This is one of the most amazing pictures of the knitting world that I have ever seen.
A few years ago, Artist David Cole developed the idea of knitting a huge American flag following a week of doing search and rescue work in NYC post 9/11. The needles are made from aluminum utility poles (the kind used for street lights). The "hands" are 2 John Deere excavators. He had to teach his 3 friends who were already skilled in heavy machinery techniques how to knit so that they could understand the principles of what was needed.
He likened the experience to brushing one's teeth by remote control at a distance of 30 feet. But they persevered and in 2005, the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in North Adams (home of the Yarn Harlot's publisher by the way - could there be a connection?) commissionned Cole to knit and install a huge American flag. The "yarn" was nearly a mile of red, white, and blue acrylic felt. Cole, positioned in a cherry picker and wielding a five-foot-long fishing gaff, would slip one very long stitch after another off the end of the needle. Working from the "wrong side" of the piece, he had to purl backwards, that is to say left to right as the work was too big to be turned at the end of each row.
And we balk at a little afghan now and then.
Click on the title of this post above to link to the project's website.
By the way, our most recent newsletter just went out introducing ECOKNIT organic cotton and featuring a 15% saving on Elsbeth Lavold's gorgeous Hempathy summer pullover, as well as other tidbits of information that we love to pass on to our customers. If you don't receive the newsletter and would like to, please click on the space to the right where it tells you to and you can sign up to receive it regularly (the first of each month.)
