Blogstarstruck with the Stylecraft Blogstars!

This week I’m on a mission to publish loads of blog posts and updates with what I’ve been up to. And I’m starting with the biggest news of all… Stylecraft Yarns have very kindly invited me to join their Blogstars. Which means I will be getting the chance to preview and try out lots of their lovely new yarn. There’ll be giveaways and goodies for you too, its all very exciting..

Stylecraft Blogstardom!

The blogstars had our first get together on Saturday at the Stylecraft Mill in Slaithwaite, close to Huddersfield in West Yorkshire. This was my second visit to the mill as I was lucky enough to have a full mill tour in December last year and really enjoyed it. You can read all about my winter trip in a previous post here.)

The meeting was arranged so that we could all find out a lot more about the Stylecraft Blogstar project. Until Saturday all I’d heard is that several bloggers had been invited and that we are going to have a blog tour again in the autumn. This will be similar to the one last year, for which I designed the rainbow tote bag using the special edition Special DK colours.

So off I went to drive the 90 minutes to the Stylecraft Mill, excited to find out who else would be there. After a little battle with the Satnav, I was happy to arrive and just get out of the heavy rain… But imagine how my happiness ratings rose when I was shown into the meeting room and everyone looked around and said hello. Everyone being Annabelle of Stylecraft, Lucy of Attic24, Heather of The Patchwork Heart, Sandra of Cherry Heart, Sarah from Annaboos House, Helen AKA Josie Kitten of The Knitted Adventures of a Woolly Kitty, Phil of The Twisted Yarn, Julia of Hand Knitted Things and the wonderful Sue Pinner.

And, errr, me

Seriously, it did cross my mind that I had turned up on the wrong day and this was the VIP bloggers meet up and I should have been going on another day… Crikey.

I’m writing this post a few days later and it still feels a bit surreal. My initial surprise has now been overtaken by feeling more than a bit chuffed, I have to admit. I am so excited to be part of this initiative by Stylecraft and so inspired by what we discussed at the meeting and by seeing all the gorgeous new yarn and the future plans. So much will be happening and I feel very privileged to be able to be involved and to be able to share all the news and future developments with you here on my blog and with followers on FB, Instagram and on my podcast.

Here is a photo that Sophie, who is in charge of social media at Stylecraft took of us just after a lovely buffet lunch… From the left me, Sandra of Cherry Heart, Heather of The Patchwork Heart, Julia of Hand Knitted Things, Phil of The Twisted Yarn, Helen from The Knitted Adventures of a Woolly Kitty, Lucy of Attic24, Sarah of Annaboos House and Sue Pinner. The other Stylecraft blogstars who couldn’t join us this time are Emma Varnam, Jane Crowfoot and Angela of Get Knotted Yarn Craft.

So what did we talk about?

Funnily enough we were all a bit quiet at first but we then got chatting and we had to pair up and learn more about a fellow blogger who we had never met before – I was paired with Helen AKA Josie Kitten and I learned all about her blog The Knitted Adventures of a Woolly Kitty. I must admit it was quite hard to stay on task during the  as I could have chatted to Helen all day! As a new spinner, I was very pleased to find out that she is a spinning as well as a knitting addict and spins regularly using a wheel.

Once introductions were made we were all ears for the presentation about the Blogstar initiative. Annabelle gave us quite an insight into how they plan new yarn colours and ranges well over a year in advance. They keep a close eye on fashion trends and create mood boards for colours but also pattern ideas for garments and homewares too.

 This is Annabelle explaining all about the new Blogstar logo, which we will all feature on our blogs.

And this is the mood board that was used to create the new colours in the exciting new Batik DK yarn…

I’ll be talking more about this yarn in a future post and on the podcast so that I can give you a proper review once I’ve had time to have a bit of a play with it!

These are some of the garment shapes that the Stylecraft designers are using as inspiration… mainly for knitters it has to be said. Crochet garments still haven’t really made it into the mainstream sadly – we crocheters must try harder!

The day flew by

Being in such good company and surrounded by loads of gorgeous yarn felt better than Christmas was when I was five years old! But the team at Stylecraft did organise the day very well and there was so much information to take in. We learned quite a bit more about what we Blogstars are going to be able to offer our followers in the way of giveaways, vouchers and competitions, which is very exciting. And, of course, we were able to stare at and squish all of this lovely stuff…

Above is the lovely Yarn Stories yarn, also made by Stylecraft and actually spun at the mill in Slaithewaite… and below are more shots of that lovely Batik DK – so many colours….

And just when you thought it couldn’t get any better?

We all left with a HUGE goodie bag – a ball of each colour of the Batik DK, some more balls of new yarn to try out, an entire set of Knit pro Karbonz, some gorgeous gift tags and a file with the entire current Stylecraft range with all the colourways at a glance.

I’ll be posting some more pictures on Instagram and Facebook to show all but for now, I really have to go and play with some of this lovely yarn… back soon xxxx