’, it seems appropriate to resume. KHF is pleased once again to confirm Saturday 7th November 2020 as the date of this year’s Knitting History Forum Conference. We are working towards an event that is safe and accessible. Further information about the conference will be released in due course and we will post additional details here on the Knitting History website and on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook when they are available. We hope you will feel able to join in and look forward to seeing you in November.
Knitting History Forum Conference 2019 Reminder
Join us in beautiful Leiden for a weekend of Knitting History! We welcome scholars, knitters and everyone with an interest in knitting.
The Knitting History Forum Conference 2019 with the culmination of the TRC Leiden Texel Stockings Project is on Saturday 2 November at De Tuinzaal (The Garden Room) at the Grand Café de Burcht in the historic city centre (at Burgsteeg 14). On Sunday 3 November Prof Sandy Black will chair our AGM for KHF members and we have a special visit to Het Leids Wevershuis (a textile workers’ house built circa 1560). The knitting exhibition ‘Socks & Stockings: A world full of surprises’ at the Textile Research Centre will open especially for conference delegates on Friday 1 November from 12.30pm to 2pm and again on Sunday 3rd November 10am to 12.30pm.
You can register for the conference and pay on the door (€25 or €15 for KHF members).
If you prefer you can pay in advance via PayPal using the “Donate” button on the home page of the Textile Research Centre – scroll down the right-hand column) or via PayPal directly to the TRC’s email address (info@trc-leiden.nl). Please visit our membership page for more information about Knitting History Forum and apply to join if you wish. You can also register for the conference online using this form if you are a KHF member or use this form if you are not. The conference hotel is Hotel Nieuw Minerva and a discount is available – email hotel@nieuwminerva.nl mentioning KHF2019.
The full conference programme is available here. Speakers and papers for the Knitting History Conference will include
Keynote speaker Chrystel Brandenburgh: ‘Knitting for science. The reconstruction of the 17th century Texel Stockings by a citizen science community’
Lesley O’Connell Edwards: ‘A hidden workforce: hand knitters in 17thcentury England’
Sylvie Odstrčilová: ‘Early modern stockings from the Czech Republic and neighbouring countries’
Hannah Bäckström: ‘The earliest printed knitting patterns’
Art Ness Proaño Gaibor: ‘Dye-experiments on the Texel Stocking’
Geeske Kruseman: ‘Wearing 17th century knitted silk stockings’
Sally Pointer: ‘Clues from the deep: Reconstructing for the re-enactment-market -silk stockings based on the Texel project’
Susan North: ‘How not to Knit: Sourcing silk, research and reconstructions reviewed’
Jane Malcolm-Davies: ‘Modern Slavery and the early modern work ethic: Lessons learned from volunteer participation in knitting in early modern Europe’
Panel discussion with Katrin Kania, Heleen van Londen and Roeland Paardenkoper: ‘Knitting leads the way! The perils and potential of citizen science in textile research’
It is not too late to register for the conference and book last minute flights, Eurostar tickets or even drive to Leiden to enjoy a knitting history event which, in a way, is itself historic. We look forward to seeing you this weekend.
Socks & Stockings Knitting Exhibition
A new exhibition, ‘Socks & Stockings: A world full of surprises’, has opened at the Textile Research Centre in Leiden , tying in with the Texel Stockings Project and our 2019 Knitting History Forum conference. On display are the original seventeenth century Texel silk stockings, the hand-knitted reconstructions made by the team of volunteers for the project as well as many socks from around the world in knitting and nalbinding, including some from Annemor Sundbø’s “Ragpile-collection”, in an informative and fascinating array of techniques, patterns and colours as inspirational to knitters as scholars and students of knitting history. The exhibition runs until 19 December 2019 but is also opening especially for us on Friday 1 November from 12.30pm to 2pm and again on Sunday 3 November from 10pm to 12.30pm, so Knitting History conference delegates may enjoy viewing at leisure.
The text boards accompanying the exhibits are also available to read in PDF format, English language and Dutch language formats. More information and images of some of the items are available on the TRC Leiden website.
Knitting History Forum & TRC Leiden Conference & KHF AGM 2019
The weekend of the KHF Conference & AGM 2019 approaches quickly : Saturday 2nd & Sunday 3rd November 2019. For those who still might be considering joining us for the weekend here is a reminder of the registration details.
The Knitting History Forum Conference is on Saturday 2nd November and a copy of the conference programme is available here https://www.trc-leiden.nl/trc/images/stories/pdf/full%20programme%2020190918.pdf
Conference delegates are also encouraged to support the Knitting History Forum. The annual fee is £25 and you can join via the Membership page.
Please register for the conference (Sat 2 Nov) and/or participation in the AGM (Sun 3 Nov) using this link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd_LmFUjpddmZ5LRvhJ_7fTipc1pgZpM3L4cVSK4L5U4sxN1w/viewform?
Then, pay for your ticket for the conference via PayPal using the “Donate” button on the home page of the Textile Research Centre (https://www.trc-leiden.nl – scroll down the right-hand column) or via PayPal directly to the TRC’s email address (info@trc-leiden.nl).
Normal entrance fee is €25, but for KHF members this is reduced to €15. This is the link for members of KHF to register: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd_LmFUjpddmZ5LRvhJ_7fTipc1pgZpM3L4cVSK4L5U4sxN1w/viewform?
If you have any problems registering via the google form or payment to the TRC Leiden, please email the TRC directly (info@trc-leiden.nl).
On Sunday 3rd November, Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood, Director of the Textile Research Centre in Leiden, will host us at the TRC, for the Knitting History Forum Annual General Meeting, followed by a visit to the Wevershuis Museum.
You are welcome to arrive from 10am and we will start the AGM promptly at 10.30am, dealing with KHF business and planning for the year ahead. The meeting will close by 12 noon and we recommend everyone finds their own lunch in the old town centre (minutes of AGM 2018, more info and suggestions of places to eat will follow a fortnight before the event).
In the afternoon there will be the opportunity to visit the Wevershuis Museum (The Weaver’s House), Middelstegracht 143, 2312 TV Leiden. http://www.wevershuis.nl
Geeske Kruseman has kindly offered to give tours; the museum is very small and has an interesting collection showing the “other side of Leiden”, located in the old town centre and less than one kilometre from the Textile Research Centre.
The tours will last 45 minutes and cover Leiden textile history, the building’s history, and some social history. The first tour will be at 1.45pm and the second at 3pm and we will meet outside the museum 10 minutes before the start of the tour so that we can all go in as a group. (i.e. 1.35pm and 2.50pm).
If you are with us on Sunday please email KHF Membership Secretary Tricia Basham (pbasham87@gmail.com) as soon as possible to let her know which tour you’d like to attend so that we can finalise arrangements.
The conference hotel is Hotel Nieuw Minerva and a discount is available – please email hotel@nieuwminerva.nl mentioning KHF2019 to book your room.
We look forward to seeing you all in Leiden.
KHF TRC Leiden Conference 2019
This year’s Knitting History Forum will be venturing out to picturesque Leiden in The Netherlands for a special event focused around seventeenth century knitted stockings. Please join us!
Knitting History Forum Invitation to Leiden 2019
Held jointly with the Textile Research Centre Leiden, the conference will include a full day of lectures about the Texel shipwreck reproduction silk stockings project, stocking production, studying historical knitting and textile research. The date of the knitting history conference is Saturday 2nd November 2019, with the KHF AGM held on Sunday at the TRC. Click on the images or download the PDF to learn more. Further information will be available on the Knitting History Forum website once details are confirmed.
Wool: Cloth, Clothing and Culture – MEDATS Conference 2019
“Wool: Cloth, Clothing and Culture” is the subject of the next MEDATS (Medieval Dress and Textiles Society) conference in April. Many of the papers confirmed for MEDATS this Spring will be of interest to KHF members. The history of wool and the early history of knitting are closely linked, as highlighted by the fact that three of the speakers are Kirstie Buckland, Jane Malcolm-Davies and Lesley O’Connell Edwards, members of Knitting History Forum who presented highly-regarded papers at KHF conferences. All of the MEDATS presentations look fascinating:
‘A warm house for the wits’: The craft, trade or science of capping
Kirstie Buckland, Independent scholar
‘Home or away? Woollens, worsteds and the “industrious revolution” in England
John Styles, The University of Hertfordshire
Hanging by a thread: Anticipating structural damage in Tudor Tapestries through the study of photo-oxidation in historic wool
Nanette Kissi, Independent Scholar
Turning wool into silk: How sixteenth century craftspeople created legal luxuries
Jane Malcolm-Davies, Centre for Textile Research, University of Copenhagen
The “industry” of knitting of wool stockings in later 16th century England, especially Norwich
Lesley O’Connell Edwards, MSc student in English Local Studies at the University of Oxford
The first cowl of St Francis of Assisi and the mantle of Bishop Guido
Maria Giorgi, Adjunct Professor at the Academy of Fine Arts of Brera and Independent Textiles conservator and Conservation Consultant
The St Clare intermediate tunic
Tina Anderlini, Independent scholar
Distaff spinning: a forgotten aspect of medieval wool textile production
Mary A. M. Cleaton, Jane Hunt, Alice R. Evans & Cathelina de Alessandri
“Wool: Cloth, Clothing and Culture” will be held on 6th April 2019 at Saint Stephen’s Church Hall, Knightsbridge, London, from 11:00am to 5:30pm. There is an Early Bird discount for MEDATS members and non-members if booking conference tickets before 31st January 2019. After that date, all tickets except for students will cost £45, so remember to book by the end of January.
Further information and booking enquiries should be directed to MEDATS at their website http://medats.org.uk/events/wool-cloth-clothing-and-culture/
Sewing & Stories in Leeds
Sewing & Stories is an interactive event in Leeds this Thursday 29th November. The organisers would like to gather memories of knitting, crochet and sewing, personal, domestic and industrial, from the Windrush generation and anyone from the wider community in Leeds and the surrounding area. Those can’t knit, crochet or sew are also very welcome. KHF only just received notice, but it’s a brilliant idea and looks like a lovely event. See the flyer for more information.