Pick up a skein of Bloom Woolen Yarn and you’ll swoon at its soft hand and gorgeous botanical colors. You’d never guess that much of the wool used to create these lovely skeins was originally considered waste. The owner of Bloom Woolen Yarns is building a business that produces gorgeous handknitting yarns from excess or unused wool often burned or left to compost.
The Seeds are Planted
Bloom Woolen Yarns is the brainchild of Lisa Fortin, who started knitting and fell so in love with wool that she created her own family flock. Fortin has been an artisan for many years, designing jewelry and costumes before discovering fiber arts. She founded her own farm, Growing a Bunch, several years ago with five Shetland sheep, some chickens, and a vegetable garden.
Fortin was inspired to start Bloom Woolen Yarns during the first winter of the COVID pandemic. “My love for fiber had grown in the . . . six years since starting our family flock,” she explains. “I wondered how I could bring more of this into my life while maintaining the delicate financial balance of being a single mom with four kids who was completely dedicated to homeschooling.”
Lisa Fortin began her wool journey with a small flock at her Growing a Bunch farm.
Up to that point, Fortin had been taking the wool from their small flock to a local mill for spinning. “I pretty much drove it there and said, ‘I’d like some yarn. Let’s do worsted weight,’ and left it to the mill to figure out the rest.” As Fortin moved deeper into the world of sheep farming, she realized that there was an untapped resource in the form of waste wool.
Making Waste Wool an Oxymoron
As fiberistas who adore wool’s unique qualities, we may find it odd to hear wool referred to as “waste.” So many wool breeds to try, with different qualities like fiber length, crimp, fineness, natural color and more: how could anyone view this bounty as waste?
Pick up a skein of Bloom Woolen Yarn and you’ll swoon at its soft hand and gorgeous botanical colors. You’d never guess that much of the wool used to create these lovely skeins was originally considered waste. The owner of Bloom Woolen Yarns is building a business that produces gorgeous handknitting yarns from excess or unused wool often burned or left to compost.
The Seeds are Planted
Bloom Woolen Yarns is the brainchild of Lisa Fortin, who started knitting and fell so in love with wool that she created her own family flock. Fortin has been an artisan for many years, designing jewelry and costumes before discovering fiber arts. She founded her own farm, Growing a Bunch, several years ago with five Shetland sheep, some chickens, and a vegetable garden.
Fortin was inspired to start Bloom Woolen Yarns during the first winter of the COVID pandemic. “My love for fiber had grown in the . . . six years since starting our family flock,” she explains. “I wondered how I could bring more of this into my life while maintaining the delicate financial balance of being a single mom with four kids who was completely dedicated to homeschooling.”
Lisa Fortin began her wool journey with a small flock at her Growing a Bunch farm.
Up to that point, Fortin had been taking the wool from their small flock to a local mill for spinning. “I pretty much drove it there and said, ‘I’d like some yarn. Let’s do worsted weight,’ and left it to the mill to figure out the rest.” As Fortin moved deeper into the world of sheep farming, she realized that there was an untapped resource in the form of waste wool.
Making Waste Wool an Oxymoron
As fiberistas who adore wool’s unique qualities, we may find it odd to hear wool referred to as “waste.” So many wool breeds to try, with different qualities like fiber length, crimp, fineness, natural color and more: how could anyone view this bounty as waste? [PAYWALL]
Lisa Fortin uses botanical materials to dye her yarns, shown here drying at home.
Not surprisingly, systemic changes in agriculture help explain why. According to the Department of Agriculture, the United States lost over 141,700 farms in just the past five years. We’ve also seen a sharp decrease in the number of local mills. With fewer farms producing wool and fewer mills to process them, there simply isn’t a cost-effective way to get fleeces made into yarn. And even if those resources were readily available, competition from cheap overseas wool makes the economics untenable.
Kristin Nicholas, who co-owns a sheep farm in western Massachusetts, explained how these changes have played out with respect to her flock. Her farm, Leyden Glen, has 400 sheep, which is considered small by agricultural standards. “Basically, all wood from small flocks of sheep these days is waste wool,” she explains. In the past, farms would join together to form a wool pool, each bringing bags of fleece. The wool was graded and weighed, then packaged into bales that were sold to mills.
Unfortunately, says Nicholas, wool pools have disappeared. “The last time there was a wool pool in our area, we trucked the wool many miles. We unloaded the wool, and several months later we received a small check for 25 cents a pound. We were told our wool went to China. It was not worth our time.” After that, Leyden Glen viewed shearing as a farm expense and used some of the wool for garden composting, leaving the rest outside to compost itself.
Waste Not, Want Not
As Lisa Fortin became immersed in the sheep farming scene, she learned just how much wool was discarded by farmers or used as mulch or compost. Much of this yarn comes from sheep that are bred for meat. “Sheep that have been bred to produce large and delicious cuts of meat generally do not have soft wools appropriate for fabric or yarn,” Fortin says. Yet these sheep still need to be shorn once a year to stay in good health. Although their wool may be relatively coarse, it does have bounce and strength—qualities that are well suited to industrial use, such as insulation and mattress or furniture stuffing.
Fortin works out an arrangement with farmers, usually paying for the shearing in exchange for the wool. She then picks up the wool, loads it in her car, and brings it home for prepping. The individual qualities of the wool determine its use: coarser wools, for example, are turned into bags of “Wooly Fill” for crafters to use as an alternative to polyester filling. She also creates felted wool sponges and dishcloths. The real fun began once Fortin decided to find waste wool that she could use to produce larger batches of yarn.
Wool that isn’t suitable for yarn can be turned into wool sponges, which are biodegradeable, non-abrasive, and remarkably effective.
Kristin Nicholas was thrilled when Fortin approached her to discuss using Leyden Glen’s waste wool. The textile industry has changed so much, Nicholas muses. “Unless a sheep farmer has the interest and time and money, marketing wool is another whole ball of wax. That's why we were so happy that Lisa was interested in taking our wool and investing her energy, skills and money into it to get it into knitter's hands.”
Leyden Glen’s flock originally was made up of Romney sheep, but the breed mix has changed over the years. Nicholas now has Dorset and Texel sheep, along with the farm’s own cross-bred rams for breeding. Lisa came to the farm during shearing and chose the wool of lambs that were less than one year old—the softest and finest wool from the youngest sheep. Those qualities are brought to the fore in Bloom’s Babe Yarn. Fortin describes Babe as a “two-strand single-ply” yarn, noting that the mill gently twists two strands together, creating the illusion of a one-ply yarn but with more strength. Right now, Babe is available in light, natural colors, although dyed colors will be coming in the future.
Sheep Stories
One of the most charming aspects of Bloom Yarn is the way that each line of yarn has a story behind it, not only the story of the breed but also the story of the farmers who tended the flock. Each yarn line uses the wool produced by a single flock, highlighting the characteristics of that particular breed. Fortin envisions what type of yarn will best suit the wool, considering factors like the amount of twist, number of plies, and yarn weight, and getting guidance from the mill.
Solstice DK combines wool from a Romney-cross flock with mohair.
As Fortin has goten to know more local farmers, she has made connections that bring her to new sources of wool. For example, Solstice DK yarn was created after Fortin encountered a shepherd whose small flock consisted of Romney-cross sheep. The farmer had been using the wool for weaving, since it had longer-length fibers. Sadly, health issues forced the shepherd to retire from weaving. Working with New York mill Battenkill Fibers, which excels at spinning longer-fiber wool, Fortin created Solstice DK, blending the Romney cross wool with 10% mohair. Solstice DK is a two-ply yarn that is soft enough for next-to-skin wear. Fortin also makes a fingering-weight yarn from the same fiber blend called Roots, perfect for socks as well as shawls, lace, and colorwork.
Other Bloom offerings include Yearling, a wool/alpaca blend that is carded more lightly than usual so that the natural white, gray, and brown fibers maintain individuality. This gives Yearling a heathered look and extra depth of color when dyed. Hearth is an aran-weight yarn made from a Cheviot flock; Meadow is an all-merino, non-superwash yarn with bounce and sheen; and Summit is composed of 60% Suri alpaca and 40% merino wool.
By working closely with the local fibershed, Bloom Yarns sources ethically produced wool that doesn’t travel halfway around the world to be spun. Best of all, many pounds of wool that would otherwise be treated as waste are transformed into beautiful yarn—a big win for farmers and knitters alike.
To hear Kristin Nicholas talk more about Leyden Glen Farm and their sheep and wool production, listen to her episode on the Long Thread Podcast in the Farm & Fiber Knits Library or your preferred podcast app.
Carol J. Sulcoski is a knitting author, designer, and teacher. She’s published seven knitting books, including Knitting Ephemera, which is full of knitting facts, history, and trivia. Her articles have appeared in publications such as Vogue Knitting, Modern Daily Knitting, Noro Magazine, the Craft Industry Alliance website, and others. She lives outside Philadelphia and teaches at knitting events, shops, and guilds. Her website is blackbunnyfibers.com.
