Unravel is a community craft experience that celebrates all things yarn and yarn making. With all kinds of creativity to inspire makers from our curated marketplace to workshops, there is also a programme of free to attend talks and demonstrations.

Take a break from the festival to hear from designers, makers and other craft experts about the projects they're passionate about. Talks with our craft experts take place in the long kiln gallery.

Sylvia Watts-Cherry: A Search for Identity and Culture through the Art of Knitting
Fri 08 September, 11am - 12pm

Sylvia talks about her knitting journey and how she communicates her sense of identity through hand knitting.

Natural Dyeing Demonstration with Liz Baltesz
Fri 08 September, 12pm-1pm

Liz Baltesz will walk us through each step of the natural dyeing process. There will be a long table in the middle of the room, set up to demonstrate each stage as follows...
How to prepare a skein for dyeing
Soaking
Mordanting
Extracting dye from onion skins
Dyeing with onion skins in a slow cooker
Shifting colours with modifiers
Finishing yarn

Liz will also have lots of projects made using natural dyes to admire.

Crafting a business in knitting with Sophie Hemmings (The Knit Purl Girl)
Sat 09 September, 10am – 11am

Sophie Hemmings is a full-time knitwear designer living and working in Hampshire, UK. She works to create fibre-conscious contemporary designs to suit all bodies and is going to share how she crafted a business in knitting.

Machine Knitting Demonstration with Morenikeji Ajose
Sat 09 September, 12pm – 12.30pm and 1pm – 1.30pm

Kemi is a knitwear designer based in South East London, recently graduating from Central Saint Martins. She creates work that tells a story, narrating the significance between material, culture and craft. Taking inspiration from the process of traditional West African Textiles and translating it into contemporary knitwear, resulting in a zero-waste production at her inhouse studio at Cockpit Arts. Kemi will be demonstrating how she knits using a machine and incorporates a range of interesting textures, colours and patterns.