Retrofutura is a new website. Right now, there isn’t much to see here, but I do have lots of plans! My name is Astrid, and I’ve been running Midgaards Have for some years now. Midgaards Have is about natural dyeing, and that’s the place where I describe my natural dyeing experiments and give details on the cultivation of many dye plants. It turned out that knitting and knitting design did not become a big part of Midgaards Have, and that’s why I have started Retrofutura. to talk about knitting, knitting, knittig. And maybe other textile techniques down the road. Retrofutura is going to focus on the knitting designs of the past, in order to bring them into the present and future, of course.
Retrofutura is going to focus on the knitting designs of the past, in order to bring them into the present and future, of course. Hand knitting was never seen as something of high value. It was a domestic activity, something practiced by women in their homes. The Norwegian designer Annichen Sibbern Bøhn wrote that knitting is “cosy and useful” – she certainly meant well when she wrote that. Hand knitting was never art, nor craft. It was just production by hand. Over the years, the history of knitting was not seen as terribly interesting academically, either. So the description of knitting history is full of lacunae and contradictions.
I have no doubt that knitting is an important part of our cultural heritage. The knitting of the past is inherently interesting, but it is also an endless source of inspiration. When we knit, either designs from the past or modern ones, the yarn runs through our fingers in the present, and becomes a part of the heritage we pass on to the future.
Astrids butik is my shop, and the place to find all yarns and patterns connected to the project Retrofutura. It is also the place to find all products connected to the project Midgaards Have – natural dyes, yarn for dyeing, seeds. And a growing selection of other yummy yarns and knitting design
