Antarctic Pullover From Raw Fleece

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31672, 7 May 1968, Page 2

Antarctic Pullover From Raw Fleece

Eighteen spinners and knitters from the Springfield Road Craft Centre are spending this week turning a raw fleece into a pullover which Mr Robin Foubister, of Christchurch, will wear while leading the 1968-69 Antarctic research programme. Spinning wheels are whirring and needles clicking in the Coal Display Centre, which is sponsoring the project Two Romney fleeces have been supplied and yesterday afternoon eight craft centre members were hard at work. Some of the eighteen volunteer* will be at their wheels all day, others will work shorter spells. Mrs Winifred Dunn, the centre’s director, plans to be at her pest until the jersey is presented on Friday. Help At Hand Her husband. Mr C. Dunn, is also spinning and keeping an eye on the others, many of whom are his pupils at the centre. He is called in to deal with any problems with the spinning wheels. “When they work well they are fine, when they are diffi-

cult, they are very difficult,” said Mr Dunn. The knack, and how to get it. is the spinner’s first and most important lesson. All at the centre yesterday agreed that with understanding of the wheel it was easy. “Relaxing too,” said Mrs E. Russell, who finds she forgets all her worries while she is at the wheel. She has been spinning for three years and now dyes her wools at home in her pressure cooker. The centre’s membership is mixed in age and occupation from career girls and housewives with young children, to older women who devote much of their time to their hobby. Two young members, Miss Judith Smyth, a nurse, and Miss Patricia Monahan, a schoolteacher, are spending their off-duty hours at the centre spinning. Both began spinning this year. Miss Smyth is about to start knitting a jersey for the ski-ing reason from wool she has spun. Miss Monahan has not spun enough wool yet to start knitting. “It takes me about three hours to spin a 2oz ball and it takes about 12 balls for a good-sized jersey,” she said. The centre's assistant director. Miss Nora Flewellen, an expert potter, is serving her apprenticeship this

week. A newcomer to spinning she has been put to combing the fleece. Spinners have come forward in good numbers, but Mrs .loan Huston's knitting 1s a solo effort. “Most knitters wash the natural wool before they knit to take some of the grease out, but this has to be a* waterproof as possible. It's very sticky to knit, and you have to keep pushing it on the needles," she said. More Knitters For the rest of the week more knitters will be rostered and the rib-pattern jersey will rapidly take shape.

Passers-by stop to look in and ask questions, although there ta little room to move among the spinning wheels. Mrs Dunn has a chart showing the many variations of colour which can be obtained from natural dyes. Tuition on this art comes after spinning lessons at the centre.

The organiser of the project, Miss Betty McKinnon, public relations officer for the Mines Department in Wellington, is impressed with the work of the craft centre. “There is nothing like it in Wellington, and it’s amazing the number of people who are coming here to spin. Now we need more knitters,” she said.