Knitting is wonderful, and embroidery is wonderful, but a knitted piece with lavish embroidery is simply sublime. Master crafters, the Norwegians knew how to make utilitarian necessities into wearable art. For centuries, knitted and nålbinding hand coverings were embellished with colorful folk and geometric embroidered designs that were not only decorative, they also made use of small scraps of fiber and added a just a little more warmth—valuable ideas for us to add to our gloves and mittens today. Past PieceWork editor and current Spin Off editor Kate Larson gives us a fascinating glimpse into this intriguing intersection of different needle art techniques that will inspire you to add a touch of history to your hand accessories.
—PieceWork Editors
Like many other examples of everyday cloth, handcoverings not only serve a humble purpose but can also express a personal aesthetic and connection to local community. In Norway, as in other parts of Scandinavia and the Baltic region, mittens and gloves were symbolic gifts during betrothals and weddings, often decorated with regionally specific patterns. Finely crafted handcoverings were worn to church or other special occasions as a show of skill and cultural identity.
Norway has a long tradition of embroidered handcoverings made with crewel (woolen embroidery) adorning woven fabrics and pieces created with nålbinding or knitting. Knitting is the newest of these textile techniques, but it makes up the largest group of extant handcoverings. The earliest knitted fragment found in Norway to date is currently on display in the museum at the University of Bergen and has been dated to the early sixteenth century. The fragment was discovered during excavation in Bergen’s historic Bryggen area. Since Bergen was a historically important trading port, it is unclear whether this fragment originated in Norway. The Hallingdal district of Norway is particularly well known for its embroidery style. The mitts shown below were brought to the United States by Borghild Halvorson from Hallingdal in about 1907.
Left: The rosesaum style of embroidery resembles the folk art painting style known as rosemaling. Right: Bright millspun embroidery yarns were widely available by the close of the nineteenth century. Photos courtesy of the Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum, Decorah, Iowa.
Knitting is wonderful, and embroidery is wonderful, but a knitted piece with lavish embroidery is simply sublime. Master crafters, the Norwegians knew how to make utilitarian necessities into wearable art. For centuries, knitted and nålbinding hand coverings were embellished with colorful folk and geometric embroidered designs that were not only decorative, they also made use of small scraps of fiber and added a just a little more warmth—valuable ideas for us to add to our gloves and mittens today. Past PieceWork editor and current Spin Off editor Kate Larson gives us a fascinating glimpse into this intriguing intersection of different needle art techniques that will inspire you to add a touch of history to your hand accessories.
—PieceWork Editors
Like many other examples of everyday cloth, handcoverings not only serve a humble purpose but can also express a personal aesthetic and connection to local community. In Norway, as in other parts of Scandinavia and the Baltic region, mittens and gloves were symbolic gifts during betrothals and weddings, often decorated with regionally specific patterns. Finely crafted handcoverings were worn to church or other special occasions as a show of skill and cultural identity.
Norway has a long tradition of embroidered handcoverings made with crewel (woolen embroidery) adorning woven fabrics and pieces created with nålbinding or knitting. Knitting is the newest of these textile techniques, but it makes up the largest group of extant handcoverings. The earliest knitted fragment found in Norway to date is currently on display in the museum at the University of Bergen and has been dated to the early sixteenth century. The fragment was discovered during excavation in Bergen’s historic Bryggen area. Since Bergen was a historically important trading port, it is unclear whether this fragment originated in Norway. The Hallingdal district of Norway is particularly well known for its embroidery style. The mitts shown below were brought to the United States by Borghild Halvorson from Hallingdal in about 1907.
Left: The rosesaum style of embroidery resembles the folk art painting style known as rosemaling. Right: Bright millspun embroidery yarns were widely available by the close of the nineteenth century. Photos courtesy of the Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum, Decorah, Iowa.
[PAYWALL]
Nineteenth Century—A Time of Change
During the nineteenth century, change was sweeping the world. People moved farther, faster, and took with them new ideas, goods, and fashions. Norwegian mittens and gloves embody many of these social and technological shifts.
On May 17, 1814, Norway declared its independence from both Denmark and Sweden. The country would remain part of Sweden until 1905, but much of Norway’s collective identity was formed during the nineteenth century. Traditional rural dress and folk motif were embraced and often reconfigured to create new traditions.
At the same time, scientific and technological advances led to the introduction of aniline dyes, a watershed for historical textiles, and millspun yarns were becoming more widely available. Prior to this time, Norwegian handcoverings were worked in handspun yarns, and any colors used would have been derived from natural dyes or the natural color of the fiber. (Silk and cotton were occasionally used for fine handcoverings, but the majority of mittens and gloves that exist in Norwegian collections today are woolen.)
The nineteenth century also profoundly changed Norway’s sheep. British breeds, namely Cheviot and Leicester, were crossed extensively with Norwegian flocks. The knitted and embroidered handcoverings from before these introductions used wool typical of Norwegian breeds such as Spelsau, with a long, silky outer fiber (dekkull) and a shorter, finer fiber (bunnull) close to the sheep’s skin. In her book, Votten i Norsk Tradisjon (Mittens in the Norwegian Tradition, Landbruksforlaget, 1991), Ingebørg Gravjord explains that in the 1840s, there began to be a transition from “homespun yarn made from the glossy, long fibers of the Spelsau to a hand or machine spun crossbred-type wool.”
Gravjord points out that the shift is most obvious in the embroidery yarns, with the earlier mittens “embroidered with two- or three-ply, fine, hard spun, glossy yarn.” This style of smooth embroidery yarn with the plies clearly visible worked well for the outlined patterns and geometric shapes typical of the embroidery from this period.
The new yarns, available in the 1860s, and later greatly affected Norwegian embroidery styles. A well-documented yarn imported from Germany, Zephyrgarn, was available in an array of vibrant colors thanks to aniline dyes. This three- or four-ply yarn was made from worsted-spun fine wool with low twist. A lofty yarn, it was often used for an embroidery style called rosesaum with intricate shading and rococo style, similar to rosemaling, a colorful painting style popular in Norway and Norwegian communities elsewhere. Most of the embroidered handcoverings that can be found today in Norwegian and Norwegian American textile collections are from the 1800s. While many mittens and gloves were added to museum collections at that time without much additional background information, some have detailed information about what district the textile comes from, what materials were used, and even the name of the maker in some cases. Look through these acquisition notes for yourself on www.digitaltmuseum.no, where artifacts from 138 museums across Norway and Sweden have been digitized and connected through a searchable database. To see hundreds of pairs of embroidered mittens and gloves, just type vott, broderi into the search bar.
Left: A contemporary riff on traditional motifs from Norway’s Hallingdal district. Right: Several types of embroidery yarns are often seen in Norwegian handcoverings from the nineteenth century. Photos by Joe Coca
In the images above, the fulled gray mitten is made from handspun two-ply yak and Merino top, and embroidered with fine two-ply yarns spun from a handpainted combed top. The white glove is spun from Cheviot wool and embroidered with three-ply fine wool. The yarns shown are a Norwegian Pelssau two-ply, spun to resemble as closely as possible the older yarns seen in museum collections, a two-ply fine wool, spun in a more modern style for embroidery thread using combed top, and a three-ply fine wool, also spun in modern style.
Spinning for Embroidered Handcoverings
Even after the millspun, brightly colored yarns became available, handcoverings were still commonly knitted with handspun yarns. Many of the existing mittens and gloves appear to have been fulled, and the most common yarn seems to be a woolen or semiworsted two-ply. However, many types of yarns, ranging from woolen to worsted, two- to four-ply, exist in museum collections and are still used in Norwegian knitting today.
Looking for prepared Norwegian wool? Louet carries two Norwegian fibers: black and white combed tops that originate in Norway and are processed in the United Kingdom (as is much of Norway’s wool). A few small mills have recently started in Norway, and several of the larger woolen mills that got their start around the turn of the twentieth century are still active. Hillesvåg Ullvarefabrikk is located just north of Bergen and has been producing carded fibers and yarns since 1898. The mill produces carded batts using Norwegian fibers, primarily for felters, these batts are also available through New England Felting Supply in Massachusetts. All of these fibers work well for spinning and knitting Norwegian-inspired mittens and gloves.
With endless options for dyed fibers available today, we can spin any type of embroidery yarn we want. The classic Norwegian-style smooth and hard worsted two- or three-ply, spun with silky wool, works well for outlines of shapes, dates, and initials. For the satin-stitch rosesaum patterns, try a two-, three-, or four-ply worsted yarn using a fine, crimpy wool. When this yarn is somewhat loosely spun, the grain of the plies is less visible, giving the motif a more matte appearance. Explore using silky longwools and bouncy finewool yarns in the same piece—some extant handcoverings incorporate more than one type of yarn in the embellishments.
Handcoverings have long served as a canvas for needleworkers to express their creativity. Often what begins as necessity becomes an opportunity for self-expression—a tradition that we can carry forward.
Resources
- Fossnes, Heidi. Håndplagg til Bunader og Folkedrakter. Oslo: Damm, 2012.
- Gravjord, Ingebørg. Votten i Norsk Tradisjon. Oslo: Landbruksforlaget, 1986.
- Hoffmann, Marta. Frå Fiber til Tøy. Oslo: Landbruksforlaget, 1991.
- Norsk Sau og Geit (Norwegian Sheep and Goat). Learn more about sheep in Norway today. www.nsg.no.
- Sundbø, Annemor. Everyday Knitting: Treasures from a Ragpile. Kristiansand: Torridal Tweed, 2001.
- The Norsk Folkemuseum in Oslo has an extensive exhibit detailing the progression and development of Norwegian folk motifs from woodcarvings of the Middle Ages to the distinct regional styles and motifs of today’s folk art, including embroidery. www.norskfolkemuseum.no.
- Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum, Decorah, Iowa. www.vesterheim.org.
- www.digitaltmuseum.no. Online collections database for many museums in Norway and Sweden.
Kate Larson is the editor of Spin Off and spends as many hours as life allows in the barn with her beloved flock of Border Leicesters.
