Hello, Chief Wonky here (aka Alison) with our May newsletter.
A round up of May 2023
I’ve been pretty quiet on the social front this year, things are moving quickly and I can’t believe it’s June already! I have decided to start doing a monthly round up to keep track of where we are as a business. I hope you find it interesting to hear a little more about what we do in the workshop.
To start our May newsletter, a little introduction.
This is our workshop in Kelso, Scottish Borders. From here our team create new designs, knit samples, knit batches of hats, hand finish all of the products and dispatch the orders. We spend time in the summer developing new concepts for our website as well as manufacturing custom design hats for others. Our tag #hatsforallreasons reflects this, as we work with brands, sports team, individuals, businesses and the corporate sector, we knit hats for all reason!
Recent commissions.
Scottish Borders
We are very lucky to live in such a beautiful part of the world, I always find the colours in nature inspiring. At the moment the hills are bursting with bright yellow from the gorse bushes. I grew up in a house at the foot of the Eildon Hill’s, just outside of Melrose, the Eildon’s were my playground. Every year I was attracted to the gorse and until recently, I actually thought their coconut smell was my imagination. This is Scotland after all, we don’t often associate it with tropical things!
A fond farewell
In May we bid a fond farewell to Helena Coman, knitwear graduate from Heriot-Watt University in Galashiels. Helena joined us in May 2022 on a 6 month internship via GCAS. We continued to employ Helena for a further 6 months before she moved to Hawico to continue developing her career in cashmere garments. It was a pleasure to work alongside Helena, her creativity and passion for textiles was infectious! We wish her all the best in her new role and we look forward to seeing her career unfold. You can read about Helena’s experience by clicking here.
Sample sale!
When Maw Wonky and I started knitting back in 2010 we created dresses, jumpers, tank tops and all sorts of items that we loved to wear. We are excited to let you know that we are going back to the future (of sorts!).
We have started to work with some of our original patterns and we are collating a sample sale to launch at the end of June. All of the pieces are unique, unrepeatable and use industry surplus yarns. If you would like to be one of the first to know about the sale, you can sign up to our newsletter on our home page.
We love dogs!
On 17-18th June we will be exhibiting at the Championship Dog Show at Springwood park in Kelso. Last year we attended the Border Terrier centenary, which we absolutely loved! To prepare for the event, we have started to add more breeds into our dog hat pack. We have added a Border Collie, a Boxer, a Rottweiler, a Labrador and a Springer and Cocker Spaniel. If there is a breed that you would like to see, please let us know and we will design it! Click this link to go to our Dog hats page.
Thank You!
Thank you for reading our May newsletter, it has actually been really nice to look back and reflect on what we have been doing. As a small business, we often keep our heads down and move quickly from one point to the next. I have found this journal beneficial to create a space to reflect on the ever changing landscape of our business. I hope you have found it interesting to read and will join us again next month.
All the best,
Alison
If you would like to leave us a review, please use this link to place one on Google.
