Find out why knots appear in your yarn, and what you should do with them.

What is a yarn knot?

Knots aren't tangled yarn, they're a point where the yarn has been broken and tied back together. They can be a frustrating but unfortunately inevitable part of knitting with natural fibres.

Finding a knot in a new ball of yarn can be irritating but unless you hand spin your yarn, and know where your joins are, you’re likely to come across more than a few if you regularly knit with natural yarn.

Where do yarn knots come from?

Stitch & Story’s yarns are spun from 100% merino wool, a completely natural and sustainably sourced fibre. Because of this, it’s not possible to have a continuous thread for an entire yarn batch that totals 1 tonne.

The knots are made by spinners joining new threads, or repairing breaks that occur during the spinning process. Knots could be anywhere in the 1 tonne of spun wool, so figuring out which balls have the knots to throw them away would increase the cost of all the yarn produced - not to mention a terrible waste of wool! This means occasionally, but not often, you’ll find a knot in a ball of yarn.

What should I do with a yarn knot?

A knot should be treated like joining a new ball. Untie the knot or cut it out, then either spit-splice, felt it, or leave a tail long enough to weave in and start knitting with the new thread.

A few knots per 1 tonne of yarn are considered acceptable but it is very rare to have knots appear in more than one ball per dye lot.  If you receive yarn from Stitch & Story that has more knots than you think it should please contact us at hello@stitchandstory.com