knittingmag.comHow did you come up with the idea for
your business?
For many years, I had been working as a
womenswear multi-product designer in the
UK, China and Italy, and learned on the job
that there is so much waste and so much
wrong with the fashion industry. But I still
loved it and wanted to create lovely fun
pieces that didn’t affect the Earth. So I had
planned for a while that I wanted to design
and make knitted pieces that were ethically
made, from source to end product.
What is your background and training?
I learned sewing and pattern cutting from a
young age, helping my mother, as she was a
seamstress. I did a formal knitwear degree
in 2004 at the London College of Fashion,
followed by a masters in womenswear at the
Polimoda International Institute of Fashion
Design and Marketing in Florence, Italy.
How do you source your yarns?
I use a small, family-run business based in
the Midlands which sources surplus, end-of-
line yarn stock and dead stock. This means
you can’t get many kilos of the same colour
or fibre, making each piece extra special.
How is your business sustainable and why is
that so important?
By using surplus yarns, I am saving so much
that would have gone to landfill. I use natural
fibres that decompose. As well as this, I
waste nothing in the process, so everything
is utilised – including the yarn cones, which
make great shop displays. Having no stock
means I just knit what is wanted, making
only tiny quantities for events and
pop-up shops, to give the public
a chance to try things on. This
leads to no discounting and
every item is treasured. I tend to
upcycle my samples and pieces
that haven’t sold, and I also
wear my samples, making
sure nothing is wasted but
is celebrated instead.How do you come up
with your designs?
I always say, the
machine leads the
way, I prefer to
swatch stitches first
before coming up
with shapes,THE LONDON-BASED KNITWEAR DESIGNER WHO HAS BUILT A BUSINESS
ON SUSTAINABLE PRODUCTION AND ZERO WASTE SHARES HER STORY
VALENTINA KARELLAS
and I play on the machine with colours,
tension and so on until a story starts to
come. I prefer to do it this way, as if I design
something before the swatch and force the
stitch design, it usually doesn’t turn out how I
had it in mind. It’s always full of surprises.How do you make them?
I use the vintage semi-industrial Dubied
machine, hand-powered, still in the
traditional way: I swatch a 30cm piece,
calculate, play and knit samples. If they
come out wrong, or not the right fit, then
I carefully unwind them to reknit, as I am
all about zero waste. Every fibre to me is
precious, as it has gone through so
much to exist – and why not, when
I can, it just takes a while. I then
steam, wash, flat dry, block, link,
steam again and sew the label,
and then it’s done.Can you tell us about what you
call your organic lifestyle?
It’s pretty much how I
have been raised – to
never waste anything,
from food to clothing,
utilising furniture, skip
diving, upcycling, recycling,
utilising what we already have.
It’s only now that it has become
‘trendy’, which is a good thing,
I just hope it stays this way
and in fact continues to grow
awareness in tackling waste.C a s t o n w i t h ...
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