Kate Larson Textiles

This is the third and final installment about my 2013 trip to Scotland, Shetland, and Norway.

Bergen.

We left Shetland and took the short flight to Bergen in western Norway on Midsummer’s Eve. Our hotel was near the university, which has a fantastic museum with a number of knitted artifacts on exhibit. I was surprised to see a few of them were pieces I had studied closely in some of my favourite knitting books, and I greeted them like old friends. (Like the sweater on page 14 of Susanne Pagoldh’s Nordic Knitting.) The museum’s permanent collection includes the earliest knitted fragment found in Norway to date. I was rapturous when I saw that it was included in the current exhibit. The fragment has been dated to the early sixteenth century. Translating the placard, I learned that it is knit in stockinette stitch using 2-ply wool, which was plied S (left). It appears to be fulled and is about 10 sts to the inch. The fragment was discovered during excavation in Bergen’s historic Bryggen area, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Since Bergen was a historically important trading port, determining whether this piece originated in Norway is difficult. I can’t share a picture of this lovely artifact, but here are some images from Bergen. Click on any image to open the gallery.

Bergen’s train station.

Looking towards Bryggen from the Fish Market

University area.

Gardens near the university.

University area.

Fish Market.

Oslo.

I spent a blissful day at the Norsk Folkemuseum once we arrived in Oslo. Months before the trip, I arranged to visit the collections at the museum and selected a number of artifacts that I would like to see. When I arrived at the museum on a bright, sunny morning, I was met by the collections manager, Heidi.

Here is an example of the artifacts I was so very lucky to see. You can find these gloves (and more) on the digitaltmuseum.no database, and they are currently part of a new knitting exhibit at the Folkemuseum. These fingervanter (gloves) (NF.1901-0502AB) are particularly fine and well-preserved examples of fulled and embroidered handcoverings from the Telemark region. They were added to the museum collection in 1901. They are woolen—knitted and intensely fulled, with added cuffs of fulled cloth.

Do these gloves set your heart racing, too? One of the reasons I wanted to take a closer look at this particular pair is that there appeared to be several types of woolen embroidery thread used, and that is indeed the case. The elaborate Telemark-style patterns on the back of the hand are done with matte, 3 (or more) ply yarn, and the embroidered initials are done with a silky, 2-ply yarn. Itching to make your own? I wrote an article for the summer 2014 issue of Spin-Off about these yarns, their history, and how to spin your own. In the meantime, allow me to show you my favourite corner of the internet.

Step 1: Connect to NRK Folkemusikk, the Norwegian Broadcasting Company’s folk music station. (Also available through iTunes.)
Step 2: Dive into the collections at digitaltmuseum.com.