We were so happy to get two talented local dyers in for our May meeting! While they seemed shy at first both of them opened up while talking about their passions.
Our first speaker, Yvonne Elsworth, admitted that her love of both sheep and the color purple gave her the perfect name for her company – Lavender Sheep. A childhood spent immersed in crafts and visits to the local knitting guild with the artistic women of her family set the stage for (so far) a lifelong pursuit of all things fibery.
Once she started dyeing, she found that she preferred direct application dyeing, which is where you apply the dye directly to the yarn. Her eyes lit up while talking about how different fibers take the same dye, and the little changes that can happen with different yarn bases. It was definitely fascinating after her talk, holding up her different yarns that were the same colorways and being able to see what she had described.
Her plate is full these days chasing after two young children and running her business in Hood River. She teaches weaving at Knot Another Hat, her LYS. Her table was full with a huge variety of yarns; she loves trying new and exciting bases. Lavender Sheep yarns are sustainably sourced. Yvonne boasts a beautiful line of Oregon yarns sourced from Imperial Stock Ranch. A personal favorite was the many colorful mini skeins. Yvonne said she doesn’t mind the labor intensive process of making mini skeins, “they’re so much fun!”. We were encouraged to give her a call if we found ourselves in Hood River; she is very proud of her “Sweet Studio” and would love to open it up and show us what she’s working on.
Melanie Dilsworth was a goth girl in Eugene with a love of literature and science. She had a post grad degree on the east coast planned when she met her husband and life took a detour. With two young sons underfoot in a tiny apartment she started dyeing her yarn. Thanks to a lot of time spent wearing black and memories of the local trillium flower, Black Trillium Fibres was born.
She favors a submersion dyeing method, where the yarn is completely submerged in the dye, and sources from an exclusive mill. Melanie takes a scientific approach to dyeing and meticulously formulates her process. She has an incredible three hundred repeatable color ways! She does not believe a professional dyer’s colors should bleed, it is a serious pet peeve of hers.
Besides her retail yarns she also focuses on her gradient kits, which she only sells on her website and at shows. If you can believe it, a single kit will take two weeks to create! She has a very specific process for creating each kit, which is why they take so long, but also why they are perfectly gradated. She had a gorgeous selection of her gradient kits for purchase at the meeting. There were so many amazing samples for inspiration that it was difficult not to snatch one up in each color.
It was a pleasure to have these two ladies join us. We look to forward to seeing (and knitting) their yarns in the future.
-Jess