Design a new gansey pattern

JERSEY KNITTING IS SET TO BE AN ‘EXTRAVA-GANSEY’
KNITTING NEEDLES are busily clicking over the Highlands, and a good deal further afield, it appears.
It’s all in aid of the traditional fisherman’s jersey, or gansey as it is affectionately, known, was a utility garment which was his other “friend” as he toiled on the windswept high seas.
Now the gansey is in line for a fashion makeover, sort on the same principle as Harris tweed is being used accessories and footwear.
The Inverness-based Moray Firth Partnership has sent out an invitation to knitters and those with bright ideas, to give the gansey a new look. While the Partnership is keen to ensure that the traditional patterns and the skills that go into them, are not lost, it is keen to encourage new designers, young folk with ideas for exciting new designs.
But nimble-fingered purveyors of the plain and purl won’t have to produce a whole gansey. The completion has been split into two parts, design a brand new adult gansey pattern and come up with a design for a gansey-patterned bag.
Gansey project co-ordinator, Stephanie Hoyle, stressed that, although knitted samples of the patterns are requested, they don’t have to be knitted by the person who devised the design.
Already, the novel competition has attracted international interest on the Partnership’s website, www.gansey-MF.co.uk, from Europe and North America, Japan and Australia, although it is early days for entries to be appearing.
The first promotional event for the competition takes place in Helmsdale, on June 19 and 20, which will include an exhibition of ganseys under the title of Extrava-gansey, what else! Moray Firth folk are also being asked to attend,wearing ganseys and to bring old photos along with them. The next event will be a gansey exhibition and classes, at the Scottish Traditional Boat Festival, at Portsoy, on June 26 and 27.
Entries have to be in by April 4.