In the world of fast fashion and disposable goods - my new range stops, takes a breath and smells the country air.

Each of the yarns featured in this range is from a small Australian farm.

These primary producers work hard to care for their lovely animals. The fleece procured from these naturally farmed animals is then processed in Australia or New Zealand in order to maintain the integrity of the yarn. Some of it is dyed with natural dyes, others maintain their lovely natural colours.

The yarn is processed and spun locally, and these local farmers have created a beautiful 100% Australian product for you to enjoy.

I hope you enjoy the kits I have created to showcase these Australian small rural businesses, and appreciate the provenance of each yarn.

Here are the stories of the suppliers I have featured in the Aussie Yarn range:

Tarndie/Great Ocean Road

Great Ocean Road Woollen Mill’s vision is to bring these yarns to the world in an environmentally friendly and sustainable way. At the Great Ocean Road Woollen Mill, they collect rainwater for their washing system, just pure, unadulterated water. The wash system uses a low phosphate detergent which enables us to recycle the grey water into our orchard.

All of our yarns are natural in colour, no harsh dying that can impact the feel, or damage our environment – just beautiful colours as nature has intended. This also means no fading or running when you wash our yarns/ finished projects either!

Continuing this philosophy, the mill is partially powered by solar, in fact 95% of all power used on the property (including mill) was generated by our solar panels last year.

Even the carbon footprint of our fibre is incredibly low. What we don’t produce ourselves is only sourced from within Victoria, or eastern South Australia. Even the scoured wool we source is produced on sheep farms within an 80 km radius of our mill and is scoured in Victoria.

Tarndwarncoort (known as Tarndworth/Tarndie) breeds Polwarth sheep.

The Polwarth is Australia’s first breed of sheep, and one that reflects the environment it is from. It is now referred to as a "conservation" breed. With the direct descendants of this breed still on the farm where it all started, we are delighted that you have chosen to help us conserve this heritage.

Polwarth sheep were developed by Richard Dennis at Tarndwarncoort in 1880, by crossing Saxon Merino sheep from Tasmania with Victorian Lincoln sheep. This progeny was then joined back to the Merino and bred to a fixed type. These un-mulsed sheep were named Dennis Comebacks and later renamed Polwarth after the local electorate.

The Alpaca yarn of the Great Ocean Road Mill is spun with the Tarndworth Polwarth merino yarn to create the special blend used in the WJK project.

Nundle

Prior to arriving at Nundle Woollen Mill, the fleece is shorn, sorted and classed in the shearing shed, and conveyed by truck to the major wool buying centres in Sydney and Melbourne.

Following sale by auction (wool is still sold by the open cry auction system and under auctioneers hammer), the wool is scoured or washed in Geelong to remove dirt and grease, and transported by truck to Nundle.

At Nundle, they use 22 to 23 micron Polwarth type wool with very little vegetable matter. The Nundle process begins with original Wool processing machinery , the last wool spinning mill of our kind still operating in Australia. We don't know of another spinning mill in the world that is working in a commercial way with machines aged up to or exceeding 100 years old. Our oldest machine is a beautiful old carding line, manufactured around 1914, a spritely 102 years old! All our machines work just as well today as they did when they came off their production lines!

White Gum Wool

White Gum Wool sheep are raised on a single farm, in the high midlands of Tasmania. They graze in mostly native pastures where they can find the plants they need to keep healthy.

White Gum Wool is made into yarn by Design Spun in New Zealand, having first been scoured by Canterbury Wool Scourers. NewMerino ® Chain of Custody certifies the sustainability and traceability of the yarn.

No herbicides, fertilisers, pesticides or fungicides are used in growing White Gum Wool.

White Gum Wool sheep non muselsed

The yarn created for the WJK projects is hand dyed, using natural dyes in Tasmania by local artisan Rosehip Island.

Alpaca

Mirrormere Alpacas is a small huacaya stud near Canberra, with a focus on coloured animals - lovely fawns, browns, grey and black! The alpacas give us a range of fibre products - roving for spinning and beautiful yarns processed at Boston Fine Fibres in Burra, NSW.

The yarn is gently processed at a local mill using solar power and rain water. All care is taken in preparing the fleece for processing, but you may find occasional flecks of vegetable matter in the yarn.

The yarn used in the WJK project is from one single Alpaca - Indiana a beautiful black Alpaca.

In keeping with the environmentally responsible practices of these small businesses, the kits are now packaged in a fully compost-able project bag. You can still use it to transport your kit while you work, but at the end of its useful life just add it to your compost!

Same goes with the packing your kit was posted to you in, fully compost-able. Don’t throw it in the bin, pop it in your compost.

The first kit in the range is the Nundle yarn Handwarmer kit, in a gorgeous pumpkin coloured merino yarn.

Click here to purchase.