Meet Heather,
founder of nittin.
Her neatly knitted covers started as a hobby, but when her creations began to take over the home she decided to launch a business.
Heather's story
I learnt to knit when I was about six years old. Granny taught, which meant I had the best dressed Tiny Tears in town. I progressed on to bigger things, knitting for my pet poodle and pushing him around in a doll’s pram, much to the utter embarrassment of my older brother.
I think it was this that encouraged my parents to buy me a knitting machine. I would spend hours in our upstairs guest room which I innocently pretended was my ‘Design Studio’. My creations included a very bright yellow jumper for my supportive father and even my first commission for a couple of long cardigans which were sent to New Zealand as Christmas presents for a family friend – International!
My creative endeavours were cruelly curtailed when the guest room/Design Studio was needed for a long term guest, so the knitting machine was packed away in the loft and I was forced back to my needles.
I was never going to be the auntie who knitted boring jumpers for Christmas!
School work, then studying, sort of got in the way together with marriage and a career and, although I always had a ball of wool and a couple of needles in the wings, I sort of lost the creative urge.
In the intervening period I attended a couple of classes in Knutsford; one oddly called Extreme Knitting which I incorrectly imagined would involve knitting whilst hanging off a cliff edge, but turned out to be using large needles and large wool. Another involved knitting a large snuggly jumper for an armchair.
As you can see, I was never going to be the auntie who knitted boring jumpers for Christmas, I wanted to design and create funky stuff!
I more recently joined a local knit and natter group where we made hats for premature babies and the hats and scarves for the homeless, also hundreds of squares to send to Africa where the young mums made colourful blankets to keep their babies warm in the cold nights.
Then came the Pandemic, the local hospital wanted knitted red hearts to give to bereaved families and the local playgroup for the front-line workers wanted doll’s clothes. I loved it! I had rekindled my love of knitting; the needles were clicking again.
Also, with the Pandemic came a reassessment of life and I started to think about retirement, I realised it would give me more time to further my interest in design and creation of lovely things.
I spent most of lockdown with my trusty double pointed needles in hand and started creating brightly coloured cushions, so much so I needed to sell some to make some space, so I could keep on knitting and make more!
This is how nittin was born.