Little Granny knits the "Skappel-jumper"

Norwegians will get the x-mas reference here... I hope

Every now and again, I enter what is commonly known as Granny Mode, and get a sudden and inexplicable desire to knit something. This most recently happened a couple of weeks ago, and as a knight in shining armour, the Internet was there to help me search for possible projects. Something other than "scarf".


This is how I came across something incredibly odd. It appears that my native country, Norway, has been home to something of a knitting craze over the summer of 2012. Young girls are teaching themselves to knit. Wool shops have been struggling to meet the demand for Alpaca yarn in greys, whites and browns over what is normally a rather quiet season. All in all, this is very strange behaviour and surely an early symptom of the zombie virus that will eventually wipe out the majority of the human population.

Actually, the Norwegian knitting hysteria is caused by this jumper, known as the Skappel-jumper because of its connection to celebrity Dorthe Skappel. The story, as I've understood it, is that she enjoys a bit of knitting, and has been photographed wearing her own, home made jumpers. As have her increasingly well known daughters. (I have to take the internet's word for that, as I am rarely exposed to Norwegian media in general these days and don't tend to follow fashion or gossip if I can help it) So, as people were getting more and more curious as to how one of these unique pieces of clothing could be acquired, Maria Skappel posted the instructions on her blog.

Norway went mad.

When I was a school girl, art teachers would face a desperate struggle every year to attempt to teach another group of kids to knit, with responses ranging from reluctant attempts to complete anarchy. Knitting just couldn't lose its granny image. Therefore, this phenomenon is quite extraordinary if you ask me. Which you do. Since you're reading my blog.

Now, for the very first time, I am starting work on a knitting project that is part of a fashion craze! I have chosen a different type of yarn though - as Alpaca yarn, and indeed any yarn with a high percentage of quality wool, is quite expensive. What I'm using instead is a 50/50 Meriono Wool and Acrylic for my thicker bit, and a fine yarn with small silvery sequins (31% wool) for added detail. Both from my local wool shop, that I went into for the first time less than a week ago and am now in love with!

My yarns and knitting needles, displayed so they just happen to show the labels clearly.

So, my Skappel-jumper
Because I'm a small girl, I made some adjustments. The pattern I worked from suggested to make it 80 stitches wide, I did 66. With the sleeves, I started at 28 rather than 40, and took it up to 52 as suggested.
And of course the yarn is different, as I've already mentioned.

The total cost of the yarn and equipment used was £51.47
broken up as follows:

2 pairs of knitting needles, one long bamboo and one 60cm round, total £6.20
1x 2 yarn/wool hand needles from amazon, £1.77 per packet of 2
8x Wendy MODE yarn, each £3.25, £26 in total
5x King Cole Galaxy yarn, each £3.50, £17.50 in total

It took me just under 2 weeks of intensive knitting to finish, and I'm quite happy with the result. Not blown away by it, there are some awkward bits - namely the seam connecting the sleeves to the torso - but hey, I made it myself!

I do feel a sense of pride and achievement to have knitted my very first jumper. I think it has also given me a new perspective of the value of clothes in general, in terms of the cost, time and effort it takes to make even the simplest of items. Making a jumper from good quality yarn, even taking out the potential cost of the labour, is not cheap. It costs more than you would typically pay for a (let's face it) better looking, finished product from somewhere like Primark. Even considering their materials are typically cheaper (bought in bulk and typically 100% acrylic), taking into account the margins needed to make a profit, imagine the value of the work going into producing each item? It can't be much?!