Mostly Merino Information

MOSTLY MERINO is a fiber studio specializing in hand-dyed luxury merino and mohair blended knitting yarns, patterns and knitting kits. When owner Margaret Klein Wilson and her family moved from suburban Boston to a hillside farm in southern Vermont in 1988, they acquired a few Merino sheep to keep the farm fields open. A year and three bags of wool later, MOSTLY MERINO was born. Every stage of MOSTLY MERINO yarn production is one of attention, affection, nuance and craftsmanship. Maintaining a flock of sheep, acquiring additional fine wool and mohair fiber from regional farms, having these locally custom spun, and then over dyeing the skeins in small dye lots are processes rich in their own satisfaction, specificity and vocabulary. "The materials are shepherded from one process to the next-scouring, picking, carding, spinning and skeining-from hands to hands to hands. Throughout, the fibers remain lively and energetic. The finished yarn is soft, elastic and full of character. And then the yarn finds its way to the knitter, who gives it another life." "Purchasing locally produced yarn has both an economic and a cultural impact. It immediately helps the farmer, and that said, it also supports the infrastructure necessary to sustain a lively agricultural community: a veterinarian, a feed store, a spinnery, a regional sheep festival. The knitter has the fun of working with one-of-a-kind yarns and becomes a patron of the arts and agriculture.