The End of the Yarn?

Trends, fads and fashions come and go, and many are the businesses that try to keep up with them, including publishing. Whether chick-lit, anime, sudoku or survivor memoir, book publishers run the risk of committing to projects only to see the public's enthusiasm wane before the books appear, or grow tired at the onslaught of titles once they do. Suddenly, yesterday's trend is today's old news.

In the hobbies and crafts category, knitting began to take hold about six years ago; no one knows why. But in a post-9/11 world, the activity has continued to increase in popularity. Publishers, of course, have responded with books and more books. But now comes the challenging part. Is knitting on the verge of becoming a widely established American hobby (like, say, gardening) or is it headed for the fate of philately? Although St. Martin's senior editor BJ Berti characterizes knitting as "the trend that refuses to die," not all the signs promise longevity.

The knitting trend that most publishing mavens agree began in 2000 does continue, by some measures. The Craft Yarn Council reports that in 2002, 13% of women ages 25—34 knitted; by 2004, that figure had more than doubled to 33%.

One reason a preindustrial activity like making garments at home out of yarn caught everyone's attention was that the stories upended the traditional image of knitters. Melanie Falick, today editorial director for Stewart, Tabori & Chang's craft imprint, STC Craft/Melanie Falick Books, recalls that when she toured to promote her own 1996 title, Knitting in America(Artisan), "People would still say, 'I thought you were going to be a lady with a gray bun.' "

Knitting was so widely declared "the new yoga" that it's an impossible quote to source, but there's no lack of evidence that it had indeed caught on. Trisha Malcolm, editor-in-chief of Vogue Knitting, the highest-circulation knitting magazine, recalls that chunky, hand-knit sweaters started showing up on fashion runways while knitting needles appeared in the hands of celebrities like Julia Roberts and Uma Thurman. Young, fashion-forward women came to knitting in droves. And men aren't totally blind to the stitch: about 3% of knitters are male—a large enough group to merit their own books, such as Michael Del Vecchio's Knitting with Balls (DK, Nov.) and the even more specific Men Who Knit and the Dogs Who Love Them by Annie Modesitt and Drew Emborsky (Sterling/Lark, Jan.).

The norm in knitting these days is an edginess, a pushing of the traditional image of the needle-wielder. The goth knitting and craft Web site www.theanticraft.com offers a pattern for a knitted effigy with X's for eyes. In Houston, the Knitta Crew (www.knittaplease.com) "tags" public spaces with yarn graffiti. Yarn stores like Knit New York in New York City's East Village (which includes a coffee bar) and the Yarn Tree, a store and studio in Brooklyn's über-hip Williamsburg neighborhood, are no longer a novelty. Titles like Judith Durant's Never Knit Your Man a Sweater: Unless You've Got the Ring(Storey, Dec.) and Nikol Lohr's Naughty Needles: Sexy, Saucy Knits for the Bedroom and Beyond(Potter Craft, Dec.) address the young, hip knitter.

But judging from book sales, the popularity of knitting has slowed. After peaking in 2003, knitting book sales have "plateaued," says Allison Korleski, craft, home reference and gardening buyer for the 797-store Barnes & Noble chain, although she says they are still strong.

Suzan Mischer, who carries 50 to 60 different titles at L.A.'s Knit Cafe and wrote Greetings from Knit Cafe(STC Craft/ Melanie Falick Books, June), says the trend plugs along, although not at the hectic pace of a few years ago: "It's not like the Internet, where it crashed and came to a screeching halt. It's just that the frenzy isn't there anymore."

The problem with catering to young people who rush to the latest trendy subject is that the audience moves along to the next fad (crocheting, felting, spinning and beading are contenders) just as quickly, although knitting seems to be a bit of an exception. The craft has a higher retention rate than many hobbies, says Craft Yarn Council of America executive director Mary Colucci, who claims the group's research shows that knitting is "addictive," and that newcomers stick with it for its soothing quality, a kind of knitter's high.

Still, "Once you declare something a trend, nobody wants to do it anymore—it backfires," says Linda LaBelle, owner of the Yarn Tree in Brooklyn, who is working on a book for Potter Craft, tentatively titled Simple Color and Straight Talk: Hand-Dyeing Techniques and Knitting Patterns from the Yarn Tree, to be published in September 2007.

Knitting books do go out of fashion, but the basics remain the same, meaning that there isn't enough falloff in sales of older titles to make room for what B&N's Korleski terms "an ongoing barrage of new titles." In short, the market is now saturated with titles that target the no-longer-so-new young knitting demographic.

"Pattern books in particular are overpublished," says Vogue Knitting's Malcolm. Vogue Knittingalso publishes books with Sixth&Spring Books and is focusing on reference volumes such as its Stitchionaryseries rather than, as Malcolm puts it, "books with 25 patterns that look great right now and in two years will look like hell." In 2002, Vogue Knitting published a revised edition of Vogue Knitting: The Ultimate Knitting Book,which Knit Cafe's Mischer calls "Fannie Farmerfor knitting"—the updated version alone has sold more than 100,000 copies.

The magazine's resistance to publishing titles geared specifically to the young may also reflect some signs of slippage in that market, at least based on magazine sales. Malcolm reports that sales of Knit 1magazine, a Vogue Knittingspin-off for younger knitters—the summer 2006 issue features knitted boxer shorts and a punk toilet-paper cozy with a fuchsia yarn Mohawk—have decreased slightly.

Tricia Waddell, editorial director of Interweave Press, says, "The trend of knitting among young people is kind of peaking at this point. I wouldn't say we're moving away from publishing for that audience, but we're not publishing only to that audience. The market is getting very saturated."

Interweave is looking to books of instant-gratification projects suitable for knitters of any age. The house's One Skein: 30 Quick Projects to Knit and Crochetby Leigh Radford has sold 34,000 copies since February, making it the publisher's fastest selling title ever.

For its part, Taunton Press had all but stopped publishing new craft titles, with only one frontlist book in 2005.

The newly invigorated market has drawn the house back, though, and it has seven titles on tap for fall 2006 and spring 2007, including Marion Edmons and Ahza Moore's When Bad Things Happen to Good Knitters: An Emergency Survival Guide—Don't Cast on Without It (Feb.) and Knitting Tips & Trade Secrets Expanded: Ingenious Techniques and Solutions for Hand and Machine Knitting and Crochet(Oct.) in a new edition with 30% more material than the original had in 1996.

In any case, it would behoove those who are staying put in the category to consider that beginners do not stay beginners forever. Those young women who flocked to knitting five or six years ago have either switched to other hobbies or are now more experienced. Like many craft publishers, STC Craft's Falick is focusing on books that take knitters "beyond the scarf" to more challenging projects. The assumption is that the young audience has had its fill of knitted iPod covers, or, as Taunton executive editor Pam Hoenig puts it, "You can knit only so many beer cozies and then it's time to move on." Korleski at B&N, too, cites opportunities for growth in books for those at the "if I knit one more scarf I'm going to kill myself" stage.

Founding Mother of Hip Knitting

Those peak 2003 knitting sales noted earlier were driven largely by the extraordinary sales of one title, which caught the wave of the young knitter trend. Debbie Stoller's Stitch 'n Bitch: The Knitter's Handbook, published by Workman, was the original hipster knitting title. "Stitch 'n Bitchis the idea we all wish we had thought of," says Carol Taylor, publisher of Lark Books.

For good reason: Stoller's seminal title has more than 400,000 copies in print. Korleski calls it one of the chain's "cornerstone" knitting titles and "the single title that galvanized a lot of people." Stoller went on to write Stitch 'n Bitch Nation(2004) and 2006's The Happy Hooker (on crochet), and she's under contract with Workman for two more knitting titles.

Stoller's debut marked a change not just in the tenor of knitting books, but in their look. Stoller herself poses on the covers of all three of her titles. Suddenly, knitting, a category that had not been author-driven, developed a cult of personality.

Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, author of Knitting Rules!(70,000 copies in print) and At Knit's End(101,000 copies in print), attracts crowds of 300 or more at her events, says Jayme Hummer, publicist at her publisher, Storey. (Like all in the new wave of knitting, Pearl-McPhee appears at both bookstores and yarn stores.) Pearl-McPhee's Cast Off: The Yarn Harlot's Guide to the Land of Knitting(Mar., 2007) will have a 100,000-copy first printing.

Another personality-driven title, Kay Gardiner and Ann Shayne's Mason-Dixon Knitting(part of the first list from Clarkson Potter's newly created Potter Craft imprint), has been the top-selling knitting book on Amazon.com since its March publication.

Mason-Dixon Knittinggrew out of www.masondixonknitting.com, the humorous blog the authors launched in July 2003, reflecting how key the Internet has been for young knitters. (Although when asked about young knitters, Mason-Dixon Knittingco-author Gardiner protested, "I'm more sassy than young.") Blog tracker Technorati.com estimates that more than 900 knitting blogs exist. In a 2005 study, the Craft Yarn Council of America found that 31% of knitters went online to find patterns, order supplies and to network—twice as many as the previous year.

"The blogs are Internet dating for knitters," says author Pearl-McPhee, who blogs at www.yarnharlot.ca. Pearl-McPhee does not, however, use her blog to publicize her books beyond posting click-through buttons to Amazon. The blog, she insists, is "my living room, where I invite knitters over to play."

More typical are sites such as www.knitty.com, a quarterly online magazine for knitters. On Knitty.com's message boards, readers exchange tips and discuss yarns, books and other products. Editor and publisher Amy R. Singer maintains a blog on the site, where she tracks her progress while writing books such as Big Girl Knits: 25 Big, Bold Projects for Real Women with Real Curves(Potter Craft, Apr.) and her latest, No Sheep For You: Knitting Without Wool,due from Interweave next spring.

A Close-Knit Community

One thing is for sure: if the trendiness of knitting someday vanishes, there will remain a committed community of knitter. "Knitting is a way to reconnect with others," says Bernadette Murphy, author of Zen and the Art of Knitting(Adams Media, 2002) and editor of The Knitter's Gift(Adams Media, 2004). "It's a lot different than instant messaging and trolling through MySpace, a lot more genuine."

In Stitch 'n Bitch,Stoller encourages knitters at all levels to form "stitch 'n bitch" knitting circles (the term dates back at least to the 1950s, Stoller says) that meet in cafés and other public places, and many have heeded the call, making knitting not only popular, but visible. Some booksellers have reached out to host those gatherings; independent bookseller Where the Sidewalk Ends in Chatham, Mass., offers free knitting lessons and has a corner of its store arranged for knitters.

But what has truly brought knitting "out of the closet" and to the attention of not just the young and hip, but millions of people who have picked up needles, says Vogue Knitting's Malcolm, is the annual Knit-Out & Crochet fair that the Craft Yarn Council of America has organized in downtown New York since 1998. On September 17, Union Square in New York will be the site of a fashion show emceed by Pearl-McPhee. Vickie Howell, host of the DIY cable network's Knitty Gritty, who has a book due from Lark in January, will also appear.The 2004 New York Knit-Out (events have spread to other cities) attracted 30,000 people. Book sales are not allowed, but member publishers do attend.

And DIYers seem to appreciate the socially conscious side of the knitting community, visible in its numerous charitable organizations, from Afghans for Afghans (blankets and sweaters to Afghanistan) to Caps to the Capital (teeny hats to protect the heads of newborns). In October, STC Craft/Melanie Falick Books will publish Betty Christiansen's Knitting for Peace:Make the World a Better Place OneStitch ata Time, about 28 such organizations.

Ultimately, the reasons that young people have picked up knitting—and are sticking with it—are as varied as the stitches in a hand-knit pullover, and perhaps impossible to unravel completely.