An Itch To Stitch
Disregarding machismo, some men challenge convention with balls of wool
A wiry, athletic man stood in front of the assembled Brown University Phi Kappa Psi members. Following proper parliamentary procedure, he solemnly began the meeting. “We, the Social Chair, propose to have a party on Saturday. House funds of four hundred dollars are requested to fund the party. And Todd will be forbidden to knit in any and all of the Sunday night fraternity meetings.”
Todd Guren, a rugby player, looked up from his half-finished sock and smiled. He continued to add stitches to his project as the meeting progressed. The fraternity passed amendments banning his hobby every week, but Guren always ignored their jokes and relentless teasing.
“Luckily, I was bigger than them,” he laughs.
The Craft Yarn Council of America has no statistics about men who practice the craft, but yarn store employees and Internet blogs can attest to the rising popularity of the hobby. Despite a lack of male-targeted knitting groups or how-to books, men throughout the nation crochet and knit. A three hundred-pound offensive tackle at Indiana’s Ball State University knits washcloths. An air filter repairman in Maine knits while waiting to finish a job. Some male knitters in California use tackle boxes and tool boxes to store their needles and yarn.
Men wielding needles may raise a few eyebrows today, but societies didn’t always restrict yarn crafts to women. In seventeenth-century Europe, financially struggling men knitted and sold stockings to supplement their meager incomes, and both genders knitted gloves for soldiers during the two World Wars. For generations, men have darned socks, mended nets, and sewn clothes.
“Slowly but surely, we’re getting over gender-specific crafts and jobs,” says Sara Asher Morris, the copresident of the University Student Fibers Guild at the University of Oregon. Roughly 20 percent of the group is male. “[Men say], ‘If my sister can do it, if my girlfriend can do it, why can’t I?’” Today, some young men are defying the gender roles assigned to knitting and crocheting, one stitch at a time.
Guren started knitting eight years ago to pass the time during food cooperative meetings and fraternity gatherings. At thirty, he now teaches in a Portland, Oregon, yarn store, but he first taught mentally ill, homeless people to knit.
In a Chicago YMCA residential psychiatric program, Guren used the opportunity to share something he loved to help boost patients’ confidence. He taught men and women to make scarves and change purses in his newly formed knitting circle. Although only one student at the facility finished a scarf, Guren believes that learning a new skill increased their confidence and helped them use their time constructively.
“I hope Bill’s still knitting. He had scarf potential.”
He also worked at a similar program in New Jersey. One of his favorite students there, Bill, was expelled from the facility for selling anti-anxiety medication. After he was asked to go, Bill stood in the entry way and said goodbye to his many friends. Guren spotted him leaving and met him in the parking lot.
“Don’t you want your needles?” Guren asked.
A smile spread beneath Bill’s strawberry-blond beard. “Oh, great. Thanks,” he said. “I’m definitely gonna need these.”
Guren was glad that his student took the needles. “I hope Bill’s still knitting,” he says. “He had scarf potential.”
James Walker isn’t likely to grace the cover of Vogue Knitting anytime soon. He wears comfortable, wide shoes and baggy jeans that enable movement when he learns new skateboarding tricks. A wry smile constantly plays at his mouth, suggesting a perpetual joke only he understands. And his right-hand pinkie is still recovering from a minor skateboarding accident. The cast was only a temporary setback to his hobby, though. He has been hooked ever since his girlfriend taught him to crochet in November 2004.
The twenty-year-old started so he could stitch hats as holiday gifts for family members. He later crocheted beanies with ear flaps to keep himself warm while skateboarding in the Eugene, Oregon, winter rain and wore his handmade headbands during tennis class.
![[photo]](./img/knitting01.jpg "James Walker demonstrates how to crochet a beanie")
James Walker demonstrates how to crochet a beanie.
Walker sets his aspirations much higher than hats and sweatbands, though. He plans to learn a new stitch, a pattern for mittens, and some knitting techniques. Ultimately, he dreams of making a pair of crocheted trousers — or maybe a pair of woolen underpants.
His ambitious projects stem more from his irreverent sense of humor than his love of yarn clothing, yet he says he is addicted to crocheting. “I think it’s the wave of the future,” he says. “It’s fashion.”
Sami Elshafei has become accustomed to the confusion his yarn crafts inspire. One evening, Elshafei sat on the couch in his living room with a group of friends who had gathered to smoke from his bong. The twenty-year-old brought out his water pipe, covered in a light- and dark-blue wool jacket he crocheted. The words “The Cozie” were embroidered on its base.
Elshafei’s friends stared at the strangely attired pipe.
“Whoa. Why’s the bong wearing a sweater?”
The bong cozie, Elshafei’s most prized accomplishment, certainly is unusual. After trying several techniques, he invented his own pattern to cover and protect the pipe’s irregular shape. The design evolved as Elshafei later added the boxy lettering, a strap to hold the cozie tight, and a lighter holder.
Elshafei uses the same innovation to perfect patterns for his other creations. When learning to crochet from his mother, he experimented with designing hats and insulators for beer cans. After about ten attempts, he perfected the “can cozie” pattern. He gave his mother a “Diet Coke holder,” as she calls it, in gratitude for her help.
Although his friends tease him about his unusual craft, it seems that they can accept his hobby as long as he crochets gifts for them. They often wear his hats to parties and carry chilled beers in green and yellow cozies, crocheted using the University of Oregon’s colors, to school football games. Elshafei loves to see people use his creations but has not yet consented to the many requests for more bong sweaters. For now, the cozie remains a one-of-a-kind creation.
- Online Extra!
- LaBree Shide shares her thoughts about photographing An Itch to Stitch.