Story originally printed in the Winona Daily News or online at www.winonadailynews.com

Published - Friday, March 16, 2007

Old art of knitting catching on with younger generation of women

By Amber Dulek / Winona Daily News

STOCKTON, Minn. — When Shana Williams picks up her needles and yarn, she feels a connection to her aunt Betty.

“She taught me to knit when I was in the second grade, and I’ve been doing it since then,” the 23-year-old substitute teacher said while knitting slippers in her Stockton home. “Every Wednesday night, I used to sit there for hours.”

With new techniques such as felting and fancy materials available today, the historic craft isn’t just for grandmas anymore. For young women like Williams, it’s hip to knit.

“Over the last 20 years women have been getting back into (crafts),” said Tamara Berg, director of Women’s and Gender Studies at Winona State University.

At Gustavus Adolphus College in Saint Peter, Minn., English professor Elizabeth Baer and education professor Carolyn O’Grady taught a one-month knitting class in January. To their surprise, the class had a waiting list of students vying to get in.

“They like the idea of making things with their hands,” Baer said.

In tribute to knitting as a part of women’s history, WSU will host a forum at noon today with Baer and O’Grady on knitting as a craft, culture and community building tool.

“When you pick that up and do it yourself, it’s like you’re connecting to its history,” said Berg.

The Craft Yarn Council of America estimates 53 million American women know how to knit or crochet; that’s 50 percent more than a decade ago.

Teens and women age 24 to 34 represent the largest growing segment of knitters.

“They don’t just go to the Gap and pick out something hundreds of other people are wearing,” said Mary Colucci, executive director of the non-profit trade association. “They want something more unique.”

Colucci believes crafts like knitting, sewing, and quilting have caught on in part because of a higher quality of designs and yarns available.

“People still have this idea you have to be really old to do it,” Colucci said. “Years ago, they only did it for economic reasons, but today it can still be for that but is gratifying and satisfying to work with hands.”

Baer, who has knitted for 45 years, said the range of new yarns and new processes like felting—the technique of shrinking wool—have sparked new interest in younger people.

The repetitive crossing and counting become a form of mediation and relaxation for many knitters.

Eunie Alsacker, a counselor at Winona State, started a once-a-week knitting class a month ago with a dozen students.

“In order to manage stress, we recommend active and passive activities. Exercising is an example of active, while I think knitting can accomplish the second,” Alsacker said. “Knitting (uses) both sides of the brain, which leads to higher concentration.”

Winona State junior Sally Slattery said knitting keeps her calm.

“Your hand keeps going in the same motion,” she said. “You just kind of do it and your mind goes to another place.”

Slattery of Elk Mound, Wis., started knitting last fall while studying in England. She said she was eager to learn, so she joined a knitting club with 15 other students.

“It was a gossip hour kind of thing,” she said. “We’d talk about the boys in the program, where we’d like go, who we were missing and what we’d do when we got back home.”

Slattery, 21, calls herself a closet knitter.

“I’m not ashamed of it or anything, but I don’t bring it to the movies,” she said. “I thought it was this old person thing to do, but our culture is getting craftier and if you can find the right yarn, you can make some really beautiful things, which can be cheap to do.”

Reporter Amber Dulek can be reached at amber.dulek@lee.net or (507)453-3513.