Slow Down And Try Not To Lose The Thread
I thought I’d go easy on myself and my readers in this edition of my quest for happy hobbies and intriguing interests. Find something nice, something cosy, you know? I noticed a bunch of people crocheting around me and figured I’d find out what’s up with that. I didn’t think I’d find Tinna Þórudóttir Þorvaldsdóttir — crochet queen of Iceland — and that we’d end up chatting in her studio surrounded by eye-catching patterns. Tinna has published books on the craft and her Instagram profile and YouTube channel show off her colourful crocheted creations. I quickly found myself “hooked,” you might say. But how did Tinna pick up the needle and why and how has crocheting become so freaking trendy?
Tinna’s origin story into the textile arts starts fairly simply. She was taught needlepoint, knitting and crocheting by her great-grandmother. “I just did it for a hobby at first,” she says. “In college I would knit socks for all my friends. When I lived in Barcelona I didn’t have a heater so I made a big blanket — stuff like that.”
One fateful Facebook post of one of her projects (a light series with bells) caught the attention of Icelanders, though. “I ended up having women from all over the country calling me from places like Höfn and Akureyri, just on my home line, asking for help.” This then led to leading classes and eventually writing a book when Tinna realised there hadn’t been a proper crocheting book published in Icelandic in about half a century. Þóra – heklbók was published in 2011 and reached the second spot on the national bestseller list.
“I think they only printed about 500 copies at first and had to rush to print more,” she says. “So, the yarn ball got rolling from there. Now I’ve published four books; for one of them I was the editor, the other three were just my patterns. Then I started publishing online and, from 2014 on, I went to do crochet work full time. Next year it’ll be 10 years. I bought a house with crochet money! Who would have thought?”
Expanding beyond the Icelandic market via the internet was certainly a boost. Tinna’s crocheting videos helped keep more than a few people sane while stuck at home during the pandemic — although covid wasn’t the first spike in textile art and crafting popularity that Tinna has seen in the last years. “The first spike was really after the crash here (2008) — everybody was knitting. My mom knit all the Christmas presents that year, it was a very back to basics thing to do.”
“I think that when you have a crisis people tend to go back to the basics,” she says. “And now we’re also always on our phones, always in a hurry, everything is so fast. Crocheting forces you to slow down. It is not fast! It’s repetitive and meditative. A bit like hand yoga. And you’re producing something and end up with a final product that you’re hopefully very proud of and it’s useful and I love that.”
Tinna mostly focuses on crochet patterns, taking inspiration from her surroundings, at home or when travelling. She shows me a piece based on her azulejo kitchen tiles, for instance. “I do a piece and then I write up the instructions,” she says, “basically as a manual, so other people can copy it. I don’t sell what I crochet because there is no money in that. But I like being versatile in my patterns, so you can play with it yourself. I try to do what I call interactive patterns. I want to spark creativity. Different designs that you can arrange as you want in any size you want.”
The hobby has brought Tinna in contact with people all over the world. Her team of testers — “because you have to test the patterns and there are calculations involved” — is spread across Australia, England, India, Spain and the U.S. And then there’s all the connections she’s made with other enthusiasts around the globe. “It’s so gratifying,” Tinna tells me. “I make something here, in some basement studio in Iceland, and then there is somebody making it again in Jakarta and maybe they have a totally different take on it and it becomes a type of conversation of colours and threads and it’s really heartwarming.”
You can find Tinna’s work on YouTube @TinnaThorudottirThorvaldar, Instagram via @tinnahekl and on Facebook Tinna’s Crochet Club.
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