This article appeared in the Kingston Guardian on the 2nd of April. Although the title refers to it as knitting, the reporter does say that the yarnbomb is crocheted. Phew!
She also calls us “yarn bombardiers” and “craft connoisseurs”. Love that!!
No introduction needed for this photo, hey? As you can see we yarnbombed the lamp post and five bollards on the traffic island in front of Surbiton station.
In the space of one hour, the roundabout went from drab and dreary to striped and adorned with fruity bunting – the way all roundabouts should be I think.
It was soooooo much fun and I’m still on a yarn high!
Bobi Robson, from The Craft Inn came along to give John and I a hand.
Her help was much appreciated, and it ended up being a brilliant team effort. John had the great idea to bring along packaging tape just in case we needed it to keep the stripes up on the lamp post (and we did!), Bobi suggested we attach the bunting lower down on the lamp post to prevent the wind from blowing the bunting into cyclist or cars, and when we realised our cable ties were too short to go around the bollards, I suggested we tie the bunting to the cable between the bollards. Three problems – three genius minds at work.
I think John was amazing. He sewed two of the granny squares onto the bollards (a very unmanly thing to do for, what felt like, the whole of Surbiton to see) and then took on the task of getting really, really high on the ladder to put up the bunting (thereby redeeming his manliness).
The end result of our hour on the traffic island, and my four weeks of crochet, is a brilliantly colourful work of yarn graffiti.
Bobi and I at the Surbiton roundabout yarnbomb.
I hope the yarnbomb will raise awareness for the upcoming Surbiton Food Festival. If you found this blogpost because you Googled “weird woolen stripes on Surbiton roundabout” please also visit the Surbiton Food Festival website here, and of course come to the festival in May, otherwise my hours of crochet would have been in vain.
Well, probably not totally in vain because even if people don’t realise a food festival is coming, at least they can appreciate a bit of stripey colour in the middle of Surbiton.
And as you can gather, I thoroughly enjoyed myself and I’m kinda proud of myself. This is my biggest, most prominent yarnbomb yet. The other three (warm-up yarnbomb dare I say?) are herehere and here.
I hope you enjoy the new and improved traffic island. As far as I know the yarnbomb is staying up until the end of the Food Festival (19th of May) so you will have a lot of time to appreciate it in all it’s fruity glory.
Here’s a video giving you a 360 degree view of the yarnbomb.
Keep your eyes peeled around Surbiton, as Bobi and her Craft Inn pals will be adding more granny squares to the railings around the roundabout, and other crafty items will pop up around St. Andrews Square. You have been warned. The craft bombers are coming!
P.S. If you ever get the urge to crochet apples, pears, oranges or strawberries like I did for this yarnbomb, there is a link to the pdf pattern in this blogpost. The fruit were originally designed by Louise Howe. They make excellent coasters. Which is what she designed them to be…. until this yarnbomber got her hook into them.
I think I’ve had my fill of fruit for now: 14 Days of crocheting fruit (including on the 07:26 to Waterloo and lunch hours in Caffe Nero), four balls of Stylecraft Special Chunky and six balls of Sirdar Hayfield Bonus Chunky later, I’ve made 64 pieces of fruit for the Surbiton Food Festival yarnbomb.
64 Pieces of crochet fruit over 14 days works out to just under 5-a-day. How health conscious am I?!
Crocheting the fruit was fun, but doing the stems and leaves and then having to sew the three (tiny) parts together got a bit tedious by the time I got to pear number 15, give or take an orange or two.
Now, thankfully, it’s time to move on to stripes. My favourite thing in the whole world. Just mindless trebles in any colour and I can go as mad and bright as I want. In fact, for the purpose of a yarnbomb the more outrageous the colours the better!
My amazing husband was with me two weeks ago when I went to Surbiton to take measurements. He is a stickler for detail and an excellent draughtsman. With his accurate measurements and my love of colour, the yarnbomb is going to look great!
Lovely Alice of Knit n Run 4 Sanity has blogged about her very cute cherries, grapes and strawberry contributions here. She even shares her pattern with us. Thank you so much Alice!!
Just to recap, the details of the fruity yarnbomb is in this post, and the pattern for the crocheted fruit is on this link: Crochet fruit pattern. Anyone can crochet fruit and send it to me, as long as it reaches me before 22 March 2013. Apart from Alice and Louise (the designer of the fruit patterns) I have a lady from Dubai who is contributing and I think one or two from South Africa as well!
If you are also crocheting fruit for the yarnbomb, how many have you made?
Saturday it’s the big one. The Surbiton Festival 2011 market stall. The one day event in Surbiton when roads are closed, the Mayor of Kingston does the opening ceremony, marching bands march and street entertainers entertain. It’s a biggy. Apparently there are “over 100 stalls” – I’m number 58 so at least 58 stalls. Wowzer.
Last year the Surrey Comet quoted David Randal as saying there were about 25,000 people!!!!!
Hubby and I are really looking forward to Saturday. Even if I don’t sell anything it’s going to be a very fun day. The Grand Parade will be marching by in front our stall at 12 noon, and the entertainment is taking place a couple of meters from us from 10 am to 4pm. As stall holders we have free parking for the day as well. Bonus!
Luckily I still have all my stall things ready from the Merton Abbey Mills market so preparation won’t take long. All I have to do is remake a couple of price tags, iron the table cloth and glue broochpins onto a few brooches. Easy.
Something else I’m really forward to is meeting Kelly from Maple Village WI who invited me to have a stall at their Christmas Fayre on 19 November, way back in June. This year will also be the WI’s first year at Surbiton Festival. Their stall is on the other side of the entertainment area so I’m hoping to pop round and say hi (and maybe buy a cake or two – supporting the local community and all that ;-))
Keep an eye on the crocheTime Facebook page for updates and photos during the day – that’s if I’m not too busy selling all my clocks!