2016 Tour de Fleece colourways: Chauvet

For our next TdF reveal, we're going to jump from Stage 4 to Stage 13 - the first time trial of the Tour de France, running from Bourd-Saint-Andéol to La Caverne du Pont-d'Arc, home of the stupendous prehistoric cave paintings of Chauvet.

The paintings of Chauvet, discovered by chance in 1994, are estimated to date back to 36,000 years ago, and are renowned for their uncommon representations of predatory animals. Hundreds of animals are depicted on the walls of the cave, including cave lions, panthers, bears and hyenas. Beyond the realistic pictures, the artists used the shape of the walls to emphasise the features of the animals shown.

In looking at images of the cave paintings, I was struck by the variety of earthy colours, generated by combinations of red ochre and charcoal, and I've used these colours in dyeing this top. The result is a blend of reds, rusts, dark browns, charcoal and steely blue. I'm thrilled with this combination, and can't wait to see it spun up!

2016 Tour de Fleece colourways: Rosé d'Anjou

2015 Tour de Fleece colours (clockwise from top left): House of Orange, Le Havre, Lac Blanc and Gamay

For last year's Tour de Fleece, I developed four limited edition colourways based on the course taken by the peloton over the course of the three weeks of the Tour de France. The process of finding parts of the race to highlight and working up the colours was a real jump start to my creative process, and I have been looking forward to this year's batch of colourways ever since!

As with last year, I've sourced a special French base for these colourways - Merino d'Arles. This breed of sheep is from the Provence region of France, and is descended from the first Spanish Merinos imported to the country in 1786, which were then crossed with the local breed in Arles. The resulting sheep are small and sturdy, well able to cope with tough living conditions in the plains and in the mountains, and they produce a fine, bulky wool. The average micron count for the fibre is 20-21 microns (very fine!), but it tends to be on the shorter side of staple length, at approximately 3 inches. It is very, very crimpy, and can be spun to a range of finished yarn weights. 

I spun up a few samples of this fibre as I was working out the colours, and it reminds me of Targhee or Portugeuse Merino. In other words, it is more interesting to spin (in my opinion) then your typical, run-of-the-mill Merino, as it has a nice toothy feel and isn't super slippery. The final yarn is super bouncy and springy - perfect for hats or sweaters! I think this fibre will also give phenomenal stitch definition, due to its elasticity.

On to the first colourway: this one is inspired by Stage 4, which passes through the Loire Valley, where many of the grapes produced end up as gorgeous Rosé wine. 

Rosé d'Anjou on Merino d'Arles

After last year's Gamay colourway, I definitely wanted to do another wine-inspired version for this year's Tour de Fleece. This one, instead of being inspired by a particular grape, is instead taken from the soft pinks of the finished product.

This colourway blends pinks, browns and tans with a special dyeing technique to get a particularly dappled appearance to the dyed fibre, and will spin up as a lovely semi-solid yarn.

Similar to last year, these colourways are only going to be available for a limited time. Starting with the next shop update, on 14th May at 10:00 am, you can order your limited edition colourways up until the start of the Tour de France/Tour de Fleece on Saturday, 2 July. There will also be a Porpoise Fur Tour de Fleece team on the Ravelry board, so please come join us in spinning up a storm in July!

Lab Goddess Fibre Club April 2016

I've managed to get more or less back on schedule with the fibre club, and packages should now be at most of their destinations, so I excited that I can now share this colourway with everyone.

Cacophony on Shetland

This colourway is inspired by Rachel Carson, an American marine biologist and conservationist best known for her popular books on the environment, particularly her 1962 bestseller Silent Spring, which is credited with jumpstarting the modern environmental movement, and led directly to a ban on the use of the pesticide DDT in the United States.

I wanted to counteract the bleakness of Silent Spring with a lively springtime colourway - this one used a lot of colour mixing to get some more complex hues, as well as some unexpected juxtapositions of colours for something exciting. And since it's dyed up on one of my all-time favourite bases, I've already spun mine up!

I split my 4 oz into three equal pieces, then spun one without any further prep, split one in half and spun them end to end and split the third piece into fourths and spun those end to end. This type of fractal spinning is one of my favourite techniques for tops that are highly variegated and have lots of contrast. I'm hoping my resulting chunky/bulky skein will knit up with some more subtle blending of the colours in the final fabric, but I've got to decide on the right project. It's nice and soft so maybe a cowl or a hat for next winter.

If you're in the club please share your spinning and projects as you go along, and if you've missed out on this quarter's sign ups, they'll open back up again on 1 July! 

Lab Goddess Fibre Club March 2016

Cortus on Wensleydale

The March club colourway was inspired by Virginia Apgar, an obstetrical anaesthesiologist who pioneered the testing of a newborn's transition from life inside the womb to life outside after birth. In addition to developing the ubiquitous Apgar Test, she was also the vice president and Director of basic research for the March of Dimes, and a strong advocate for vaccination in the fight against mother-to-child transmission of German Measles (Rubella), which was pandemic in the United States at the time.

The name of the colourway comes from the Latin word for birth, breaking out or originating. Given that March is the month in which my eldest daughter was born, this seemed like an apt name! The colours come from obstetrics - greens for the surgical scrubs worn by doctors and nurses in the delivery room, and for the tiles that are everpresent in hospitals, with a bit of mauve and dark blood red for contrast.

I've been away for the Easter holidays for the last week or so, and I took along my Cortus and a spindle to get a bit of work done on it. And I was struck, once again, but how much I like spinning Wensleydale. This fibre is certainly the polar opposite of last month's Corriedale: from a very straightforward easy-to-spin medium fibre, we've gone straight into longwool territory this month, and I'm finding it to be a lovely change! The Wensleydale is much more slippery to spin then a lot of other wools that we've used in the club, due to its lack of crimp, but the shine and lustre of the singles are amazing. I think I'm going to keep this one as a singles yarn, both to emphasise the drape of the yarn and to keep the colours from getting too muddied. Which means it's going to have to become some kind of lacey something to keep from biasing...anyone have any suggestions?

There is still some space left in the second quarter of the 2016 LGFC, if you'd like to join in the fun. Club membership gets you three monthly shipments of 4 oz/113 g of an exclusive colourway inspired by a female scientist, and also includes a brochure with information about the scientist, the development of the colourway and the fibre base. We'd love to have you join us!

Lab Goddess Fibre Club February 2016

As I was finalising the March shipment of the Fibre Club this morning, I realised that with all the hubbub of the last few weeks, I completely missed showing off the February club colourway - so here it is!

A Life Aquatic on Corriedale

When I dyed this fibre, it had been very grey for a very long time in London, and I was desperate for something blue! This colourway is inspired by Eugenie Clark, a world-renowned icthyologist (i.e. shark addict) who was one of the first marine biologists to use scuba diving as a major research tool.

In addition to her research, Clark was a bestselling writer who's first book, Lady with a Spear (1953), based on her Fulbright Scholarship experiences studying sharks on the Red Sea in Egypt, brought her to the attention of the wealthy Vanderbilt family, who built her a laboratory in southwestern Florida, where she continued to research sharks, with studies ranging from fish test tube babies to training sharks to press targets to shark repellents.

This colourway is a more abstract one, rather then inspired by a particular concept; its my interpretation of what the ocean must look like from underwater, looking upwards – bright shades of blues and greens, those tropical colours of the ocean under the shining sun.

February’s fibre is one that I recommend to any beginner spinner  – Corriedale. The Corriedale sheep is a dual purpose breed, and is used for both meat and wool. It is the oldest of all the crossbred breeds, and is derived from Merino ewe and Lincoln ram crosses in New Zealand and Australia. The aim in crossing these breeds was to develop a sheep that would thrive in drier climates and produce longer stapled wool. The Corriedale is now raised all over the world.

Corriedale could best be described as “medium”. It has medium staple length, medium softness, and medium crimp. But it’s not a boring spin by any means, just very straightforward. It won’t take a lot of attention and won’t do anything tricky, so it’s the perfect fibre for some truly relaxing spinning. 

If you'd like to join the Lab Goddess Fibre Club for April through June, slots are now open - we'd love to have you join us!