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Advice for Knitting When You Have Natural Hair

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If you’re a person of color with natural hair, something you need to think about when knitting hats is the fiber content of the yarn used, because the yarns typically called for — think wool and other animal fibers — aren’t great when paired with natural hair.

That’s because the scales on animal fibers tend to be grabby, which can damage natural hair. Plant-based fibers suck up moisture, which is the last thing you want when you’ve worked so hard to get moisture into your hair.

Yolanda McNair did a lot of research into the qualities of different natural and human-made fibers to determine what might be best for her natural hair, and she share the results over on Knit’s All Folks.

You’ll have to click over to find out the best fibers to choose and her other tips and suggestions for knitting for natural hair. If you have any other tips I’d love to hear them!

[Photo: Knit’s All Folks.]

 

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Comments

  1. Hello! While I appreciate you linking to my website, please rethink the language you use here. Your phrasing “Most of us probably don’t spend a lot of time thinking about the fiber we use to knit hats in terms of how it will react with our hair,” – implies that “most” of the knitters who might read this blog are white – and that most knitters aren’t people of color. It (hopefully) unintentionally excludes the POC I hope to promote on my website.

  2. You’re right, of course, and yes, it was completely unintentional on my part to be exclusive. I should have said as a white woman it isn’t something I have to think about. Thanks for the kind reminder to choose my words more thoughtfully.

Have you read?

What’s Next for Joann?

Now that all the Joann stores have closed, a mysterious message has appeared on the company’s website:

For generations, Joann has been honored to be part of your creativity: your quilts, costumes, school projects, and handmade moments of love. It has been our joy to serve markers and dreamers across the country.

We’re stitching up something new behind the scenes and we can’t wait to share what’s next.

Stay tuned for exciting news about the future of Joann.

To quickly recap, Joann filed for bankruptcy in January for the second time in less than a year. In February, in the hope of making the company more attractive to potential buyers, it petitioned the court for permission to close about 500 of its 800 stores. The company was put up for auction, with Gordon Brothers set to buy the company, sell its assets and close all the stores if no other buyer materialized.

In the end the winning bidder was GA Group, but the result was the same: all stores were to be closed by the end of May if not sooner.

Once store closure sales started the company quickly stopped selling on its website, and now all that remains is this jpeg image hinting at new ventures.

I’m sure there will be a tone of speculation in the coming days and weeks (or as long as it takes for them to announce the meaning of the message) as to what sorts of plans Joann could be cooking up.

My theory based on nothing but my gut is that they will transition to an online only storefront, probably with much reduced inventory, sort of like Herrschners (which had previously announced that it will be carrying Big Twist yarn, the beloved private label yarn brand sold at Joann). I also think they will use whatever retail sales they do to support CreativeBug, the digital learning platform that Joann purchased in 2017. That could mean producing kits for projects that already have classes, or developing classes based on products they want to sell, or both.

As of this writing the CreativeBug website seems to still be functional and there’s a full slate of new classes planned for June. I’ve got my eye on both the Joann website and the Joann restructuring website and will let you know as soon as I see changes.

In the meantime, I’d love to hear your speculation as to what the next chapter might be for Joann.