Fiber Fest Teacher Feature: Franklin Habit

We're delighted to have Franklin Habit teaching two fantastic (and incredibly helpful) classes for us during Fiber Fest this year!

Franklin is largely a self-taught knitter, we discovered. "I learned the long tail cast on from a classmate during my senior year of college, when I was supposed to be studying for exams," he said. (We call that "procrastiknitting," Franklin, and we're very familiar with it!) His classmate got tired of teaching, though, and he had to turn to books to teach himself the rest.

He does an amazing job taking vintage patterns and reworking them for modern knitters. Some of our favorites are Summer Neckerchief (1843) and Miss Lambert's Lace Sampler. Franklin's current project, a 1915 men's sweater, has been the bane of his existence. "It has been pulled back twice already, and may have to be pulled back to the beginning again," he explained, "And I am three-quarters of the way through it." We can't wait to see it finished--and neither can he!

When we asked Franklin about his current knitting celebrity crush, he was coy with us. "The terms of the settlement forbid my mentioning the name in a public form," he quipped. Yarn, however, can't get a restraining order so he felt free to share this week's favorites with us:
Cascade 220 Sport (we have a rainbow of colors of the superwash)
Jamieson and Smith Shetland Jumper Weight
Lopi Einband
Madelinetosh Vintage (we just got a huge shipment of this fantastic yarn yesterday!)
Zitron Lifestyle from Skacel

Franklin is just like us in his love for knitting in public. His favorite place to KIP is Green Park in London. "Very comfortable, very beautiful, and when it starts to rain you can take refuge in one of the hotel bars on Park Lane," he reminisced. The strangest place he's knit in public was "the set of a porn movie." With an answer like that, we had to know: what was he knitting? "A Baby Surprise Jacket. No, I am not kidding," he laughed.

Sign up for Franklin's classes today!
Sunday, April 28th, 10am-1pm @ StevenBe: History, Methods, and Styles of Knitting
Sunday, April 28th, 2pm-5pm @ StevenBe: Photographing Your Fiber