ColourWorks

25% off this lovely soft yarn! Comprised of baby alpaca, merino wool and cotton, it's soft and fluffy with the appearance of mohair but without the itchiness! Almost sold out, just 3 colours left.

Natural Fluff 4 Ply - Etsy This Yarn item by ColourWorksCreations has 7 favorites from Etsy shoppers. Ships from United Kingdom. Listed on Jul 9, 2024

A fabulous time was had by all today at our spinning workshop in the Covered Yard. There was much laughing and cursing going on! Thank you to the lovely participants who all went away with a little skein of their very own handspun yarn. I really enjoyed the session too, I love sharing my knowledge of traditional crafts with people.

More workshops this month on the website 😊

A programme of workshops for August is now available. Learn to spin, basic weaving on a shoebox and 2 types of natural dyeing workshop are available to book through the website (see link in bio). Learn something new or build on existing skills, as well as meeting new people in a friendly atmosphere. My new workshop is perfectly set up for welcoming curious minds and creative people!

Getting back into dyeing now with my new equipment. The first photo is Blue-faced Leicester dyed in tansy, the one on the left is being brightened with washing soda and on the right is turning a lovely green in an iron solution. Then cochineal being rinsed and the last 2 photos show the new look outside the workshop with an information board about some of the dyes. I'll be adding dyed samples to it so visitors can see the amazing range of colours which can be achieved. This BFL 4 ply is proudly grown and spun in the UK.

#

It's bargain time in the tiny shop! Need to make space for new stock so we have 350g colour packs for £26, saving approximately 50%, an ever growing bargain basket with savings of 40%, and some mystery yarn on sale where the labels went walkies.

Pop in to the new workshop, still in the Covered Yard but now in Unit 3 at the end.

We are finally open for business! The monster sink is installed, the sign is up and the shop area is sorted. There have been a few hiccups along the way and a lot of work put in but it's all turned out fine.

My new workshop is bigger and is better set up to run workshops. One of the sinks is heated which is great for dyeing, and I'm going to experiment with dyeing t-shirts and fabric. There will be a programme of workshops soon in dyeing, spinning and basic weaving so watch this space.

Space...the final frontier. Big thanks to my mate Paul for helping me take down the wall in my new workshop (actually he did most of it). So excited for this next phase in my business! Much more room for me to run dyeing sessions especially with my new HUGE sink.

Yes! It's happening! The next stage of the ColourWorks journey is under way and we will be busy over the next couple of weeks getting the new workshop ready to welcome customers, and also for workshop sessions in dyeing and other crafty stuff. Watch out for updates 👀

Thank you to for this opportunity, as her venture has moved out to a lovely new location.

Had a lovely afternoon with participants at my spinning workshop. They learned how to prepare the fleece, spin yarn and then ply it together to make a little skein of yarn. I enjoyed a delightful afternoon in their company and they did really well for total beginners.

Look out for more sessions and courses, and dyeing workshops too when I've moved into my larger workshop in July. I've definitely outgrown my little space!

A peek at some of the Shetland fleece which I've been test dyeing. From the top down, dyes are cochineal, madder, annatto and onion skins. Very pleased with the results and there's more colours on the drying rack. Might just have to spin it and do a test knit, and then keep the result for myself, what a shame 😁.

I know this will be great to spin, but I haven't done any type of felting so I don't know the suitability of Shetland for wet or needle felting so any comments welcome.

I'm pleased to announce that I'm now stocking fleece for spinning and felting, in the workshop and online. Available in natural colours at the moment and I will also be offering naturally dyed fleece too in the near future.

Pictured here are Manx Loaghtan, Black and White Shetland and the very shiny grey Gotland. I've spun all of them and they're all gorgeous, but my favourite is the Manx with it's lovely soft feel and the rich brown colour.

On the subject of spinning, there are still places available for my spinning workshop on 25th May, see the website for details and booking.

Newsflash!!! ColourWorks will be moving in a couple of months! But I'm not going far - I'll only be moving 3 doors down in the Covered Yard into the end workshop vacated by Amanda at Tinbox Angel. You may have seen her post, she's moving to a lovely rural workshop (and will be missed but wish her all the best).

The new space is a bit bigger so I'll have room to run the workshops which I'm planning, i.e. dyeing, spinning and basic weaving. I'm running a spinning workshop on 25th May which is in the current workshop but I'm holding off on the dyeing classes as they will be so much easier with the extra space. Also I might be able to keep it tidier...😄

I'm running a spinning workshop using traditional wheels on Saturday 25th May in the afternoon. Places are limited to 3 so that each participant gets plenty of attention. This is suitable for beginners or those wanting a refresh, and includes techniques of preparing the fleece and spinning different thicknesses of yarn. There will be a chance to try different types of fibres and natural colours too.

The cost is £35 for 2.5 hours, 1.30-4.00.

Go to my website to book under 'workshops' or contact me.

Now available on the website and Etsy shop, lovely Shetland 4 ply in a range of yummy colours. Part of the new Best of British range, they are wound into 50g skeins so you can mix colours.

There are so many fabulous breeds of British wool and it's important to support this heritage industry and keep it going. Reared in Britain and spun in West Yorkshire, this Shetland yarn is one of the finer British wools and is great for fair isle projects and sweaters.

Just a little teaser for things to come...kicking off my new range of British wool spun in West Yorkshire is this gorgeous Shetland 4 ply. Lovely bright colours, 14 at the moment and will add more as they're dyed.

They are not yet listed because I'm just in the process of photographing and editing to put on my website. It's my least favourite bit as it's so difficult to represent the colours as faithfully as possible on screen. Sometimes it takes several days of photographing, editing and then repeating the process because I'm not happy with the results. Does anyone else have this problem? I bought a decent camera but often the colours are nothing like the real thing.

Whoa! Just discovered that if you boil annatto seeds with washing soda it brings out this bright orange colour, normally I get a lovely gold. It says it in my favourite dyeing book by Jenny Dean, I just never read that bit 🙄

I have had my IT hat on this week and have revamped my website! After much bum-numbing work and cursing, I've managed to use a new theme. There may be one or two blips - if anyone would be so kind as to let me know I will be most grateful 🙏🏼.

If it takes 10,000 hours to master something, the amount of time I've spent trying to figure out this darn thing over the last year must add up to genius level. But the IT hat is too big I must confess. Procrastination was the name of the game, but a flare up of a back problem forced me to work at home for most of this week and I ran out of excuses, i.e. I didn't want to do housework.

My Etsy shop is on holiday due to a technical issue beyond my control, so do visit my lovely shiny new website ✨️ 😊.

www.colour-works.co.uk

Had a fab day running a natural dyeing workshop today. We crammed a lot in to our 3 hours, dyeing in onion skins, weld, madder, cochineal and indigo. Also experimented with block printing onto fabric mordanted with tannin. Happy participants went away with an indigo tie dyed tote bag, two skeins of woollen yarn dip dyed in weld and indigo, and cochineal and indigo, and several colourful pieces of fabric.

The best thing about the workshops is people's reaction to the natural 'magic' which happens when you're using natural dyes. Through the addition of a household substance like washing soda or lemon juice you can change the colour of something dyed in madder for example. It's a whole new world to be discovered, and I myself am always learning.

Thank you to my friends for coming along and allowing me to practice on them, they were great students and I had a ball!

Watch this space for upcoming workshop dates!

The first of the new Shetland range, 4 ply and DK. These are not yet online but the DK is in the workshop (I also had blue but it's sold out!). I'm aiming to do around 20 colours in 50g skeins, priced at £5.40 each.

Next I'll be experimenting with dyeing fleece for spinning and felting. Looking forward to that!

That's the back done. Hoping to get it finished for next winter!

I have a bagful of skeins which I've used to chuck in leftover dyebaths and mixtures of uncertain dyes. Also experiments which maybe I didn't like. I don't like to waste the dyebath if there's colour left, so sometimes I mix 2 or more together to see what happens. What's happened is these gorgeous colours!

So I'm knitting a thing. Well, the back of a thing. You don't know what a 'thing' is? It's when a knitter has a bag of lovely yarns which have been whispering away in a corner until eventually they put themselves onto a needle and take over the brain of said knitter. Knitter then has to knit whatever thing yarn tells her/him to. Simple.

Help the fundraising to get the roof fixed! Should be a lovely day

Really looking forward to this! Just wanted to give a shout out to the brilliant crafty creators who have made it possible, Harvey/Made By Harvey, Diane Hinson, Liz Mellen Ceramics, Anita Chamberlain, Kay Maynard and ColourWorks. A very talented bunch!

Pop along between 10 and 4 on Good Friday to browse their stalls, eat some cake and help us inch closer to getting the roof fixed!

I've just received this amazing invention called an iSPIN which turns your sewing machine into a spinning wheel! It's an affordable alternative to shelling out hundreds of pounds for a wheel. This will be available to have a go at when I launch the spinning lessons. I'm now waiting on an actual spinning wheel to arrive too, then I'll have enough for 3 or 4 participants.

Can't wait to test it out!

I've spent a very relaxing day weaving on my shoebox loom. I didn't have a plan in mind, I just wanted to use handspun wools. I ended up with a sort of hill in the middle (made of camel hair!), fluffy clouds made of unspun fleece and a cloudy grey sky. I'm not sure what the tassels are on the sides, I was just experimenting.

I might sew on some beads or shells, then hang it on some found driftwood.

Another workshop introducing people to a new skill. On Saturday participants learned how to turn a shoebox into a loom and learned the basics of weaving. We spent a couple of hours chatting, weaving and exploring a creative side which sometimes we don't have time or energy to access.

It's great to learn a new skill, as neuroscience has shown it's good for the brain. The other objective of this workshop is to provide a safe and non-judgemental space for people to spend time in company with others, swapping stories and exploring creativity using fibres and yarns. You may say, 'I'm not a creative person', but it doesn't matter, as the point is not to create a work of art but to experience the benefits of mindfulness which naturally happens in the session.

I will be advertising these workshops in the near future and if you're interested you can contact me (see profile) or leave a comment below.

Having given a spinning lesson to the lovely on Friday, I thought I would get more adventurous to show what can be done. It's a bit overtwisted but that can be balanced out by washing and hanging with a weight.

The lesson was a trial to test out my teaching methods on a beginner, and my willing guinea pig went away well happy with a little skein of her very own handspun. Silly me forgot to take any photos but they are on her profile. I'm now looking into buying 2 more spinning wheels so I can provide lessons in small groups. They will be for beginners but also if you have a little experience but want some guidance. If you would be interested please leave a comment below.

#

Happy Spring Equinox! It's a lovely time of year with lots to look forward to 😊

I'm feeling a bit today. Forgot my heated jacket for the workshop but found this natty little number instead, thought it went well with the hippy vibe I've got going on. I made a couple of these for presents a few years back. Love, peace and rainbows everyone, it never goes out of fashion 🌈 xx

I'm here at the Spring Market in Market Square today, slightly damp but hopefully it will clear up this afternoon. There are some lovely stalls here selling local produce and crafts. It's great to see the local talent and expertise.

ColourWorks will be here! 👇 I will have lots of bargains as I'm having a Spring clear out.

Lancaster's Seasonal Market returns on Friday 15 March for its Spring 2024 edition. Come down to Market Street and the Market Square between 10am and 5pm for a range of stalls including hot food, local products including honey, cider vinegar, cider, wool, toiletries using local honey and art and craft and information about the FoodFutures project. Visit the repair/recycle tent to get help mending clothes, servicing your bike and sorting your computer and relax with music played by musicians from the area!
https://www.facebook.com/events/1060784935127346/