Artistic visions
WATERCOLOURS & Lace is a hand-dyed yarn company run by Julie Harris, and she has united her love of yarn with her skills as a botanical artist to develop a huge range of gorgeous colourways. Based in Norfolk, Julie is also a talented knitwear designer, specialising in intricate lace shawls. We chatted with Julie to discover how she came to set up her dyeing business, and how she creates her hand-dyed colours.
When did you first try dyeing yarn?
“I found some hand-dyed yarn at a show and fell in love with some lace shawl patterns on Ravelry, so I knitted a couple of the designs. I was disappointed to find the colours pooled or gave obvious stripes, which I felt didn’t look right for lace. So, I bought a book and some undyed laceweight yarn and had a go myself, with the aim of producing something with short and irregular colour changes.
“I dyed my first skeins in 2011, mainly for myself - although friends and relations started admiring them, and my cousin sold a few in her gift shop in the early days.
“Watercolours and Lace became a business in 2012. I’d suffered a neck injury in late 2011 which required
