The knitwear thread

[The Shooman]

this is exceptionally creepy

nice jumpers though. Also: those jumpers are not cashmere, they drape like wool.

Talking of argyles, look what l just bought. An 80's Ballantyne argyle in cashmere. Great style (quaint), and supposed to be really thick and nice.


I also bought this. Ballantyne turtleneck from the early 2,000's. Sadly it is only wool, but none-the-less it is a turtleneck made by Ballantyne. Will be a good item for Spring with a sportscoat when it is not so cold.

 

[figurine]

Soo, I had a very weird ebay experience, maybe someone can help with some tips.
Got a very nice Pringle of Scotland diamond cashmere sweater for a nice price, it arrived quickly, condition was as described, BUT had some smell (like on of the Eastern Europe Chinese shops, naftaline-like).
After soaking it into water a very, very intense petrol smell appeared and filled the whole flat and I was just disgusted...
Now after 2 or so days outside the smell is somewhat milder, but still there..
My assumption is that it is from the dry cleaning solvents, but not sure.
Do you think another round of washing would solve it?
(It's just too nice to be returned, and I'm optimistic this can be sorted out somehow...)

 

[Grand Potentate]

Soo, I had a very weird ebay experience, maybe someone can help with some tips.
Got a very nice Pringle of Scotland diamond cashmere sweater for a nice price, it arrived quickly, condition was as described, BUT had some smell (like on of the Eastern Europe Chinese shops, naftaline-like).
After soaking it into water a very, very intense petrol smell appeared and filled the whole flat and I was just disgusted...
Now after 2 or so days outside the smell is somewhat milder, but still there..
My assumption is that it is from the dry cleaning solvents, but not sure.
Do you think another round of washing would solve it?
(It's just too nice to be returned, and I'm optimistic this can be sorted out somehow...)

id take it to your local dry cleaner and get their take on it. if it is some kind of dry cleaning chemical chances are they'll know how to get it out.

 

[The Shooman]

but only a high end dry cleaner like this: there are not that many highend cleaners around.

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Bought this beauty.

Pringle vintage cardigan in wool.

 

[Grand Potentate]

solely posting this for discussion purposes

The Softest, Coziest Cashmere Sweaters

We tested nearly 70 men’s, women’s, and unisex cashmere sweaters (poor us!). These 16 cozy styles are heavenly soft.

www.nytimes.com

 

[The Shooman]

The most expensive and desirable cashmere hair is meticulously hand combed or carefully sheared from the cashmere goats during the spring, when they naturally shed their winter coats. Skilled cashmere processors are capable of retaining the longest hairs from the goat’s undercoat; the longer, thinner hairs can be more tightly woven into stronger yarn.

Some good things written above which explains why cashmere jumpers can cost so much. The good cashmere is more labour intensive to harvest, and it isn't harvested with machines which [I think] result in making the fibers shorter than they need to be.

the longer, thinner hairs can be more tightly woven into stronger yarn.

This quote is funny. The top Italian and Scottish mills use the top cashmere which would be thinner hairs, yet Scottish cashmere is generally more tightly woven and dense than from the Italian mills. The Scottish ply is often thicker too.


pure cashmere makes up just a fraction of that amount, 6,500 tons (PDF). Compare that figure with the massive 1.08 million metric tons of wool (PDF)

Just goes to show how rare cashmere is, but it makes one appreciate how special the old vintage Scottish cashmere jumpers are. One day one won't be able to get those vintage jumpers anymore. Many were for the wealthy and were probably in short supply, so any vintage is a treat that future generations will never experience. The old skills have probably died out too along with the quality.


appetite for luxury goods, and you understand why cashmere remains an expensive commodity.

They talk about luxury, but little is luxury compared to the golden age of cashmere. Hermes made-in-Scotland is definitely luxury (Barrie/Chanel), even in this modern day, especially with it's dense tight thick ply weaves and m.o.p buttons etc, but no other cashmere strikes me as luxury because much of it has an average weave with a thin ply (skimps on cashmere) and pills and has plastic buttons where-as Hermes is special because it doesn't skimp, but not as special like it used to be. I have cashmere jumpers from Brunello Cucinelli and Loro Piana etc, but none are true luxury Italian cashmere jumpers.


High-quality long-fiber cashmere, however, remains scarce as heritage and luxury brands such as Italy’s Loro Piana, where you can easily spend thousands of dollars for a single cashmere sweater, buy up the majority of premium-grade cashmere. The yarn spun from shorter and broken cashmere filters down into the mass market, though sometimes higher-priced fashion brands use it, too, so you can’t rely on price as an indicator of quality.

Explains why prices can be high. You get what you pay for.


According to Derek Guy of Put This On, “the best cashmere sweaters came by the way of Scotland prior to the 1990s,”

He is right. Ballantyne after the 80's was never that good. Ballantyne before the 90's was EXCELLENT and unbeatable. They made a lot of hard minimally processed hard cashmere that rarely pilled and made to last longer than anything else. Pringle also made some hard cashmere on occasions, but Ballantyne was king imo. Those 50's, 60's 70'sand 80's Scottish jumpers were WOW, you don't see that quality anymore. Always loved Lyle & Scott too, they had a nice thick spongy cashmere that was truly unique.

 

[ballmouse]

I know the writer of the article is not an expert. Neither am I. My thoughts:

1. Confirmed my suspicion that sweater market is littered with ill fitting designs (my opinion). If I'm wearing a cashmere sweater, I am not looking for something that fits like a sweatshirt (at least that's what both of the pictured men's sweaters look like). And of course, what I hate about modern sweaters is their length. Look at how long the men's sweaters are. And in his team's opinion the fit was something that made the featured brands stand out.

2. He noted all cashmere sweater pilled. I have many vintage cashmere sweaters. All were made in either Scotland or England. I don't recall any of them pilling. Perhaps he was speaking technically where sweaters can pill yet they aren't noticeable to the human eye. I'm not an expert, but pilling (and lack thereof) is one of those clear differences between modern and vintage cashmere sweaters. Maybe my memory is failing me but this is what I remember.

3. William Lockie was the 'high end' brand they tested. I've expressed how disappointing their sweaters are here before. I don't know their budget, but I would've enjoyed a layperson's point of view of a Cucinelli or some other super high end cashmere sweater. A suppose they limited themselves to $500 to give the average person a somewhat attainable high end item. But the equivalent of any vintage high end sweater (before super high end apparel existed) would probably be priced at over $1k.

4. I liked their inclusion of some of the technical jargon. Ply, gauge, fully fashioned vs. cut and sew, long vs. short fibers. Some pictures would have been nice (I'm still bitter that the only pictures are of these ugly looking sweaters), though I'm happy they mentioned these terms at all.

5. They apparently used the other forum (and it's members' blogs) as research material.

 

[The Shooman]

A good article linked in Rambo's article above.

The Last of Good Scottish Cashmere: William Lockie

For over a hundred years, workers in Hawick have traced their fortunes to the cashmere industry. This town, like others...

putthison.com

Some good quotes from the article:

It is said by those who love good knitwear, and I suppose who have also been around long enough to know, that the best cashmere sweaters came by the way of Scotland prior to the 1990s. They never lost their shape or pilled, and they kept their whipped cream, puffy cloud goodness even after decades of hard wear.

The best goats are in Inner Mongolia. Due to a mixture of the food they’re given, the terrain, and the climate, they yield the best hair.

Italian sweaters tend to be more fashionable. Many are even what you could describe as high-fashion. So the customer doesn’t worry as much about longevity – they care more about cut and pattern, which may be very of-the-moment, but aren’t meant to last forever. A Scottish sweater, on the other hand, tends to be more classic in terms of design, so it’s supposed to last a lifetime.

When I left school at the age of sixteen, there were about sixteen knitting mills in Hawick. Now there are eight. Four of them employ more than a hundred people — Johnston’s of Elgin, Barrie, Hawick Knitwear, and of course William Lockie. The rest are smaller companies.

Which means Italian sweaters are often made differently. For one, many aren’t even fully fashioned, which means the ends aren’t linked point-by-point, as we do here in Hawick. They also tend to be very soft at first in order to impress the customer, so that they like the handle when the sales associates hands something to them over the counter. It’s good when a sweater is soft, but sometimes it can be too soft. And if it’s too soft, the garment doesn’t have enough body to it, which means it’s stretch out over a period of time from repeated washing and wearing. There’s not enough strength in the knitting, even if they’re using a quality yarn.

With Scottish knits, however, we start with the best quality yarns, but we also knit at a tighter tension. This results in a denser, slightly heavier weight sweater, but it holds it’s shape over time. You want to hit a happy medium. You want a garment that’s soft enough to impress the customer at first, but still give them the kind of longevity that justifies the price. Knitting tight also means using more raw material, which is why you don’t see this kind of quality on lower-end sweaters.

There’s always someone in charge of this washing process, or as you correctly called it, milling. And it takes years of experience to do it right. The person has to pull the garment out at just the right moment. So there’s a bit of skill involved to make sure the sweaters are washed just enough and not more.

 

[güero]

I've picked up the Lockie cardigan(s). As suspected, the cashmere cardigan is heavy enough to keep warm at 0-5 Celsius with only a shirt underneath for up to 1-1,5 hours, even while not moving a lot.

 

[The Shooman]

I know the writer of the article is not an expert. Neither am I. My thoughts:

1. Confirmed my suspicion that sweater market is littered with ill fitting designs (my opinion). If I'm wearing a cashmere sweater, I am not looking for something that fits like a sweatshirt (at least that's what both of the pictured men's sweaters look like). And of course, what I hate about modern sweaters is their length. Look at how long the men's sweaters are. And in his team's opinion the fit was something that made the featured brands stand out.

What irks me is how long all those Scottish multi ply shawl cardigans are. They are made for giants.

2. He noted all cashmere sweater pilled. I have many vintage cashmere sweaters. All were made in either Scotland or England. I don't recall any of them pilling. Perhaps he was speaking technically where sweaters can pill yet they aren't noticeable to the human eye. I'm not an expert, but pilling (and lack thereof) is one of those clear differences between modern and vintage cashmere sweaters. Maybe my memory is failing me but this is what I remember.

Yes, many of the vintage cashmere knits didn't pill much, and some didn't seem to pill at all. Most of the modern knits do pill, even the best ones, and even Hermes does.

3. William Lockie was the 'high end' brand they tested. I've expressed how disappointing their sweaters are here before. I don't know their budget, but I would've enjoyed a layperson's point of view of a Cucinelli or some other super high end cashmere sweater. A suppose they limited themselves to $500 to give the average person a somewhat attainable high end item. But the equivalent of any vintage high end sweater (before super high end apparel existed) would probably be priced at over $1k.

Any of those old vintage jumpers from the top houses would sell for thousands of dollars if made today. I remember Rjman (Raj) saying he saw Ballantyne 2 ply turtlenecks for sale in San Francisco for $700 U.S in 1991. If those Ballantynes had a made-in-Italy tag on them they would go for much higher, yet my understanding is that the Italian made knitwear never had the handwork that the Scottish knitwear had: eg, the intarsias in Italy are machine done where-as in Scotland they were hand knitted, + the cuffs, neck and hems were hand attached by Ballantyne where-as most jumpers were machine done in those parts.

My 2 ply Lockie is only o.k. My 6 ply 5 gauge Lockie is decent, but my 6 ply 8 gauge Lockie is very good (solid and very meaty with nice wood buttons).

5. They apparently used the other forum (and it's members' blogs) as research material.

Pity.

 

[The Shooman]

I've picked up the Lockie cardigan(s). As suspected, the cashmere cardigan is heavy enough to keep warm at 0-5 Celsius with only a shirt underneath for up to 1-1,5 hours, even while not moving a lot.

Pictures? How many ply? What is the gauge? In my experience no Lockies are warm enough at that temp. I really would like a dense 12 - 15 ply that weighs 5 pounds.

Some of the fattest heavyweights go up around 3 pound, but l want mine extra heavy and f-a-t.

 

[güero]

It's the regular Windsor shawl collar cardigan:

WINDSOR SHAWL COLLAR CARDIGAN with real leather buttons – William Lockie

They say it's a 4-ply garment. Don't know about the gauge. I asked one of the retailers some month ago, but they didn't know (but offered to ask at Lockie, but I didn't bother at the time). I tried to weigh it and it's just short of 1kg, including buttons of course. So maybe a bit more than 2 pounds I guess.

I was wearing it at below 5 degrees, but usually with the sun out. I guess that helps a bit. I also wore it early in the morning without sun for meditation, at around the same temperature (1.5 when I left, 4 when I returned), and it was perfectly fine for ~1 hour. But as you keep saying, people feel the cold differently...

 

[Kingstonian]

I bought a House of Bruar, three ply, fifteen gauge, v neck. Made by Barrie. Todd and Duncan yarn.

I mostly wanted a Scottish-made garment and I am unlikely to be visiting Hawick soon. It was not discounted in their Black Friday sale.

Seems decent. Good depth of v neck too.

 

[figurine]

but only a high end dry cleaner like this: there are not that many highend cleaners around.

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Bought this beauty.

Pringle vintage cardigan in wool.
View attachment 35683

You should make an exhibition out of your collection, never thought of it?

The dry-cleaning lady suggested I wash the sweater and the water should take care of the smell...Now the smell seems gone, even though it was still there while garment was wet (the wool often does seem to have "memory" of its past).

Anyway, this one arrived today - my very first Ballantyne (Berk).
The first impression is that it's weightier than any other similar cashmere sweater I own. And I am in love with this diamond intarsia somehow, just can't get enough of it

 

[doghouse]

The sweaters aren't too long, you motherfuckers are too fat.

 

[The Shooman]

A man tells lies about the 12 ply jumper he is selling.

He used to advertise it as retailing for $1,200






But suddenly the retail increased from $1,200 to "over $2,000"







Looks like Matt is telling fibs....he has been very naughty.

 

[The Shooman]

I also bought this yesterday:

1960's yellow/tan Pringle cashmere cardigan


F figurine

You should make an exhibition out of your collection, never thought of it?

Making an exhibition would be good, but who would appreciate it, and how would l draw crowds? I think women would probably be the target audience. Who knows, one day l might. I would talk about the golden era of cashmere. I am lucky to be part of that golden era, but one day it will all by gone and golden oldies will not be available.

I dreamed about having a shoo exhibition too (shoo party), but who would come and what would we talk about?

 

[belinmad]

1960's yellow/tan Pringle cashmere cardigan

The Shooman , can you tell the year from the label design? I'd be curious to know the approx production date of some of my cashmere sweaters.

 

[The Shooman]

You should make an exhibition out of your collection, never thought of it?

The Shooman , can you tell the year from the label design? I'd be curious to know the approx production date of some of my cashmere sweaters.

Yep, the label tells us many things. Post some of your labels and we'll see what dates they are.

 

[figurine]

I dreamed about having a shoo exhibition too (shoo party), but who would come and what would we talk about?

There would be many topics - starting from Scottish knitwear history and who knows where it ends. I could imagine some older folks might give nice contributions as well...everything is possible.

Coming back to the tags, I am wondering when this one could be from (it's the "stinky" one mentioned before) - the seller was claiming it'd be from the 70s, but I wouldn't go that far - my guess is rather 90s.

 

[The Shooman]

That label is 1970's.

 

[güero]

A man tells lies about the 12 ply jumper he is selling.

He used to advertise it as retailing for $1,200
View attachment 35755
View attachment 35757




But suddenly the retail increased from $1,200 to "over $2,000"



View attachment 35756
View attachment 35758


Looks like Matt is telling fibs....he has been very naughty.

Over 2,000$ today for "made in China of Italian yarn"? I don't think so.

 

[Lobbster]

Ballantyne returning to their home shores in 2021.

Unbeknown to me, I handeled some of their new pieces in Italy this year thinking it must be NOS. Quality was on par with standard Italian stuff like Malo or Cruciani. Will be intersting to see how this pans out with Brexit and covid. There are some nice pieces in their online shop and they seem to have picked up on their old quality with their Raw Diamond line.

 

[The Shooman]

Ballantyne returning to their home shores in 2021.

Unbeknown to me, I handeled some of their new pieces in Italy this year thinking it must be NOS. Quality was on par with standard Italian stuff like Malo or Cruciani. Will be intersting to see how this pans out with Brexit and covid. There are some nice pieces in their online shop and they seem to have picked up on their old quality with their Raw Diamond line.

Yeah, the raw diamond series looks very very nice, but despite them being made in Scotland they will never be like the old Ballantyne. The old workers, the old looms and the old quality cashmere is all gone now. The prices of the raw diamond are much lower than they once would have been, so corners are probably being cut. These days the expensive cashmere often pills, but a during the golden era that rarely happened with top pieces.

It is all marketing, and the glory years for cashmere have long ended, so l refuse to get excited over it. I'll post some pics of the raw diamond if l can find them...have them saved up somewhere.

 

[Kingstonian]

So ‘raw diamond’ is unwashed cashmere with a rough handle?

Why buy that instead of Shetland?

 

[The Shooman]

It's not that rough, it's still cashmere. Can't find many great raw diamond pics except for this one, but trust me, the raw diamond stuff looks fantastic!

 

[The Shooman]

Bought a rare gem on Christmas day, an extremely rare Ballantyne intarsia. Here is a peak.


btw, here is some more raw diamond under the made-in-Scotland Ballantyne name. Still wouldn't be like the original, but they sure look nice.

 

[The Shooman]

A better pic. Such a rare intarsia.


This is why they are so special; lots of handwork. Big machines can knit 500,000 stitches per minute of cashmere (see about 9:35 of video), but Scottish intarsia take a long long time.

Full record for 'CASHMERE IS SCOTTISH' (0578) - Moving Image Archive catalogue

The Scottish intarsia are all hand done while the Italian intarsia are said to be machine knitted and take a fraction of the time.

Btw, those 12 ply cashmere cardigans from O'connells are supposed to pill a lot. Doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

 

[The Shooman]

Here are some awesome videos of hand intarsia knitting, from Scotland of course. It is highly time consuming work.

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You will see that Ballantyne are putting out thousands of special edition sports intarsia knits in recent times. They call them hand knitted intarsia, but in fact they would be massed produced machine knitted intarsia that are far from the real luxury masterpiece Ballantyne used to make in Scotland. Thousands of each design is produced and sold in many places, where-as mine above is the real mc coy made in the old ways of like the videos above and very rare.

 

[Noob]

The Shooman : is Murray Allan any good? Vintage piece, made in Scotland? Not sure of the date.

 

[Kingstonian]

.....

 

[Kingstonian]

Todd and Hunter section of the film was interesting. I did not know oil was added as part of the spinning process.

I am not keen on jumpers with pictures on them. Patterns are OK.

 

[Sammy Ambrose]

Just been reminded of the importance of moth balls after viewing in horror four previously pride- inspiring Hawick V necks. I never learn.

 

[Kingstonian]

Just been reminded of the importance of moth balls after viewing in horror four previously pride- inspiring Hawick V necks. I never learn.

Unfortunately you cannot buy mothballs anymore, they are banned. They were very effective though.

 

[The Shooman]

The Shooman : is Murray Allan any good? Vintage piece, made in Scotland? Not sure of the date.

I have never owned vintage Murray Allan, but l hear it is decent.

Just been reminded of the importance of moth balls after viewing in horror four previously pride- inspiring Hawick V necks. I never learn.

Best solution = store washed woolens in cotton zip bags with mesh bags full of lavender for warm weather storage.

Myths = household freezers kill larvae
Myths = cedar keeps moths away

Shaking knitwear once a month can also be a good solution.

 

[The Shooman]

A very rare Ballantyne intarsia is for sale at the moment. Too small for me. More suitable for a women....men don't wear animals on their jumpers. One of the most skilled intarsia l have seen.

 

[Grand Potentate]

A very rare Ballantyne intarsia is for sale at the moment. Too small for me. More suitable for a women....men don't wear animals on their jumpers. One of the most skilled intarsia l have seen.
View attachment 36123View attachment 36124

i'm 100% positive i could find you something exactly like this at the local Goodwill store.

 

[The Shooman]

i'm 100% positive i could find you something exactly like this at the local Goodwill store.

Rambo, now that comment was completely awesome. One of the best comments you have ever made, l laughed my head off when l read it.

It's true, you could find something like that at the local goodwill store, BUT the Ballantyne l posted would be in a completely different league. The goodwill versions may look similar, but they are mass produced. The one l posted are loomed strand by strand on old 100 year old handmade looms by the best knitters in the history of the world using the best cashmere ever to exist.

Check out my posts above about the intarsia work. They are some of the best posts l have ever made on the forum, yet no-one took any notice of them. Wanna see how complex intarsia work is?...check this out, it'll knock your sox right off:


NOW just imagine trying to do the shading and extra fine detail in the intarsia above. It is far more complex than the intarsia the lady was doing in the video here. The dog intarsia is the work of pure genius from a great artist. Even my Ballantyne intarsia isn't as great as the doggie one above. The doggie intarsia is pure WOW!!!!!

 

[Grand Potentate]

Rambo, now that comment was completely awesome. One of the best comments you have ever made, l laughed my head off when l read it.

It's true, you could find something like that at the local goodwill store, BUT the Ballantyne l posted would be in a completely different league. The goodwill versions may look similar, but they are mass produced. The one l posted are loomed strand by strand on old 100 year old handmade looms by the best knitters in the history of the world using the best cashmere ever to exist.

Check out my posts above about the intarsia work. They are some of the best posts l have ever made on the forum, yet no-one took any notice of them. Wanna see how complex intarsia work is?...check this out, it'll knock your sox right off:


NOW just imagine trying to do the shading and extra fine detail in the intarsia above. It is far more complex than the intarsia the lady was doing in the video here. The dog intarsia is the work of pure genius from a great artist. Even my Ballantyne intarsia isn't as great as the doggie one above. The doggie intarsia is pure WOW!!!!!

shooey it looks like a sweater of two dogs fucking. if not the goodwill then definitely the local sex shop or wherever perverted goods are sold.

 

[The Shooman]

shooey it looks like a sweater of two dogs engaging in intercourse. . if not the goodwill then definitely the local sex shop or wherever perverted goods are sold.

Fixed.

Wow, l never thought of it like that, but it does look like two dogs decided to have fun by doing rude things together doesn't it, they even have smiles on their faces. Glad that is not on my jumper.


AND


if it was on my jumper and kids started asking questions such as

kids = "why are those dogs so happy"?

me = "because they are having fun"

kids = "what fun"

me = "it's rude (rood) stuff mums and dads do when they wanna have babies. I'll tell you when you turn 18.