One Member’s Sock Yarn Journey

PROJECT PLASTIC FREE SOCKS - PART 2

Having five pairs of socks on my needles has been a joy and comfort these last few months. The end of summer into the beginning of fall met my family with a loss that has changed our life in big ways. Having this simple sock pattern that my hands quickly memorized and repeating the stitches over and over in all these beautiful farm yarns has been a steady friend during this time of upheaval. A balm to my grief. Knitting does this, doesn’t it? It’s there for you through it all. The light, the dark and the gray. 

Each of the five yarns has such a unique personality and it’s been a pleasure getting to know them all stitch by stitch. The first sock I cast on used the 100% Cotswold yarn grown at the Queen’s County Farm Museum. This farm has been operating since 1697 and is the only farm where you can get true NYC-grown yarn. In 2009, the farm's agricultural and educational programs greatly expanded and part of that expansion included bringing a beautiful flock of Cotswold sheep to the farm. The farm didn’t acquire the flock with fiber production in mind. They came to the farm to be visited by the many New Yorkers who come to the farm each year as an escape from busy city life. It wasn’t until Mary Jeanne Packer (of Battenkill Fibers Mill), accompanied her husband on a maple syrup delivery to the farm in 2011 and spotted the beautiful sheep that anyone thought about what happened to the wool.. When she heard they did nothing with it, she asked if they had ever thought of selling yarn, suggesting that they spin the wool at her mill and then sell it at their farm store. And so began the first New York City-grown wool. 

When I discovered the Queen’s Farm in my search for hyper local yarn in 2021, only one of the Cotswolds from the original flock was still alive ( she has since passed). They now have a beautiful flock of Jacob’s Cross sheep, as well as a few sweet Cormos and a delightful, old Romney wether. I knit a sweater that year with a blend that had been spun with the Cotswold’s wool and US-grown Merino. I wear it constantly. 

This past year, the farm had the final batch of the remaining wool they had from the Cotswold flock made into 100% Cotswold yarn. Cotswolds are known for their lustrous locks of wool. When they’re shorn in the spring, they’re often left with some long ringlets on their heads making them look quite punk rock. The yarn is a beautiful sport weight, with deep luster and shine. Last May, I got to do a natural dyeing demonstration, as well as speak about the local Fibershed affiliates in our area at their sheep shearing festival. My demonstration focused on using food scraps from our kitchens. One of the yarns I made that day with the 100% Cotswold was a variegated yarn I dyed with avocado peels and pits. When it was time to begin this project, that skein was the first one I knew I wanted to work with, and the first pair I cast on. The color was so fun to work with, and I love the halo that Cotswold yarn creates. It makes the socks look very inviting to put on. It does also make them a bit prickly. Not something I’m worried about against my feet, but for someone with sensitive ankles, this would be a consideration. I was right about the lack of elasticity. The fabric this yarn made at such a tight gauge was quite stiff, and making the actual stitches was a workout on the hands at times. I’m hoping their strength will shine once I enter the wearing part of this experiment, but we’ll see what the lack of elasticity does for comfort and durability. 

Many things make Brooklyn General Store a special place to visit and buy yarn. Among them is that they are the only yarn shop in the city to carry their own line of local yarn sourced from the Hudson Valley. The yarn, just like the Queen’s County Farm Museum yarn, is spun at Battenkill Fibers in Greenwich. But unlike the Queens County yarn, which is spun with the focus of being a souvenir from the Museum’s farm, Brooklyn General’s yarn, Skydance, is curated meticulously by Catherine Clark, the owner of Brooklyn General. Catherine has been passionate about supporting local farm yarns for a long time, so creating a special yarn for her shop (and her designs) just made sense. She wanted to design with something that was hers. She chose to spin the yarn in her favorite weight to work with: slightly beyond fingering, but not quite a sport. She finds this weight gives it lots of versatility to go between fingering and sport weight garments, an important factor when thinking about her design process. If you don’t know Catherine’s designs, pause and go look at them immediately. They feature stunning color work that is so connective to the world and cycles that surround us. 

Catherine’s main intention for milling her own yarn was to be able to carry local yarn in the shop—something customers often come in search of. She carries Jill Draper's amazing yarns, but it’s hard to get a good amount of supply from other local yarn makers. Often it’s the farmers themselves paying for the long process of going from sheep-to-skein, which usually means they want to be the ones to sell it, as opposed to having it in a shop. If a shop owner wants a local yarn, the path is often to create their own. Catherine also wanted her own yarn to be able to play around with different blends. Initially, she just wanted a pure Cormo yarn, but it’s hard to get in this region. There just aren’t a lot of Cormo sheep in the Northeast, so she adapted. Skydance has some Cormo in it, but also blends in Merino and Romney. Because finewools are somewhat scarce in the Northeast, especially compared to out West, many of the mills source US Merino and other finewools that aren’t necessarily local to our specific region. But Catherine told Mary Jeanne Packer that she wanted her yarn to be sourced locally only, and Mary Jeanne promised her that it would be. The blend of those three particular breeds was Mary Jeanne’s suggestion. Catherine wanted a heathered effect, and Mary Jeanne thought those three breeds would create it beautifully. They went back and forth for a bit, and then they settled on the right thing. Each batch of yarn is never exactly the same, because the wool used for one batch of yarn may not be available when you are looking for another batch, and that is just part of doing business with small farms. It can be challenging, but that’s also part of what the commitment to using only local wool looks like right now.

This is the first time I’ve knit with Skydance, and let me tell you, it’s dreamy. It is both soft and strong, with a really even spin. The color I chose, Spots On My Apples, is mesmerizing as it moves from brick red to an earthy brown and back again. Variegation can be really hard to achieve with natural dyes, and this is done exquisitely by Green Matters Natural Dye Co. I’m definitely pushing the yarn by knitting it with US 0 needles when the recommended size is US 3-6, so I’m certainly getting a stiffer fabric than what is intended with this yarn, but I’m hoping this helps the socks have added durability. As promised, this yarn crocks, a common occurrence with naturally dyed yarns. Crocking is the part of the natural dye process we get to participate in as knitters, if we aren’t dyeing the yarn ourselves. Never fear, crocking yarn doesn’t bleed on your work. Only onto your body. A fascinating process you should experience at least once in your knitting life. I quite enjoy that when I’m done knitting, my hands look like they’ve been hungrily hanging out in a berry patch, and it washes away quickly with soap and water. Something I don’t love about the crocking process is how it gives the yarn a chalky quality while knitting. I found this to be true in all of the naturally dyed yarns I worked with for this project, except for the Taconic Twist that Wing and a Prayer produces—more on that later. Still, it’s worth it to me for the depth and complexity of color that only natural dyes can produce, and for knowing that I won’t be harming the earth or myself with the chemicals used to produce color. Catherine’s made a lot of sweaters and cowls out of Skydance’s Ursa Minor, but no socks. So, we’re both curious to see how it wears, being used for such a different purpose than intended. And I’m longing now to cast on a sweater in this gorgeous yarn and watch it sing in the gauge it was made for. 

Like Brooklyn General Store, Cornwall Yarn Shop had dreams of carrying their own lines of local yarn. Gail Parrinello the owner of the shop, also collaborated with Mary Jeanne at Battenkill to make some beautiful local yarns, one of which is Bear Mountain Sock—the yarn I was the most excited to try out of the ones I picked. Bear Mountain is a local, naturally-dyed, non-superwash, non-Merino yarn designed specifically for socks. What more could this gal ask for? It’s made from 100% Dorset wool—an ideal breed for socks, because of the elasticity and durability. It’s also the only 3-ply yarn I used in this experiment, which makes it much more suited to socks, as each ply you add to a yarn strengthens it considerably. Ideally, I would have chosen all 3+ ply yarns for this project, but my strict parameters made that particular aspect one I had to compromise on. 

Dorset is also rumored to have natural superwash qualities. Unlike other wools, it’s not supposed to felt when put in the washing machine. According to the Cornwall Yarn Shop's website: “I have washed my socks in the washing machine. They have bloomed nicely and a gentle tug when wet ensures they keep a good fit.” My friend Anne Choi, co-founder of NJ Fibershed, handspun some Dorset yarn and made socks on her knitting machine to try this very experiment with the breed. Her socks did felt some after going through the machine, but they were also too big for her at the start, so she didn’t mind. I won’t be washing mine in the washer during my durability experiments, because I’ll be treating all five pairs of socks the same and the others can’t take a machine wash, but once the experiment is done, I may be brave and try it out. 

I got the Bear Mountain Botanicals in Indigo. The color is so beautiful and has slight variation in it, which makes for a wave-like, subtle stripe in the socks. They’re stunning in the winter sunlight. I haven’t knit with Dorset before. It’s crunchy! In a really fun way. It’s like knitting with a Wasa cracker. It also has an incredible bounce to it. Again, there is crocking and a bit of chalkiness to the yarn, but it’s quite manageable. I’m so excited to see how these socks wear.

Speaking of crunch, Middle Brook Fiber’s Vintage No. 9 was another delightfully crunchy yarn. But unlike Bear Mountain’s rougher, Wasa-cracker crunch, Vintage No. 9 was more like a cornflake or a rice crispy. Light, springy and satisfying. The spin on the yarn is somewhat uneven, giving it the energy of a handspun yarn, which is a rare feature in mill spun yarns. It has the aliveness of a handspun, which makes it SO fun to knit with. It also gives the sock a beautiful texture. Anne Choi, the mastermind behind Middlebrook Fibers, went on a fiber tour in Korea this fall. While there, she was sitting next to someone in a hand sewing class who was a very good hand stitcher, and was looking at her stitches and thinking about how pleasing they were. Anne told me, “Our eyes can pick out when something is irregular. When we see a seam that’s machine-stitched, our eyes gloss right over it, but when you see a seam that is hand-stitched, there is just enough irregularity that it makes your eyes stop. There’s a characteristic to it that just—I think it’s arresting, almost. And it’s just really pleasing because it just feels very organic.” That’s exactly what Vintage No. 9 does for our knitting too. Its organic nature makes it a total joy both to knit and to admire in the finished fabric.

Anne has a beautiful small flock of Shetland sheep that she likes to blend with other wools and fibers to create her very special Vintages of yarns. Vintage No. 9 is a blend of Anne’s Shetland’s wool, Mohair and Tussah silk. The latter two add strength to the delicate Shetland wool. It’s the only yarn I chose that had a plant fiber added to it. Like Gail, Anne designed this yarn specifically with socks in mind. When we spoke, she had a pair of Vintage No. 9 socks on the needles. Her pair is in Stone. The pair I made is in Biscuit. Anne achieves her Vintage colors through blending the natural colors of the fiber animals. Stone is made from both her gray and black sheep, blended with both white and black mohair. Biscuit is made with the Mioget colored fleeces from her flock—a pale brown color. They’re then blended with white mohair to get the beautiful grain-colored yarn. Though the yarn was destined for socks, Anne chose a two ply for a few reasons: the practical—mills often prefer spinning a two ply because it’s less work; and the creative—she wanted a light fingering weight and trusted that the mohair and silk would hold up the durability factor of the yarn, forgoing the added bulk from an extra ply.

Anne starts the process of creating her yarns by getting the blend ratio right, both for color balance as well as texture. She does this by sampling on her spinning wheel. Once she gets the blend percentages just right, she sends the remaining wool off to the mill to be fully processed and spun. She designs all her Vintages by first thinking about what she wants to knit with! That’s always what she’s been driven by: “What do I want to knit next?” I’m so happy socks were on the brain when it was time for Vintage no. 9. Note, these Vintages, like wine, are gone once they’re gone, so if you’re curious to knit with this yarn, be sure to grab a skein while they last.

Last, but certainly not least, is Wing and a Prayer’s breathtaking Taconic Twist. A gorgeous blend of Wensleydale, Cotwsold, Mohair and Merino. I knit my socks using Leaf, which is achieved with indigo and onion skins. This yarn is a treasure. The day I had the pleasure of speaking with Tammy White, the owner, farmer and yarn maker extraordinaire of Wing and a Prayer Farm, she was washing and drying a fresh batch of Taconic Twist just back from the mill. What Tammy is doing at Wing and a Prayer is very special and it shows up in the quality of her yarn. I have to say, this was my favorite yarn out of the five to knit with. The elasticity in the yarn surprised me with the amount of longwools included in the blend, but the Cormo’s finewool shines through with its bounce. Taconic Twist is the lighter weight version of Thelma and Louise, a beloved DK weight yarn that Tammy also sells. This yarn came out of a collaboration with one of our region's main players. You guessed it: Battenkill Fibers Mill. Taconic Twist is a consistently good yarn year after year because Tammy uses similar (or the same) fleeces each year from her flock, a luxury that yarn shops creating yarn don’t have. 

Tammy’s process for making yarn is almost the opposite of Anne’s. She never goes to the mill with a vision of the kind of yarn she wants. Instead, it’s born of the animals and their fleeces. “It’s about using the ingredients that I have. That has been the way I’ve always looked at making yarn from my farm. Not trying to make something that competes with commercial yarn. I’m just trying to make do with what I have.” But Tammy’s not making due. Her breed (and sometimes sheep!) specific yarn is extraordinary.

When Tammy first started making yarn, she tried to make a sock yarn with some of her finewool fleeces, blended with her medium grade wool. Upon recommendation from the mill, she also added nylon. But, it didn’t sit well with her because she’s against nylon! Because it’s not, as she put it, “of her heart.” Tammy took that lesson, and continued on the path of making from her heart. She never makes yarn to suit somebody else now. She doesn’t follow trends or do what she does for popularity or abundant income. Being a yarn farmer is not that path. She has a mission to which she stays true, and thank goodness she does. She makes yarn that has a greater purpose. Tammy doesn’t blend any other plant fibers in with her yarn, because it makes no sense to her. They don’t grow around where she farms. “Why am I going to work so hard, love on these sheep so much, and be so passionate about trying to make the world a greener place, and then use imported fibers when what we have here is sufficient and wonderful?” What makes Tammy’s wool special is the meaning infused into it by the place-based specificity and care that goes into it. She makes heritage yarn that’s meant to last. When you invest in her yarn, she envisions that you will make a project that will last for years and years. A wardrobe staple. She finds it works better when she embraces that it's a farm yarn through and through. “Whole grain bread vs. white bread.” That’s what she’s here for: if you want the whole grain yarn. And boy, should you.

The thing I was itching to ask Tammy about was her dye process! Her yarn is the only naturally dyed yarn that I’ve worked with (not just for this project) that doesn’t crock or feel chalky. I had to know how she achieved this. Luckily, she was wonderfully generous in talking about her dye process. Though she said she wouldn’t be honest if she claimed to have perfect yarn that was never chalky or crocked. Tammy says she has made yarn that both crocks and feels chalky—but I have never experienced this with the five yarns of hers I’ve knit with so far. Tammy has dyed thousands of skeins of yarn, and in the process, she has inevitably refined her process. She is the sole dyer of her farm's yarns and has learned a lot. 

Tammy thinks the chalkiness in naturally dyed yarns is caused by a residue leftover from either too heavy an application of a mordant or whatever the dyer rinsed their yarn with that was sudsing, which can leave residue. So how does she avoid this? First, Tammy doesn’t use as much mordant as is usually recommended. She uses a very weak percentage of 2-3% of the weight of fiber (WOF) versus the usually recommended 10-20%. Sometimes Tammy uses natural mordants readily available to her, like rhubarb or acorns, but most of the time it’s the usual aluminum sulfate (alum) that so many natural dyers use. Originally, she backed off of the mordant for economic and resource reasons. It becomes less and less affordable to be a yarn farmer the more supplies you have to buy. Plus, the mordant has to be shipped via truck. It costs time and money, as well as polluting via transport. She wants to make a little bit go a long way. She uses the same 25-lb box of mordant for at least a year at a time. That’s impossible with the amount of yarn she dyes if you use the recommended amount. When she cut back on the amount of alum, she noticed that her yarn had less residue—an added bonus to the money, time and fuel saved by using less. 

The other thing that Tammy does differently, is that she uses time, rather than heat, in her dyeing. She has a giant kettle that has the mordant solution in it, and rather than heating it up, she lets the yarn sit passively in it for a few days. “A lot of fiber loses integrity when you add heat to process it.” So, for that first step of natural dyeing, she preserves the fiber’s integrity by using time instead of heat. The mordant kettle simply sits on the ground, not a burner. But, her dye kettles do sit on burners, because Tammy dyes every single day of the year, and in Vermont that means a lot of cold days. The vats can often be frozen solid, so she needs to warm them enough for them to be usable. 

Once the yarns have had a few days mordanting, she’ll dry them and store them until she has a dye kettle ready. When she does, she’ll take the skeins and shake them to remove any excess residue left over. Even with the tiny amount of mordant Tammy uses, she says there is still often a cloud of dried mordant solution that comes off of the yarn as she shakes it. So, you can imagine what it might look like to use more mordant and not have this level of attention to detail in the process, something that is often not possible in bigger operations.

Other than the aforementioned defrosting, Tammy seldom uses heat for the dye process either. Time is the resource once again. She’ll let the yarn sit for a week at a time sometimes, every few days giving it a mix around with her hands to make sure the color is getting distributed. Once she likes the look of it, she’ll take it out and drain it, and then the yarn is ready to be washed. The solutions she dyes with aren’t concentrates or extracts. They’re the plants from her dye garden. She always tries to exhaust her dye baths. We spoke mid-November, and she had a kettle going from summer cosmos that still has a gorgeous rich beautiful pumpkin-y color to it.

I asked her about indigo specifically, since that’s one of the worst culprits of crocking, and yet I’ve experienced no crocking from her yarn. She says when she dyes with indigo, she has a large bin full of water next to her vat. She puts the yarn coming out of the indigo vat straight into the fresh water and lets it sit in there. She doesn’t take it out to oxidize until the next day. If she needs another layer of color, then she’ll take it out, let it oxidize, and then go through this process again. She finds that the added soak before oxidization nearly eliminates crocking, because the indigo doesn’t have a chance to sit on the surface. It’s truly saturating the fiber. A lot of the time when we’re experiencing crocking, the dyer may have put too heavy a layer of indigo on it. Tammy doesn’t rush her process. “You have to layer it. A layer a day.”

My other guess as to why Tammy’s indigo didn’t crock was that she might use fresh indigo leaves, rather than a fermented vat—which she does sometimes. But, in the case of this Taconic Twist in Leaf, it was in fact a fermented vat with her own fermented home grown indigo paste! Her process just really really works. Tammy says she’s always so pleased when she makes a green she loves, because it’s a hard color to achieve and it’s her favorite. She’s sold out of Leaf right now, but she said she was planning to make more. Though Tammy’s never worn socks in Taconic Twist, she guesses that they’ll be wonderful to wear. I’m so excited to try all of Tammy’s dyeing wisdom going forward in my own natural dye practice, as well as to keep knitting with her beautiful yarn. I dream of getting to go to the farm and take her natural dye workshop there. Maybe this summer.

Making local yarn, whether it's straight from the farm or from someone who has a yarn shop and wants to carry a local yarn, is a labor of love. Committing to milling, dyeing and sourcing locally takes so much. This became clear from every single person I spoke to. These yarns are precious and take sacrifice in all parts of the process. We, as consumers and fiber lovers, can vote yes with our dollars and support the amazing work that they’re doing by keeping those values alive and insisting on local in all parts of the supply chain. When the lives of these yarn makers would almost always be made easier by sourcing from far away, using synthetics, and going to the big mills that are cheaper and sometimes more consistent, they stick to their values, their missions and they choose the harder path. And let me tell you, it makes gorgeous yarn. Yarn that means something. Yarn that’s connective to place, people, plants and animals. Yarn that lets the things that keep us and our beloveds warm come from the land on which we are spending this precious time on earth. It tells that story of the here and now, capturing this moment in time. What could be more creatively fulfilling than that? 

Check back here in a few months for a report back on how all these beautiful sock yarns did in the durability trial portion of my experiment. Until then, happy knitting.