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Wrapped up in knit

Knitting needles' soothing click. Indulgent textures like angora, cashmere and silk. Friends and a glass of wine. How knitting has spun a $1-billion industry.

By MARK ALBRIGHT
Published January 16, 2006

ODESSA - Monday is the regular "stitch and b----" night in the cramped back room at the hole-in-the-wall Fiber Art Inc. shop tucked behind a gas station on North Mobley Road.

A half-dozen women with little in common drove miles to sip chardonnay and swap yarns about their families, vacations and even politics while their fingers methodically make the needles fly.

Occasionally, they seek advice and consent about the thick fabric creations taking shape in their laps.

Cindy Munro, co-owner of the Mirror Lake Lyceum events hall in St. Petersburg, accepted a colleague's gentle probing that she appeared to be working on an "awesome sweater."

"Thanks, but it's a pillow case."

Part social event, part creative outlet, knitting has been rediscovered by growing numbers of women who lug their projects around all day in case life deals them some down time. They whip out their needles and yarn in airplane terminals, in coffee shops, even in the car waiting for a traffic light.

"There is just something therapeutic about knitting that clears your mind," said Laura Metzer, a former Tampa Microsoft executive and art gallery owner who took up knitting last year at 42. "It's peaceful, almost spiritual. It's the new yoga."

Indeed, after slipping off the radar screen for decades, knitting is in a full-blown resurgence. Sales of knitting yarns, needles and pattern publications surged past $1-billion in 2005, up from $450-million in 1995.

"Sales more than doubled in a decade," said Mary Colucci, director of the Craft Yarn Council of America. "We thought we would never get the baby boomers back after their hippie days. But here they are."

Research confirms the new or born-again knitters come in two waves: women older than 40 and women younger than 30.

Any men?

"A few," said Rosemary Nolletti, owner of Uncommon Threads, a Palm Harbor shop that specializes in fiber arts.

Among female crafters 25 to 34, participation in knitting tripled since 2002 to 33 percent since 2002, according to the yarn council. Knitters younger than 18 doubled to 16 percent. Those 55 to 64 surged 74 percent to 7.8-million.

These days a third of the regulars at Flying Needles in Belleair Bluffs are younger than 30. They are drawn to stitch everything from scarves to $30 worth of flashy yarn embellishments on their $1.99 flip-flops. The latest fad: pompoms sewn into scarves.

"The younger ones come to learn because they have never knitted and their mothers don't know either," said Dianne Colitz, owner of the 42-year-old store. "Most of the rest are baby boomers. Somehow knitting skipped a generation."

To put the cycle in perspective, knitting has grown into a $1-billion piece of the $30-billion hobbies and crafts industry. It's quickly gaining ground on scrapbooking, the most popular craft craze.

"Knitting is one of the fastest growing crafts in the business," said Kristin Degnan, spokeswoman for the Crafts and Hobbies Association, a trade group of manufacturers and suppliers.

The industry worked hard to win loyalty for what can be a time-consuming and frustrating hobby. Recognizing that many people feel stressed out or strapped for time, yarnmakers and pattern magazines promote simple projects for newbies: scarves that can be done in an afternoon if you're a speedster; a weekend if you're not.

Next come purses and hats as quick confidence builders. Then more challenging shrugs - a long-sleeve knit top that ends just below the bust line.

The lifeblood of the rebirth is a huge variety of novelty yarns that are constantly updated, relegating that coarse old wool to the back shelf. New yarns come in multicolored blends of light acrylics, silks, linens, angoras and cashmere. Today's yarn textures are ultrasoft: feathery, furry or fluffy. That means it's not all winter-only wear in Florida.

Today's bulky threads and bigger needles mean fewer stitches and less time. They also hide mistakes, which are obscured under embellishments.

"You don't have to be really bright and know all the fancy stitches to make something beautiful anymore," said Terry Schuster, a former JCrew and Urban Outfitters executive who took up knitting last year after moving to Tampa. "You just knit a pattern and the yarn does the work."

The fabric choices range from cheap on up. Polyester fetches as little as $6 a pound. A pair of needles cost a few bucks. But the latest flashy fashion fibers cost two to four times that. Prices run all the way up to $100 for a skein of hand-dyed, hand-knotted yarns spun at St. Petersburg's Prism Art. For about $25, the cognoscenti can knit with mahogany, rosewood or ebony needles.

"This is not your grandmother knitting potholders," said Rosalind Moore, the owner/coach/designer at Fiber Art. "It's more about fashion, interior design and wearable art. You can make a scarf for $18 to $40 that goes for $75 to $125 at Nordstrom."

The new yarns gave marketers an opening to romance the craft as more than a way to be handy and frugal. The industry publicity machine combs the entertainment press for celebrities who have picked up knitting.

Among them: Julia Roberts, Sarah Jessica Parker, Vanna White, Hilary Swank and Cameron Diaz.

When do-it-yourself doyenne Martha Stewart emerged from prison in March carrying a farewell poncho made by a fellow inmate, the yarn companies scrambled.

"Within 48 hours every yarn company had teams trying to figure out whose yarn was used" said John Laurie, president of Coats & Clark Inc., a Charlotte, N.C., yarn manufacturer.

Lion Brand won the lottery. When Stewart's TV show premiered, Lion planted 27 women in the audience wearing copies of the poncho. The ponchos were sold for $400 each on a charity auction on eBay.

Publicity stunts aside, knitting's rebirth has spread largely by word of mouth among friends.

"A friend told me about it," said Arlene Newman, 65-year-old training coordinator with the Hillsborough County Department of Childrens Services. "After 40 years of no hobbies, I just walked in a shop and fell in love with knitting."

The obligatory 21st century community of online fan blogs and Web sites such as chicknit.com and wendyknits.net mushroomed. A Google search of the words "stitch and b----" last week returned 2.08-million hits.

Stores have zeroed in on the new trend.

Craft discount chains such as Michaels Stores and Jo-Ann Stores dramatically increased their knitting departments in the past few years. With names such as Stitchworm in St. Petersburg and Knit 'n Knibble in Tampa, a hardy group of four Tampa Bay independent yarn stores doubled to eight in five years. Moore's Fiber Art grew from a site on eBay where she built a reputation as the "empress of eyelash" yarn into a retail store that was profitable within six months. She opened a store initially for storage space. Now it generates three times the sales of her online business.

A decade ago yarn companies only changed their knitting selections at Michaels or Jo-Ann every two years.

"Now they change the inventory plan and selection every six months," said yarnmaker Laurie.

So like a high-fashion merchant, Moore tries to stock only the latest imported yarns that have not filtered down to mass merchants. She rarely reorders. So customers have to buy now or they won't see it again.

Passionate knitters are yarn hoarders. Some hide their yarn stash like drug addicts. They fear finishing a project in the middle of TV show and having nothing to do with their hands. So they routinely have six projects in some stage of completion available as an alternate.

"Yarn is like fine wine," said Munro, who is so hooked on her hobby that she donates a lot of her creations to charity. "Sometimes you just have to have it."

"When they're going on a trip, they come in to buy trip yarn," said Moore, who keeps eight projects piled in plastic buckets going at a time. "You don't need electricity to knit, so we get a storm yarn rush whenever there's a hurricane alert."

Knitters - new or retreads - often talk of the calming effect and stress relief of the repetitive motion.

"It's my therapy," said Susan Burnam, a Clearwater claims processor who has lobbied her physician boss to let her "sit in a rocking chair knitting" when she's on the phone dealing with health insurance companies.

Christine Nissley, an Odessa resident who in a year became proficient enough to sell her capelets and shawls at craft shows, credits knitting with keeping her awake while watching TV at night. Her husband keeps the car dome light on so she can knit. Every day she's up at 4 a.m. for an hourlong knitting workout before her husband wakes up.

"It's my quiet time," she said.

Knitters knit everywhere.

Brenda Helms, a Tampa business consultant, remembers knitting to kill time in the Shreveport, La., airport (even before a recent rules rewrite, Homeland Security did not consider knitting needles dangerous enough to be banned from flights).

"I got hung up on the pattern and this woman (at the airport) started asking about my project, then told me how to solve the problem," Helms said. "She just cast on and did it herself. I e-mailed her a photo of our finished product."

Mark Albright can be reached at albright@sptimes.com or 727 893-8252.

- 36 percent of American women - 53-million people - know how to knit or crochet. That's a 51 percent increase over the past 10 years.

- About 33 percent of women ages 25 to 34 knit or crochet, up from 13 percent of that age group a decade ago.

- About 16 percent of the those 18 and younger have the know-how, up from 8 percent in 10 years.

[Last modified January 13, 2006, 21:07:02]