The Knitting Factory – A Brief History
With the rediscovery of knitting as a pastime in recent years, and with the need of consumers for clothing made of knitted fabrics, knitting factories have become a necessity. In a knitting factory, knitted items are mass produced like nowhere else. Knitting has become so popular in fact, that there is even a music club with the name of “The Knitting Factory.”
Some of the knitting factories located in China and other countries are so large that they employ over 1000 people each. Foshan Huilin and Ningbo Tianyu are some of the largest knitting factories in China, and they produce the bulk of knitted materials for the United States. In these factories, the knitting machines knit fabrics not only for the items traditionally seen in knitting pattern styles, such as sweaters and hats, but also many other items that someone would not normally think of as having been knitted. Some of these items are polo shirts, towels, fleece and many others. Of course, in a sense, nearly every fabric can be considered a knit fabric, because each fabric starts out as thread, such as cotton yarn, cotton wool, merino wool, sock yarn or wool blend and which has to be woven together to make a cloth. Although a traditional knit fabric is a little different that a woven one. The knitting factories also cover areas such as dying and finishing the materials.
During the Renaissance, the knitting factory began. This came about because metal was being mass produced, and so it was easier to get the metal needed for knitting needles. Only men were allowed to knit in the beginning. They started knitting guilds, and no women were allowed in, which was a common occurrence in those days. However, with the invention of the knitting machine, knitting guilds became obsolete, and women were allowed to knit. The main reason for this was because the knitting machines could not handle the more delicate knitting pattern styles, and so the women got to knit those patterns by hand. By the time the Victorian period came around, almost no man still knitted. The art was completely taken over by women. Nearly every woman could knit, but the practice was considered rural by some of the richer Victorian ladies, so they refused to do it. The Knitting machine and factories began to be popular by this time, and in many cases were run by women and children. Currently, there are still many knitting factories, but not many are located in the United States.
The art of knitting has withstood the passage of time. The fact that the knitting factory is still around shows that while knitting has changed through the years, people still need knits for their day to day lives. If there were no more knitted fabrics, there would almost be no fabrics at all. That is how important a knitter is to society.
By Crafts Editor
