Smash Knits is a curated collected of handdyed yarns, sewn & embroidery embellished project totes/pouches for knitters, crocheters, needleworkers and more, as well as an assortment of stitch markers, shawl cuffs, written patterns, and other tools of the trade. Ashlee Snell answers some queries about her business for this Festival new vendor profile: How did [...]
Festival Updates and Community Profiles
Two Bees Handmade Creations
TWO BEES HANDMADE CREATIONS is one sewist creating project bags and pouches for knitters, crocheters, needlework artists, and anyone else who likes handcrafted containers for their “stuff.” That sewist, Rhonda Beebe, has been sewing, crafting, and creating since she was a young teenager. When she was a child in Saskatoon, the sewing machine was [...]
Prairie Threads / Prairie Peasant
Laura Dyck creates under the names PrairieThreads and PrairiePeasant. She has been a maker for as long as she can remember, and has long enjoyed refashioning the old or unwanted into something new. Using non-traditional recycled and repurposed materials, she creates one of a kind, beautiful and functional items, while keeping unwanted items from the [...]
The Victorian Studio – Vendor Profile
Maureen Kuppe, first time vendor at the Festival, introduces herself: My shop is called The Victorian Studio. The name comes from my antique-filled art room where I create hand-sculpted, hand-painted polymer clay knitting / crocheting stitch markers and progress keepers. I am an avid knitter and when I began making these charms for myself, my [...]
“How I Spent My Summer” – from Allyson at Dye For Ewe
How I Created the 2019 Custom Colourway or, How I Spent My Summer Hello all, I am so honoured (and nervous!) to be asked by the Manitoba Fibre Festival to create the 2019 Custom Colourway. A self striping colourway. Phew, I can totally do that! The wonderful ladies asked me to give everyone an idea of my [...]
North American Shetland Sheep Association
The year our Festival has the honour of being the chosen location for the annual general meeting of the North American Shetland Sheep Association. The great majority of their members live in the USA and the annual gathering has only rarely been held in Canada. Although there are not a lot of registered flocks of [...]
Tamara Klassen – 2019 Vendor and Instructor
Tamara Klassen is a textile artist from Southern Manitoba. After learning to sew from her grandmother at a young age, she developed a love for textiles early on. Her work at Tamara Klassen Artisan Textiles focuses on traditional techniques, learned from her travels around the world, mixed with a modern design aesthetic. Working with predominately [...]
Welcome to the Flock
This year we will be welcoming a lot more sheep -- and shepherds -- to the Festival. The Manitoba Sheep Association will be setting up in the barn adjacent to our venue for their annual sheep show and sale on Saturday September 14. This is where commercial sheep farmers from around the province gather to [...]
Update on the Yarn
What is going on here? It's the "Dye for Ewe" prep for our custom colourway magic ... And our 2019 merino/nylon fingering weight yarn is hitting the dye pots ... And the finished product is being knit into sample pieces -- here Ally has the colours grayed out so as not to give away too [...]
Custom Colourway Yarn for 2019
Each year we challenge a local dyer to create a custom colourway exclusively for the Manitoba Fibre Festival, using our ram's head logo as inspiration. The original artwork for the logo, by Gerry Oliver of Spirit Sands Farm, has provided a richness of colour depth and variety. Our past dyers have been Hilori Thompson of [...]
One Nation Exchange
We welcome to our Festival market place this year One Nation Exchange, a unique and inspiring social enterprise that began as an intercultural collaborative art project in Winnipeg's North End. Here is their story, from their website: Inspiration: The city of Winnipeg has the largest Indigenous population of all major Canadian cities. In 2014, Manitoba welcomed the highest [...]
Volunteer at the Manitoba Fibre Festival
We are kicking off our latest series of blog posts with this greeting from Margerit Roger, our volunteer coordinator. Margerit also hosts most of our planning committee gatherings, keeping our meetings productive and the committee members well fed. If you have been to the Festival you have likely seen her welcoming smile. Help us keep [...]