Sunday, 30 January 2011

All the....small things....

This month at Knit and Destroy HQ it's been the small things that have been making me happy and making the day-to-day more enjoyable...

Having an order to work to. Big thank you to Hannah Zakari for keeping me busy making things through January. All this lot is now on sale in their lovely shop in Edinburgh.

Home made coconut flapjack, anyone who knows me will know that tea breaks are a very important part of any day for me. For those teas to be accompanied by deeelicious home made flapjack is heaven!
And when I'm not having a tea break, I'm knitting...these knitting machines are fairly noisy things, and I usually amuse myself with music or audio books while I work. These stylin' stereo headphones I got for x-mas drown out the metallic whooshings of the machines leaving me with pure Stephen Fry's voice reading The Deathly Hallows...heaven!!!
Things for 10p...yes that'r right not 25p or 50p...10p! I picked up this awesome knitting pattern from Save The Children in Chestrerfield, it has already assisted in unearthing an amazing 'my mum knitted me a white bikini when I was 14' story from the lovely cynthia who I used to work with at Help The Aged.
Hope you have some 'small things' too
KD x




Thursday, 27 January 2011

First stall of 2011....and some roller skating!

THIS WEEKEND...I am venturing out of the studio and taking a small selection of knits to a stall at Pond's Forge in Sheffield.

But this aint yr average craft fair, oh no...there will be other stalls full af awesome stuff to buy but, first and foremost, what's going down at Ponds Forge this Saturday is a Roller Derby Bout, wooooop!
Click the poster to take you to Sheffield Steel Rollergirls website for more information on the event.
So please do come along, buy some crafts and cupcakes and watch some very talented ladies (and men) do their Roller Derby thang!!!
Be there or I'll set the rollergrrls on you.
KD x


Sunday, 2 January 2011

2010...my year in knit (and other things)...

There were a lot of firsts for me and Knit and Destroy last year, here are some of the highlights from 2010...
Making a new website, all real stuff like...

And making the catalogue


First ever festival, and first go at hand-screen printed tote-bags, first Sugar Paper craft event at a festival.


First trip to Shetland, which involved my first ever knitting conference, solo holiday and meeting of one of my favourite Harry Potter actors.



Proper camping holiday...just 2 layers of fabric between us and the elements!

Visited a Ye olde Theme Park on the top of a hill in Barcelona accessed by funicular railway!!!
First Solo Exhibition
First stand at the big ass Knitting and Stitching show.

And to top all of that I met John Waters!!!
I hope you all had a good 2010, and have an even better 2011.
KD x

Friday, 17 December 2010

Get festive.....

It's time to start getting excited about christmas...so I picked my favourite christmas song ever... being covered by one of my top all grrrl bands, enjoy...



p.s. whoever put this video together, hottt photoshop skillz!!!

Wednesday, 1 December 2010

5 days in Harrogate...and a whole lotta knitting!

So,
If you've been here recently, you will know that I took my knits to The Knittting and Stitching show in Harrogate last week. The show opened on Thursday, but with 3 walls, a whopping 4 square metres and many crowds to wow...I needed some time to set it all up so we went over on Wednesday. The day was spent measuring, deliberating, screwing cup hooks into walls and eating...and this was the result...
I treated my assisstant to some tasty thai food then we went our separate ways. I checked in to my new home for the next 4 nights, a lovely bed n breakfast 5 minutes walk from the International centre (where the knitting and stitiching show was held).
Thursday morning was...eventful. The set up on Wednesday was so successful and I didnt forget anything, it was going so well, then...the shower was broken, hmmm maybe its me, i'm probably pressing the wrong thing, 20 minutes of switching it on and off and still cold water! Got to shower in nextdoor's room. La la la, all clean, ready to get dressed and put my....oh no, where's my make-up?!? In Chesterfield. I then managed to order a breakfast with bacon in it (no good for this vegetarian) but managed to tell the lady in time so I didnt get pig on my plate!
The next two days were a blur of giant breakfasts featuring egg and home made yogurt, young and old people oooh-ing and aaahhh-ing at my knits (and a good deal of getting told I'm clever by old ladies, he hee) ,seeing people I know from a variety of past knit related events, wandering around harrogate, bit of Gok Wan, explaining to people why my company is called 'Knit and Destroy' and sleeping.
The weekend saw the arrival of my new assistants/sales people, in the form of my Mum and sister. They both did a great job of looking after my stand for me, such a good job in fact 2 ladies asked if they could take my Mum home with them!

This meant that I could go and look round at the rest of the show and see other crafty things. The highlights were the Knitted Textile Student awards, as always this showed what the most innovative students are doing with knit at the moment, the 3D cross stitch stall with little houses and boxes all made of cross stitch and the knitted christmas display.

As you all know, it has been snowing here recently, and Harrogate was no exception. The show closed early on Sunday so that people could get packed up and 'beat the weather' but it wasnt quite early enough. By the time we got out the roads were covered with snow and traffic, we only just got up the hill from the car park with 2 helpful local men pushing and my Mum revving like she's never revved before! But we weren't getting any further, so we rang the B&B I had been staying in and booked an extra night! This meant that we could go to Betty's as planned, hooray...we trudged through the snow and sat by the open fire with hot carrot soup followed by cakes (caramel slice, chocolate torte and some christmas concoction) and felt like we had gone back in time!

All in all I had a great time at The Knitting and Stitching show, it was really good to see hardcore knitters who have been making stuff for years impressed by my work! The 3D knits went down a treat, especially with the teens, but the firm favourite was the friendly foxxx fur scarf, i think there will be a few ladies getting their needles out and knitting themselves (or their grandkids) a fox scarf this winter!

That's all, go on about all the lovely people I met and detailed every awesome thing I'd seen but I do have knitting to do!

More soon, Kandy x

Thursday, 18 November 2010

Knitting and Stitching Show..NEXT WEEK!!!

Hiya,

So I haven't written on here for a while because I have been busy knitting, for the biggest craft fair that Knit and Destroy has ever been to, the Knitting and Stitching Show!!! Described as, wait for it..."The best textiles exhibition in Europe"...and it definitly will be this year.



How come you are doing this, I hear you cry...isn't it really expensive n that?! Well, here's the thing, I won the stall. Thanks to the lovely ladies at Craft Guerilla for running the competition where stalls at each knitting and stitching show (London, Birmingham and Harrogate) were up for grabs for new designers who wanted the opportunity to bring their products to a bigger market and make that 'next step'.

I got the good news that I would be having a stand at the Knitting and Stitching Show way back in July and cannot believe just how quickly the time has gone and it's next week! I have plenty of last minute making to do, this is my anthem for it:

Just to be clear...I unfortunately won't be making the world's largest gem sweater...but I will be making lots of fancy knitted goods for people to look at and buy, wooop. Come and see me and all the other ace crafters and suppliers in Harrogate next week then go home and knit yo-self a gem sweater yeah!

Kandy x

Monday, 8 November 2010

New knits, straight outta the MOVIES!!!

So...my exhibition opening has been and gone, thanks to everyone who came along, it was a great night! I gave you all a sneak peek at a few of the products before the opening, but for those of you who can't make it to Manchester, here's some more!

Hollywood cushion

Admit One - ticket roll scarves and Celluloid scarf


Some of my main pieces, errrr behind me!!! I will go back and get proper snaps of these, they are both red and green pieces, best viewed through 3D glasses, oh yeah!
Also, the majority of the exhibition pieces will be available in my online shop SOON, I will let you know when I get them in there.

Exhibition continues at Purl City Yarns until 28th November.

Kandy x