It was an early start on Friday 25th May as we set off to the first Woollinn, Dublin’s Festival of Yarn 2018. I had taken their advice on the website and paid for the Dublin Airport Red Car Park. I’d also bought our tickets, so we were all set.
We had an uneventful journey to ALSAA, situated beside Dublin Airport, and arrived just after 10am! Of course, we started with a coffee, then I took a first meander around the marketplace. I hadn’t booked into any of the workshops but I had very much hoped to go to the lecture Smartphone Photography for Yarn Lovers by Kate O’Sullivan of A Playful Day but unfortunately, I was too late to get the tickets for this.
So I had to content myself with the Marketplace… lol… 
To experience the Woollinn Yarn Festival watch Jean the Creative Pixie’s excellent walk around the marketplace for her youtube channel. I did recognise a few podcasters that I enjoy watching such as Kate from Hawthorn Cottage Craft and Grace of Babbles Traveling Yarn podcast who had a stand with her beautiful hand dyed yarn. I’m not very good at striking up conversations with people or approaching them and introducing myself, so I tend to admire them from afar!
I had set a budget… best laid plans of mice and men and all that… this was as you can imagine broken (a teeny tiny bit). Sometimes you just see a yarn that has to come home with you. For this yarn festival I had decided that I wanted to choose a variety of colours that appealed to me. Last year at the Yarnfolk festival I arrived home to find that virtually all of the yarns I had chosen were tones of grey with added speckles. I was determined that would not be the case this time. I had hoped to see Hedgehog Fibres or LITLG represented in some way, but that wasn’t the case.
As with any festival (not that I have been to all that many), I like to have an idea of what I am looking for. I’m never after large quantities of the same yarn. I’m after special skeins that I fall in love with. I like to have a collection of single skeins and one of a kind skeins in beautiful colour combinations that really appeal to me and catch my eye. In the main, I like to knit shawls, socks, fingerless mitts and hats which don’t require large quantities of one colour… Although, in the last year I have been caught by the sweater knitting bug. Now that it has become a little warmer, my sweater project is hooked onto the handlebar of my exercise bike, and obsessive sock knitting has returned.
However, I digress! Back to the wonderful marketplace. My first purchase was a skein from Unbelieveawool in her Sparkle Sock base in the richly toned “Digging for Gold” colour. It took me a ridiculous length of time to decide on the sock yarn with the sparkly gold stellina.
My next precious find came from A Yarn Story (a shop in Bath) who had a selection of La Bien Aimee merino singles in their booth. I chose the beautiful deep coloured Sosu…
I didn’t go to the marketplace with any particular plan, although, I did want to buy mainly from sellers who I hadn’t bought from before. It was incredibly difficult deciding which skeins were coming home with me.
I just couldn’t decide between all of the extraordinary colours at the Olann stand and came away with 3 skeins. They are all in her Sock Lite base, in the colourways: Quarry, Vessel and Eden. Her yarns are like an impressionist painting on a sock yarn.
Other purchases came from Martin’s Lab, Ellie and Ada, Debonnaire, Ripples Crafts and Green Elephant to name a few. I also loved the wood turned yarn bowls that were on the Bear in Sheep’s Clothing stand they also have the cutest enamel pins. It doesn’t get much cuter than a polar bear in a fair isle sweater…
I only bought one book when I was at the show from This is Knit. Speckles written by Justyna Lorkowska a talented designer whose husband is the dyer behind Martin’s lab. There is a wonderful interview with them on Fruity Knitting Podcast Episode 27.
What I enjoy most about a yarn show like this is the opportunity to see and touch yarns with future projects in mind. This was very much the case at Ysolda’s shop. Where I enjoyed looking at the rustic wool and feeling how soft finished projects were that had been knit using them. I also spent a while looking at her book stand. I often buy hard to obtain books and magazines from Ysolda, and I now have my Birthday present chosen for September. I’d really love the book Selbuvotter, with its myriad of charts.
After lunch, we saw Susan Crawford signing her Vintage Shetland Project book for purchasers. I subscribed to the crowdfunding for this extraordinary book and later bought the ebook as well. I’ve always been glad that I bought the additional ebook when she offered it, before the hardback was published, as the final book is very large and very heavy, and I enjoy reading the essays on my tablet. When I’m reading the book, I have to read it at my desk or the kitchen table as I find it a bit too heavy to try to hold for any length of time. If you love Shetland, fair isle knitting, colour work and history, you will find something in the Vintage Shetland Project that will inspire you for your next fair isle project. I particularly enjoy reading the stories about the people who created the original sweaters. The amazing Andrea and Andrew of Fruity Knitting Podcast have a great interview with Susan Crawford on Episode 48 which is well worth watching.
A last minute purchase from Countess Ablaze was Undercover Otter’s Squirm Sock in the Woollinn colourway which had a rainbow of speckles on a dove grey backdrop.
Woollinn, Dublin’s Festival of Yarn 2018 was well worth the visit. The yarns were vibrant and beautiful. Many of the vendor’s were equally flamboyant and gorgeous! There was a comfortable corner of tables where knitters could sit and knit, drink coffee, and chat with each other.
I was a little concerned that they were very specific about no food being brought onto the premises. This is okay, if I can be certain of being able to buy reasonably healthy food where I am going, but it is an issue when you are taking insulin injections throughout the day. I did sneak a small packet of 5 oat cakes in, in the bottom of my bag, just in case! As it turned out food choices were a little bit limited if a chicken sandwich wasn’t your thing! And the oatcakes did not make it home…
The line up of teachers for the workshops was wonderful and I’d have loved to have attended a couple of them, but my first choices for the day we were attending were already full, and to be honest, I’d have felt a bit guilty leaving Neil to his own devices in the marketplace for several hours! For an inaugural event, I think the ladies at This Is Knit did a phenomenal job and I’m looking forward to next year’s event already!
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