Virtuoso With Yarn: Brooklyn Man Breaks Stereotypes Knitting On The Subway

A Brooklyn man is turning heads on the subway – all because of a needle and thread.
Every day, he is helping to break the stereotype by proving that knitting isn’t just for grannies, CBS2’s Steve Overmyer reports in this week’s Snapshot New York.
For many New Yorkers, the train is a second home.
“This is where I spend most of my time. You know traveling, it’s an hour going to work, an hour coming home from work,” Louis Boria told Overymer.

Boria is a modern artist, and his most famous work is done 100 feet underground.
“I get comments, both women and men staring at me for like 10-15 minutes. They’re like, ‘So what are you making?’” he said.
Inside the steel shell of a subway car rides a virtuosos with yarn.
“I always carried my project in my bag and never wanted to knit once on the train, because I was fearful of being judged because I’m a guy. ‘Oh, look at this guy knitting.’” he said. “I’m wasting my time and I could be knitting, and as much as I wanted to knit.
“That first time that I took that project out of my bag and I started knitting, I remembered that zone that it took me to,” he added. “And once I got into that zone, I forgot about my surroundings.”
Boria was spotted by Broadway star Frenchie Davis, who posted a photo on Facebook, resulting in a response that changed his life.
“The power of social media,” he said. “I tell you, it’s pretty awesome.”
Steve Overmyer: “What was it like to see that flurry of comments underneath that photo?”
Louis Boria: “I couldn’t understand it. They can’t make the correlation between the knitting and the guy – the guy in the sweats. And they see a guy sitting there, and he’s got tattoos and he’s got a full beard and then he’s got a baseball cap and he just looks like your average Joe on the street.
“You always ask that big question in life: Well, what am I good at? And when I found knitting, that’s when I realized that I found my niche. And from that very first time that I picked up those needles, it’s just something that I knew I was meant to do.”
Historically, knitting has been a male-dominated craft.
Sailors would knit their own sweaters. In World War One, the injured repaired uniforms. Even knights would knit their own chain mail. And the man known as “The Gladiator” relieves stress by knitting.
“It takes me to a place that makes me forget about everything. I go into a zone. And nothing has ever done that to me in my life before,” said Boria. “I’m creating something; I’m making something at the same time. So it’s kind of like I’m so focused on making sure that I’m executing whatever it is that I’m doing, and it just drifts me off. And you know, I love that it does that for me.
“It kills the time, so it makes my ride go even faster,” he added. “You know, next thing I know, I’m home and I’m getting ready to get off the train.”
Since his social media fame, Brooklyn Boy Knits has turned this into a full-time commitment. He knits up to 30 pieces a month and delivers his art to the world.
Overmyer: “This is where you come to get your materials. When you look at some of these colors, do you think of what you can do with it?”
Boria: “Absolutely. So like you know, you have different types of yarn. I mean you can see that there’s so many varieties of color here, and they’re constantly changing. So I’m always checking in and out. You know, I go online and I’ll see what’s going on there, and then I’m like, ‘I got to take a trip down to the store.’ And it’s all about feeling the yarn. I’ve been to places in Europe where you’re not allowed to touch the yarn. But here, we come and we touch and that’s how you know you’re going to get what you want.”
Overmyer: “This is an art that is built on tradition. There are only two different types of stitches, right?”
Boria: “Yeah, knit and pearl. But there’s techniques involved also that you have to learn. And you know, sometimes you’ll get stuck and your neighbor sitting next to you at a knitting booth can tell you, ‘Oh, I know how to do that, let me show you.’”
No longer the domain of grannies, knitting now has an edgy side.
“This is called Implexa. I basically used recycled T-shirts, leather, suede,” Boria said. “I never look at it as work. I look at it as my art, and it is art. You know, at the end of the day, it’s fiber art.”
Proving that art has no gender.
“My message more than anything and what I want people to understand is that you have a passion, you have a love for something that’s not considered normal, you go for it,” said Bario.  “Take that plunge and just do it, because the world can only benefit from that.”

Source:  newyork.cbslocal.com

Boys knitting? An unlikely yarn

Even the cool boys are queueing up to take up the latest trend at school – knitting 

 

Boys are taking up their knitting needles at Dog Kennel primary school, south London. Photograph: Frank Baron for the Guardian

Leaning back into the beanbag, dreadlocks swept away from his face, Remar Fulton is deep in concentration. The 11-year-old is knitting what looks like a scarf in black, green and yellow stripes. "The colours of Jamaica, my family's country," he says.
Remar is one of 20 members of the knitting club at Dog Kennel Hill primary school in Peckham, south London. As knitting fever has swept through the school, there are now almost 100 pupils on the waiting list – just under a quarter of the pupil population – and around half are boys from year 2 to year 6.

Young pupils like Remar and his classmates don't fit with the conventional image of knitters. Even in its recent renaissance among crafty twentysomethings, knitting is still considered feminine – a tradition passed down through generations of women. But boys across the country are now taking up their needles.

Boys now make up around 50% of primary pupils involved in Craft Club, the campaign run by the Craft Council and UK Handknitting Association, which supports schools to run knitting clubs led by community volunteers. Since it was set up in April last year, there are now over 350 groups around the UK, mainly in primary schools, and many more knitting groups run independently by teachers.

Stephanie Laing, trainee teacher at Dog Kennel Hill primary, can't quite believe how popular her knitting club has become among the boys. A knitting enthusiast herself, Laing set up the lunchtime club three years ago and the first four members were year 6 boys. "I was surprised by the ones who signed up – not only the boys, but it was the cool kids," she says. "I thought they weren't going to last, but it has become the cool thing to do."
Laing was a learning mentor when she started the club, working one-on-one with pupils who had emotional or behavioural problems. "I wanted them to be able to advance their skills, but it was also a way of opening up what I did for the whole school," she says. "For them, coming into a quiet room with bean bags and sometimes music playing: it's quite comforting and non-threatening."

Boys in the knitting circle agree that the club is one of the few relaxing parts of the school day. "It's peaceful, no shouting. It's different to other things in school," says 10-year-old Sam Otufale. "I usually play football – it's mad."
Another reason for the knitting club's popularity is the end-results. At today's lunchtime session, there is no sign of tea cosies or cardigans. Instead, boys proudly show off their wrist-bands, phone-holders and fingerless gloves.

The UK-wide Craft Club is keen to capitalise on this opportunity to introduce boys as well as girls to knitting, not just as a pastime, but as a technical skill that helps cognitive development.
Incorporating knitting into school life and throughout the curriculum has also been a successful way of getting boys involved. As well as teaching knitting within art, Kathryn Hitchings, classroom teacher at Bucklesham primary in Ipswich, used knitting to teach pupils about the second world war "make do and mend" campaign. This year she launched a sponsored knit, encouraging pupils to unleash their competitive streak. One boy managed to knit 75 metres in one day and pupils also took part in yarn bombing, covering a tree with their knitted garments.

The teachers involved in knitting groups have also noticed that the craft appeals to children who don't normally achieve in other areas, or who tend to misbehave. This is because there is an immediate and visible reward directly linked to the effort put in, says Katy Bevan, the Craft Council's participation and learning manager. "If you have a difficult child who's constantly misbehaving and being told off, suddenly they have knitted half a scarf and are given heaps of praise," she says.

As the boys at Dog Kennel Hill primary finish up before the bell rings, they are evidently proud of their knitting skills. They revel in advising their classmates and show off what they have made. But for one year 6 pupil, the appeal of knitting is more personal. "If you're angry, it calms you down," he says.

Source: The Guardian

The History of Knitting - Part II

The History of Knitting Pt 2: Madonnas, Stockings and Guilds, Oh My!

In Part 1 of “The History of Knitting”, you learned that knitting most likely began in Egypt at around 1000 AD. From Egypt, knitting spread into Spain – carried over by Arabs during the Islamic Conquest or brought back by Spaniards during the Crusades – before exploding into the rest of Europe. What we know about early European knitting is that it was mostly confined to the very rich, very royal or very religious (as in the Catholic Church). Case in point: the first pieces of European knitting were found in the tomb of Prince Fernando de la Cerdo of Spain. They are detailed silk pillow covers that date to around 1275 AD.


In Spain, early knitting mostly consisted of liturgical garments and accessories for the Catholic Church. Made with very fine yarn, they were sometimes stitched with gold and silver threads. 

Early knitted Spanish gloves made with red and yellow silk, worn by a bishop, 16th century. These gloves have a gauge of 23 sts/20 rows per inch!  Albert Museum. 

In other parts of Europe, knits were small and dainty – things like relic purses for holding the remains of saints, pillows, stockings, purses, and pouches. These were more decorative accessories than practical workhorse garments.

Like a Virgin, Knitting for the Very First Time

Then, around the middle of the 14th century, a funny thing happened. In Italy and Germany paintings were done depicting the Virgin Mary knitting alongside the baby Jesus. These “knitting Madonnas” tell us that, by the 14th century, knitting had spread into Italy and Germany. The Virgin is shown knitting in the round and doing colorwork, so we know these techniques must also have made their way to the region. 

But, now, a pressing question: why is the Virgin Mary knitting? Joan Thirsk writing in The Cambridge History of Western Textiles suggests that knitting was becoming more commonplace and, perhaps, more publicly fashionable among upper-class women. Donna Kooler in Encyclopedia of Knitting agrees that female knitting would have been familiar and unthreatening, “even sweetly domestic.” She writes:

“It is unlikely that reverent altarpieces of the Madonna and Christ would introduce a revolutionary theme of the Madonna usurping a male-dominated trade.

Madonna as patriarchy-defying feminist? Not until the 1990s, I’m afraid.

Real Gentlemen Wear Knitted Stockings

This engraving shows the different stages of knitting a stocking – from spinning the wool to cleaning it, to knitting it up and finishing. ca. 1698 by Christoph Weigel. 
By the end of the 16th century, knitting was an established craft that was driven by a powerful fashion trend: knitted stockings.For Italian and Spanish men of style,  knitted stockings were a must. According to historian Irena Turnau, “Men in knee breeches depended upon elegant legs for their fashion status, and baggy stockings were a disaster.” Did you hear that? A disaster. Stockings were as fundamental to a Renaissance man’s wardrobe as blue jeans to the modern Joe. The more elegant the stocking, the more fashionable the man. In response to this demand for knits, knitting guilds sprang up, beginning in the 1400s. Exclusively male, they were established to protect trade secrets, improve the quality of the profession, and drum up business. Think of them like a labor union – a competitive, rigorous, masterfully skilled labor union, that is.

So You Think You Can Knit?

If you were a young man in the Middle Ages and you wanted to become a Master Knitter in a knitting guild, you’d need to devote six years of your life to training. Three years would be spent in apprenticeship learning from the masters; another three were spent traveling the world to learn foreign techniques and patterns. If you’re as obsessed with knitting as me, this probably sounds like the best time ever. Barring dysentery and the bubonic plague, what could be better than spending six years knitting and traipsing all over Europe? As dreamy as it sounds, joining a guild was no cakewalk. After returning home from travel, a knitting apprentice would prove his mastery through a rigorous exam.To gain entrance into a knitting guild, you’d hole yourself up for thirteen frenzied weeks and knit up an assortment of garments. Like Project Runway for the Middle Ages, these would be picked apart and assessed by guild members who would decide whether you were “in” or “out.” 

To gain full membership to the Hand-Knitters’ Guild of Strasbourg, knitters had to knit a wall-hanging patterned with flowers, like this one. Adam and Eve appear beneath a central panel depicting Jacob’s Dream. France, 1781. Victoria & Albert Museum. 

Required garments included a felted cap, a pair of stockings or embroidered gloves, a shirt or waistcoat and the pièce de résistance – a knitted carpet! Akin to a grad thesis, this carpet or wall-hanging was the culmination of your six years of learning, a representation of your mastery, artistry, and good taste. No pressure! Intense as the vetting process was, the guild’s high standards elevated knitting to an art. Certain guilds became well-known for their work. In the early 16th century, Parisian guilds were considered the very best. 

Even in the Middle Ages Parisians were trumping everyone in style!Just as we moderns have our favorite designers and fashion houses, every member of the nobility had his or her favorite Master Knitter. The period of the knitting guilds produced some of the most astonishingly beautiful knitted items. 

An embroidered glove made of red knitted silk, probably liturgical, possibly English. From the first half of the 17th century. Italian, ca. 1650 – 80. Glove Collection Catalogue 

How pretty is this Italian jacket? Made of silk and metallic thread. Italy, 16th century. Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Knitting into the Future

From the 1400s, knitting grew as a trade. It spread into new lands along with European explorers and colonists during the Age of Exploration. A framework knitting machine. 

Then in 1589, Englishman William Lee invented the knitting machine. While it didn’t demolish the hand knitting industry, it foreshadowed more technological changes to come. Namely, the Industrial Revolution. During the Industrial Revolution, knitting machines became more sophisticated and the manufacture of knits shifted from human hands to machines. In a few generations, knitting transformed from a serious trade (remember those knitting guilds?) to a sweet, staid parlor craft for Victorian ladies. 

You’d think this would be the end of knitting. With machines to do all the work and knitting looking as vital as a limp noodle, why bother with it at all? It would surely go the way of the Dodo. And yet – knitting lives on.It found its patriotic calling during the two World Wars. It provided employment for the poor in the twentieth century as it did during the Renaissance. 

In the late 1920s, it was revived as an art form in the world of fashion (thanks in large part to Elsa Schiaparelli), and continues to be part of the fashion firmament today.

Elsa Schiaparelli’s iconic Trompe L’oeil “Bow Knot” sweaters jump-started her career and reinvigorated knitwear in the late 20s. 

Now we are in the twenty-first century, the “Information Age.” We live in a time of efficiency, of endless screens, of fractured attention spans and workaholism. Knitting feels anachronistic here, like we took a time machine and our hands came back stuck in the past, holding these weird sticks and string. 

So, why are we still knitting? Why does it matter? 
The reason I think knitting has persisted for so long is because it is beautiful. Plain and simple. It’s beautiful to do and beautiful to behold. Knitting satisfies a deep desire in us to create beautiful things, and it allows us the satisfaction of being a creator. Buying a sweater just won’t give you the same intense pleasure and pride as knitting one with your own hands. That’s why I think knitting will outlast us all. As long as we humans retain the part of ourselves that yearns to create and innovate, the part that delights in beauty, then knitting will live on – from that first mysterious knitter to the four corners of the world and beyond. 

Source:  sheepandstitch.com

Click here to read Part I of history of knitting.