Spinning Alpaca: processing British alpaca fleece and wool into alpaca knitting yarns and knitwear, UK

The Processing

Sorting

At Toft we purchase alpaca fleeces from owners and breeders of alpacas around the UK. Before alpaca fleeces are sent to the mills we painstakingly sort each animal's fleece individually into different grades dependent on their quality. The fleeces are also grouped into colours to enable us to create the dozen natural colour blends that we create from the natural colours available. As we do not use dyes or bleach when processing our yarns, the range is named as follows:

'cream': this is from unbleached 'white' alpaca fleeces

'bleached oatmeal': think sunbleached not peroxide pink toned 'light fawn' fleeces

'oatmeal': a peachy soft yarn from the 'light fawn' alpacas

'mushroom': a gorgeous warm light grey from mixed coloured fleeces

'camel': a warm cookie dough colour from the 'fawn' alpacas

'fudge': a rich ginger true colour from the 'dark fawn' alpacas

'chestnut': a stunning polished red brown from the 'brown' alpacas

'heather': an intriguing dark grey brown blend with a gun metal quality

'silver': a soft and sophisticated light grey from mixed fleeces

'steel': a bold defined mid grey with almost blue undertones

'charcoal': a deep grey softer alternative to true black

'almost black': deepest, darkest chocolate think cocoa not milk tray from the 'dark brown' alpacas

'black': a rare and desirable undyed colour with wonderful lustre

In addition to these colours we do every now and again create other colours. All of our blends are subject to availability and it is unusual to have all weights in all colours in stock- if you see the yarn you want then get it then to avoid disappointment.

Spinning

At Toft our fibre is spun locally in Banbury, producing our Lace, Fine, Double Knit, Aran and Chunky weight knitting yarns through a mid-size mill spinning in a woolen process. The Lace, Fine and Double knit yarns, are from the finest of the best and youngest animals fleeces that we sort. This is alpaca at its softest and finest, is only available in limited quantities and is the most difficult to spin- thus it commands a high premium deserved of the quality. Our Aran alpaca yarn is from the fleeces of young adult alpacas and our Chunky is from fleeces of young to standard adult yarns, although these fleeces are still of a high quality and the yarn is still very soft, especially with hand washing and wear.

Dyeing

We made the decision several years ago to keep all of our yarns 100% natural in colour, making the most of the rich creams, deep browns and soft fawns clearly visible in our fields. When buying our knitting yarns you can be certain that the yarn has not been dyed, and thus has undergone as little artificial processing as possible. Occasionally we will use small batches of colour by hand dying yarn or fleece on-farm. We have in the past experimented with the full range of dyes, from natural onion skins and blueberries to the vibrant reds and blue achieved by acid dyes. 'Natural' versus 'Chemical' dying is very much a contentious issue as the process to achieve guaranteed colour fastness very often has to involve chemical fixing. The acid dyes that we now use are fully absorbed into the fibre, leaving the discarded water entering the system pure and chemical free. Alpaca absorbs dye readily and as it is a lustrous fibre it reflects the light off the dyed fabric, thus producing very vibrant colours.

Knitting

We now have a team of around thirty handknitters working within Warwickshire, Oxfordshire and Northamptonshire, who all love knitting with our wonderful natural yarns. Well sorted and spun alpaca is wonderful to work with, producing perfectly even finishing on both patterned and plain knits. In our opinion alpaca garments should use simplicity to allow the 'alpaca' to be shown at its best. Kerry's best designs emphasize the uniqueness of this exclusive luxury fibre over the 'ethnic' origins of the animal. We have been breeding alpacas in the UK for around 15 years at Toft Alpacas, and our animals and designs are thoroughly British. Most of our range is knitted, as alpaca is very suited to handknitting when spun using the woolen process. Alpacas are being bred with increasing 'crimp' in their fleece as this quality is what gives knitted alpaca garments its wonderful 'drape'. Alpaca is a natural fibre and consequently must be gently handwashed in tepid water. After draining the majority of water from the fabric garments and accessories should be slowly dried flat in a cool place. Have patience with drying the item as forcing rapid drying of alpaca will dry the fibres and affect the soft handle of the fabric. If alpaca is well cared for it is renowned for its longevity in wardrobes, and many a person speaks fondly of garments inherited from parents.

Weaving

In the past we have sold woven scarves, shawls and blankets which were outsourced to craftsmen and women in the UK, very often to those cities and regions traditionally associated with British textiles. Blankets we used to sell were woven at 'Melin-Teifi' national woolen mill in West Wales in small batches of different sizes. Halifax was home to the creator of some fine alpaca and silk woven scarves and shawls that we sold several years ago, they were then handfinished and pressed in Huddersfield. We also used to have a few hand-weavers producing the occasional one-off exclusive pieces. Within Lincolnshire and West Sussex handspinners can still be found pouring hours of time and skill into weaving exquisite heirloom pieces admired by all. We do not currently hold any woven lines.

Felting

Felting with alpaca is something we have been doing for quite a few years now, it creates exciting, different textures and new design possibilities for our range, and we now using three different felting processes to produce our handbag and homewear range. This creation of felted textiles was born from a concern about the waste created by the determination to produce hand-sorted exquisitely soft knitwear and accessories, Kerry was determined to develop a product range using the less-popular coarser fibres. Our first felted handbag range was perfectly suited to the leg fibre because its coarser nature makes it more hard wearing and the felting process creates wonderfully bulky and structured fabrics. The first type of felting that we still use today for our Giant and Big Bulb Bags is achieved by loosely knitting with our Chunky yarn, (previously we used several strands of our aran yarn for all bag styles) and then fulling or washing the final product to solidify and shrink the fibres together. As a result the Bulb Bags hold their shape, they are strong and water resistant and they can be cool washed again once felted. This process totally changes the nature of the knitted product and often gives a 'fluffy' finish which we smooth down by gentle shaving the excess. The second process is wet felting, arguably the most labour intensive. A few years ago Kerry managed to find a local felt maker in Birmingham Jamie of Jambags, who worked on a range of fully 'vegan' and 'organic' bags for men and women. Fibres are arranged horizontally and then vertically across each other and then compacted and agitated with water and detergent to produce a solid fabric around a mould or resist. We also used to produce needle felted 'Toft Teds'. This final type of processing involves repeatedly stabbing the fibre with needles to sculpt them into a solid structure, the last 'Toft Ted' that we kept for ourselves can still be found pride of place in the on farm shop. Currently we use needle felting mainly for decorating our Toft Christmas Baubles and we also teach it as a technique within our felt workshops.

Fibre Workshops

After years of working with alpaca we are able to offer alpaca fleece and fibre workshops ranging from our Field to Fashion workshops and various felting and knitting workshops, all of which run throughout the year. Just check our workshop pages and book your place for a wonderfully crafty day out at Toft Alpacas!