Aberteifi Cardigan

Crikey I seem to have lost a week of blogging! Well my Internet connection has been driving me crazy and I had a lovely day of sitting about in one of those darling open backed hospital gowns on Friday – leave your modesty at the door! So by the time I was home from being poked and prodded I didn’t much feel like a Folksy Friday post. I shall be good this week though I promise.

Anyway I have exciting news to share with you lot. On Saturday I was lucky enough to be invited to meet with Lisa Hellier. Lisa is a graphic designer who had an amazing vision. Now at this point it’s probably worth mentioning that our local town is named Cardigan (Aberteifi in welsh), and 2010 marked it’s 900^th birthday. As part of the celebration Lisa designed and co-ordinated a community knitted gigantic cardigan of Cardigan. Here’s the finished article, the Aberteifi Cardigan, in all it’s glory:

It measures a staggering 5m by 2.5m and was knitted by over 200 volunteers, from school kids to grannies and everyone in between!

I am in awe. How gutted was I to have missed out on being a part of this?? It would have been absolutely perfect for me. But there we go. I’ve always imagined the West Wales countryside to be like a patchwork quilt, but the different knitting stitches side by side gives it such texture. It is utterly beautiful.

Depicting the town from 1110 to the present day, many of it's iconic buildings and stories are represented.

It is a triumph, I'm sure I'll spend a fair few hours gawking at it again. It's currently housed at the Corn Exchange, Cardigan Guild Hall and believe me it's well worth a look if you're in the area.

And I'm excited that although I wasn't able to contribute there are plans in the pipeline for lots more similar projects. Yay!

To learn more about the cardigan and Lisa's work just follow the links, and I'll be sure to keep you updated about further developments!