Knitting in Scotland

The story of Scottish knitting: the first critical history and analysis of a local craft turned international icon.

From Fair Isle patterning to Pringle jumpers, Scottish knitwear is internationally renowned and instantly recognizable. This open access study unpicks the distinctive place of knitting in the Scottish landscape, economy, and culture from the 19th century to today.

Recent reappraisals of the industrial revolution and traditional craft economies, and the recent revival of hobby knitting during the Covid-19 pandemic, have raised new questions about the roles of social communities, sustainability and women’s domestic work in the textile industries. Tracing its story from raw material to final product, from home-spun clothes and crafts to luxury markets and industrial-scale production, Knitting in Scotland investigates the Scottish knitting trade’s remarkable survival across two centuries of economic and cultural modernization.

The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by UKRI.