This is one of our favourites and a very popular boutique yarn. Light and silky to the touch, Yeti is made from equal amounts of Yak and Silk fibres – spun into a fine fingering weight yarn to create garments which are as light as a feather.

This yarn makes a wonderful all year garment – both, yak and silk, are temperature regulators. It will keep you warm when needed, yet it also allow heat to escape. With the yak being one most in need for warmth in the Himalayas, it can be easily imagined how dense the fibre must be and yet, yak is one of the softest fibres around almost identical in Microns to cashmere.

Add some flowing silk into the mix and the results are simply breathtaking, like moonbeams on rippling water.

Yeti is available as a kit as well.  Check out Criostal, designed by Albina from Lbhandknits, highlights Yeti in a simple delicate shawl pattern. 

In a nutshell for 1 skein:
50% fine yak hair / 50% mulberry silk
weight 4 ply
100g/ 3.5oz
466m/ 509.6 yards
2-3mm needles

Lincot is 'rustically spun' - meaning that the yarn is thick-and-thin, presenting like an old fashioned handspun. It takes color beautifully, with lots of subtle, rich variations in tone. And when knitted up, it gives the resulting fabric a captivatingly textured look and feel.

About the yarn: spun unevenly in Germany, the fibres are sourced from sustainable and ethical friendly sources.  The uneven texture of Lincot also has interesting implications for gauge. In meterage, this yarn is a spot-on DK weight, measuring 220m per 100g. However, when it comes to gauge it 'behaves' like a much thicker yarn, and seems to work best in garments when knitted at an aran-weight gauge. This makes Lincot an extremely economical yarn! Meaning, you need far less of it than you would an ordinary DK weight yarn. For example: a sweater requiring 500g of DK weight yarn worked up for designer Albina with only 400g. 

In a nutshell for 1 skein:
70% cotton / 30% linen
weight 2 ply DK
100g/ 3.5oz
220m/ 240.59yards
4-5mm needles

Read a designer's review of LinCot here
Read the review of LB Handknit's LinCot dress knitting pattern, Rusticana, here
Get your copy of Rusticana, here

Due to the fibre content, LinCot is a great option for Vegans with several plant dyed colours!  Curious to read more about our dyes? Click here.

Indigo* - herbaceous plant ( you might get a bit of blue on your hands while
Knitting - that is easily washed of with soap and even healthy!)
Vegan note: please be aware that we use Lac and Cochineal dyes as well, which would be of animal origin ~ Cochineal** - small louse; Lac*** - the casing made by beetles to hatch and protect their eggs.

Wrap yourself into the warmth and smoothness of Alpaca Fino! While similar to sheep’s wool, it is warmer, not prickly and has no lanolin making it a great choice for people sensitive to wool.

This DK weight yarn is a real classic - it is smooth with a beautiful gentle sheen. Fino shows off stitch work beautifully and is very easy to wear and take care of. Due to its slouchy and drapey effect it is best suited for flowing and body skimming pieces, ideally knitted seamlessly.

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All our Alpaca yarns come from the Peruvian Andes

The entire production ~ from Alpaca farmer to the spun yarn ~ is done within Peru, supporting local employment and a low carbon footprint.

Fino is available in 7 lovely natural undyed shades. 

In a nutshell for 1 skein:
100% Alpaca (fine)
weight DK
100g/3.5oz
200m/218.72yds
4mm needles
Handwash

This is a natural product and may contain natural debris ie. Straw which can be easily removed.

Stockholm is a chunky-weight, 100% wool yarn, with a meterage of 100m (110y) per 100g (3.5oz). A singles yarn, Stockholm is exceptionally soft and airy, resulting in garments and accessories which feel light on the body, drape beautifully, and regulate heat exceptionally well. For a singles yarn, it is also quite durable, and therefore suitable for knitting garments.

Naturally dyed, Stockholm is available in a stunning rainbow of tonal colourways compatible with all designs featured in the Facing North collection.

Looking for patterns for Stockholm?  Click here!

In a nutshell for 1 skein:

100% wool
weight Chunky
100g/3.5oz
100m/110yards
6-9mm needles
Hand wash
Suitable for felting

Apple Oak Fibre Works Stockholm is a chunky, 100% wool yarn, with a meterage of 100

m (110y)

per 100g (3.5oz). A singles yarn, Stockholm is exceptionally soft and airy, r

esulting in garments

and accessories which feel light on the body, drape beautifully, and regulate heat except

ionally

well. Naturally dyed in Co. Clare, Ireland, Stockholm is available in a stunn

ing rainbow of tonal

colourways compatible with all designs featured in the collection 'Facing North

'

Apple Oak Fibre Works Stockholm is a chunky, 100% wool yarn, with a meterage of 100

m (110y)

per 100g (3.5oz). A singles yarn, Stockholm is exceptionally soft and airy, r

esulting in garments

and accessories which feel light on the body, drape beautifully, and regulate heat except

ionally

well. Naturally dyed in Co. Clare, Ireland, Stockholm is available in a stunn

ing rainbow of tonal

colourways compatible with all designs featured in the collection 'Facing North

'

ALKANET ~ Dye Colour: Purple

*Cultivated in India

**The dye colour goes more into a purple blue grey, but it depends on how you extract the dye and what mordants you use.

***Please be aware that you will need to extract the dye with alcohol.

Below is an extract from Wikipedia which describes the colour as red...Time to experiment!

Alkanna tinctoria, the dyer's alkanet or alkanet, is a herb in the borage family. Its main notability is its roots are used as a red dye. The plant is also known as dyers' bugloss, orchanet, Spanish bugloss or Languedoc bugloss. It is native in the Mediterranean region.

Alkanna tinctoria has a bright blue flower. The plant has a dark red root of blackish appearance externally but blue-red inside, with a whitish core. The root produces a fine red colouring material which has been used as a dye in the Mediterranean region since antiquity. The root as a dyestuff is soluble in alcohol, ether, and the oils, but is insoluble in water. It is used to give colour to wines and alcoholic tinctures, to vegetable oils, and to varnishes.

Powdered and mixed with oil, the alkanet root is used as a wood stain. When mixed into an oily environment it imparts a crimson color to the oil, which, when applied to a wood, moves the wood color towards dark-red-brown rosewood, and accentuates the grain of the wood.

Alkanet is traditionally used in Indian food under the name "Ratan Jot", and lends its red colour to some versions of the curry dish Rogan Josh. In Australia alkanet is approved for use as a food colouring, but in the European Union it is not.

It has been used as colorant for lipstick and rouge (cosmetics).

In alkali environments the alkanet dye has a blue/purple color, with the color changing again to crimson on addition of an acid. The colour is red at pH 6.1, purple at 8.8 and blue at pH 10. Hence, it can be used to do alkali-acid litmus tests (but the usual litmus test paper does not use alkanet as the agent and its colour change is closer to pH 7).

The colouring agent in Alkanna tinctoria root has been chemically isolated and named alkannin.

ALUM MORDANT ~ necessary for most plant dyes to ensure colour fastness.

Alum is considered the least harmful or safest when it come to mordants used in plant dyeing. What many don't know is that Alum occurs naturally in nature and some plants, like horsetail, contain Alum.

*Alum has long been used as an additive to both foods and drinking water.

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Basic recipe:

Weigh your DRY textile material.

ALUM: Divide the weight of the material to dye by four. Weight out that much alum mordant. A scant two tablespoons equals one ounce of alum.

Add Alum to the pot, and almost fill with warm water. Leave enough room to add the wet textile material. Stir until fully dissolved.

*You can leave the wool in for 24- 72 hours - cold mordanting.

** Or you can heat to 80 degrees Celcius for one hour.

Rinse and dry.

BIRCH LEAVES DYE ~ Dye Colour yellow and green

A birch is a thin-leaved deciduous hardwood tree of the genus Betula, in the family Betulaceae, which also includes alders, hazels, and hornbeams. It is closely related to the beech-oak family Fagaceae.

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Basic Recipe:

Yarn 125 gr.
Alum (mordant) 15 gr.
Dry birch leaves 250 gr.

Soak the leaves for a day before using.

Boil the soaked leaves for one hour and drain. Add the alum to this solution and simmer the yarn for half to one hour.

*If the yarn is dried without rinsing and then placed in a weak birch ash lye, the colour becomes a reddish yellow.

**You can change the colour to green by adding 5% Iron.

CATECHU DYE ~ Dye Colour Brown and Beige

Catechu, or better known as Cutch, is a powdered dye which results in beautiful brown tones. It can be used for Cotton, silk and wool Fiber.

Cutch contains two dyes, catechu-tannic acid, which is soluble in cold water, and catechin, which needs hot water to dissolve.

*Catechu is apparently very good for eczema.

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Basic Recipe

200gr wool (mordant optional see note below)

20gr of Cutch extract made into paste with boiling water (keep on adding, tends to be sticky)

Add to dye pot (hot water) and simmer; the longer the deeper the colour of the dye.
Add the wool and simmer for 1 hour.
Leave wool out to oxidize before rinsing.

*Several more skeins can be added later for lighter colours. Catechu is difficult to exhaust

**mordant wool with Alum for brighter results, but it will also dye a nice brown without any mordant.