This is a second-hand soft-cover book

Condition: The book has no faults; it's in near new condition.

Dimensions: 192 x 253 mm Pages: 308 Publisher: Auckland University Press Publication date: 1999 reprint

The Loving Stitch: The history of knitting and spinning in New Zealand By Heather Nicholson

This is an engaging history of a subject never before explored but familiar to many New Zealanders. Knitting came to New Zealand with the missionaries and Heather Nicholson constantly reminds us of the ancient European history of the craft.

But her main focus is on a chronological picture of antipodean knitting which is also a history of the domestic lives of women, of their resourcefulness, their talent, their sociability. She follows the growth of pattern books, the role of knitting for the troops in two world wars, knitting in the Depression and the recent interest in art knitting. She also explores the different items produced by the skilled knitter, from jerseys and guernseys, to counterpanes, socks and stockings and the scarf that stretched right round Parliament Buildings. She is a mine of fascinating information: did you know the origin of the Peggy square? or that knitting needle sizes derive from wire sizes so that no. 8 knitting needles and no.8 fencing wire, those foundations of New Zealand life, are one and the same? Always broad and generous in her approach, she also includes material on spinning and on the woollen industry; and intersperses throughout a rich collection of anecdotes, memories and good advice, much of it drawn from the personal experience of knitters and spinners.

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