2012 TeachersClick name for full bio
Barbara Assejew is a graduate from Vilnius University (Lithuania) in Social Science, moved to US, studied at FIT (NY) pattern making and Parsons School of Design Fashion design. She is working in the fashion industry in NY, and has experience in costume design. Barbara knits, sews, crochets, felts, hand paints fabrics with natural dyes and embroiders; she grew up with the ideology that you shouldn't spend money on something that you could make. Disheartened by the idea of creating waste and environmental damage, Barbara opened Amberstudios.Etsy.com, where she sells sustainable clothing and accessories for “consciously hip” customers. Barbara tries to upcycle/reuse/reclaim fabrics, overstock and low-impact materials for her collections. She strikes for eco-couture in “reincarnated” fashion. It reminds me of a line from an old Paul Simon song: “one man's ceiling is another man's floor..."
"My grandmother taught me to knit when I was about six. My knitting was full of holes and dropped stitches, but she didn’t seem concerned and just told me to keep knitting, and I did. In fifth grade, I began knitting clothes for my Barbie and taught myself through trial and error how to join colors and make stripes. The summer before entering seventh grade, I knit my first sweater and wore it to school the first day. Knitting has always been a part of my life, the ups and the downs of it. During the months before my impending divorce, I continually knitted socks. Whoever said that knitting socks is cheaper than therapy was right. Although there are other aspects of my business involving fine arts, teaching knitting is a great joy as well as an important part of my income. I regularly teach knitting classes at Stifel Fine Arts Center in Wheeling, WV; Lakeside Chautauqua on Lake Erie, and have an on-going group of knitters in the Wheeling area. People like my classes because I am not afraid to troubleshoot their patterns or let them see mistakes in my own knitting. I love seeing knitters succeed and excel at something I find so enjoyable."
Steven Berg, also known as the Glitter Knitter, has been obsessed with the fiber arts since he was just 4, mimicking his mother as she knitted. Soon he was making clothes for Barbie dolls and selling them in the neighborhood. As an adult, he spent 25 years in the corporate fashion industry before leaving and opening The Yarn Garage. Steven then opened StevenBe. Located on Minneapolis' Chicago Avenue in a former 19th-century firehouse,StevenBe is more funky hangout than yarn shop. Leopard-print and zebra-stripe chairs create a semi-circle in the center of the store beneath a massive crystal chandelier decorated with ostrich feathers. Handbags, books, jewelry, and finished knitting projects share space with the most delicious yarns – a fiber lover's dream. Wondrously overwhelming, the store features more than 1,900 different yarns, not including colorways. Between the two stores, Berg often works seven days a week. Remarkably, he still finds time to pursue his own passion – creating quirky, wearable creations.
Jane Bigleow is co owner of A B-ewe-tiful Design along with her daughter, Jill. Their patterns are sold through local yarn shops and also online. She has taught all levels of knitting classes at Kindred Spirits Yarn Studio in Franklin, PA as well as Knitter’s Fantasy and Knitter’s Day Out. She enjoys teaching and watching students realize the comfort that knitting brings.
Jill Bigelow-Suttell is co-owner of Kindred Spirits Yarn Studio and Kindred Spirits Design Studio in Franklin, PA. She is past president of the Wooly Wonders knitting guild. Jill teaches at festivals and yarn shops all around the Great Lakes area, including Pgh Knit and Crochet Festival, Knitter’s Day Out, Knitter’s Fantasy, Ann Arbor Fiber Expo, Kindred Spirits Yarn Studio, Yarn Cravin’, Yarn Garden (of Michigan), Rae’s Yarn Boutique, and Knit A Round. She is co-owner of A B-ewe-tiful Design. Her designs have been published by Knitty.com, Dark Horse Yarn, Schulana, and Cast On magazine.
I taught knitting and crochet at two local yarn stores outside of Reading, PA, for several years. I also taught knitting for some adult education classes held in several schools in that area. Since moving to the Grove City, PA area I have been teaching for Wolf Creek Yarns for the past 4 years. I was fortunate enough to teach at the Pgh. Knit and Crochet Festival last year.
Structural Engineer by trade, Robyn Chachula, uses her building design processes to create crochet projects in Pittsburgh, PA. In her first crochet book, Blueprint Crochet: Modern Designs For the Visual Crocheter by Interweave Press, she uses her engineering background to bring crochet to new learners with the basics of symbol crochet. In her follow up book, Baby Blueprint Crochet: Irresistible Projects for Little Ones, she dove deeper into the mysteries of crochet diagram through small parent friendly baby projects. Her latest books, Simply Crochet by Interweave and Crochet Stitches Visual Encyclopedia by Wiley, explore the wide realm of crochet techniques. You can catch Robyn as a crochet expert on Knit and Crochet Today on PBS. Robyn also has two DVDs on how to branch out from the constraints of patterns and design your own crochet projects. Feel free to stop by www.crochetbyfaye.com to check up on what has inspired her lately.
Marge Connelly is a self taught knitter who has been at it for over 30 years. She has made at least 75 prayer shawls using this pattern and some not using this pattern. Marge teaches knitting and crochet most Saturdays at the Coraopolis Public Library to all comers (free classes). She has been teaching children and adults to knit and crochet for at least 20 years and loves the ecumenical service that comes with a Prayer shawl ministry. Having gone to all of the Bedford Springs Knittreats, she knows most of the attendees and is willing to help with problems during free time.
Adina DeRoy-Stouffer is a native Pittsburgh artist and graduate of the University of Pittsburgh. Her design studies have taken her as far away as Rome, as she continues the family tradition in the jewelry industry, designing, creating, and selling jewelry. She is also a fiber artist, knitting and selling her designs and work throughout the area. She teaches jewelry making, knitting, and fiber arts at various locations, including Pittsburgh Center for the Arts and Sweetwater Center for the Arts in Sewickley, PA.
Lauren Etling has been crocheting 18 out of 26 years of her life. She completed her BFA from Seton Hill University and crocheted all of her artwork that was included in her thesis show. Learning how to fuse her love of crochet and sculpture was a pivotal moment in her artistic career. She has shown work in venues such as the Andy Warhol Museum and the Chicago Art Department, and belongs to arts organizations such as the Fiberarts Guild of Pittsburgh and the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh. She started her arts and design business, Hooktastic Designs, in 2009.
Victoria Fergus has more than 30 years' teaching experience including K-12 and higher education. At the college level, she has taught art education courses, 2D foundations, 3D foundations, ceramics, crafts, graphic design, drawing, art for main-streaming, graduate seminar, and art education graduate studies. She also has experience in teaching museum based outreach programs as well as working as an exhibition and display consultant for museums. She started using crochet as an artistic medium while working on her doctorate. “I see my crochet work as a combination of the 3D and 2D training I had.” Her work has been exhibited in national and international textile exhibits and numerous one-person shows.
Amy has been fascinated with fibers forever. She learned to knit at age 3 and sew at age 7. She longed to spin as a child, and finally realized her dream when she had her parents’ antique spinning wheel re-built after she finished college. Amy taught both high school art and home economics for 22 years, while raising three boys and helping her husband, Greg, on their sheep farm. Ten years ago, Amy and Greg bought a woolmill and brought it to the farm. The mill business has grown into Amy’s full-time job - washing, dying, picking, carding, felting, and knitting with the fibers from the mill. She is best known by her customers for her unusual and creative colorway rovings. Amy and Greg reside on their farm in Paw Paw, MI, with their two dogs, two cats, 32 chickens, and a dove.
Nancy Griffin enjoyed a lifelong career spinning novelty yarns and teaching spinning, knitting and weaving. Her shop, Otter Creek Store in Mercer, PA, closed in 2007. Nancy continues to be active in the fiber arts community, working part-time knitting hats, shawls and felted pet beds, designing knitting patterns and teaching through the Mercer Spinners and Weavers Guild and other fiber arts organizations and events. Nancy posts her creations and patterns on her blog: http://www.yarnottercreek.blogspot.com/
Wini Labrecque is a textile artist with interest in a wide variety of techniques and a very strong passion for fiber. Since the late 1980s, utilizing natural fibers, Wini has been spinning, weaving, knitting and felting from raw form to finished product. Her handspun skeins and woven/knit goods are sold at area art festivals and in area specialty shops. Ever since Wini was first exposed to alpacas and their wonderful fiber, she has been utilizing and promoting the fiber to everyone who will listen. Wini teaches classes in beginning spinning, felting, and/or weaving to individuals or small groups. She is also partner in a business called Fleece To Fashion USA that provides custom fiber services from handspinning to finished knit or woven clothing out of alpaca owner's own alpaca fleece. She also is a Fiber Arts judge as well as a judge for hand spun and mill spun skein competitions. “Alpaca With A Twist" yarns and home grown alpaca fiber, roving and yarn are available from her farm.
Amy Maceyko is an architect who has been knitting and crocheting obsessively since 2004. The recent slowdown of architectural work has allowed her to explore her interests in both designing and teaching. It has also showed her the many ways in which architecture is similar to the fiber arts - the texture, the thought process, the creativity, the math and the structure - all are critical in both pursuits. Amy has been teaching at LYS's in Pittsburgh and you can find some of her published patterns through Ravelry. She will also have several crochet designs published in the Fresh Designs Crochet series of books by Cooperative Press, planned for release later in 2012.
Follow her work and learn about new pattern releases at:
Fritz Mitnick began hooking rugs in 1997 and quit her job after 25 years as a librarian so that she could hook more. An accredited McGown teacher, she teaches at local community and art centers and travels to teach at camps and workshops. She serves on the editorial board of the Association of Traditional Hooking Artists journal and her work has appeared in that publication as well as Rug Hooking magazine, the McGown Guild Newsletter, the Wool Street Journal and several books. Two of her rugs have been selected for Celebrations, an annual book featuring the best rugs as determined by Rug Hooking magazine.
Kathy McGrath has been knitting for over 23 years. One summer, many years ago, she was invited to be her new-born nephew’s nanny. Kathy ventured overseas to join her brother and family to Bertram, Belgium and discovered that her nephew was one of the easiest babies. He slept most of the day. This left Kathy with little to do, so her sister-in-law, Jennifer, took her to a local yarn shop. They picked a pattern for a sweater (yes! This was Kathy’s first project!!!), yarn and needles, and Jennifer taught Kathy how to knit. The remainder of her time abroad was spent knitting away! That first sweater was followed by numerous other knitting projects over the years. Kathy is also an accomplished seamstress and 2-dimensional artist. Encouraged to follow her artistic passions by an artist father and loving mother, Kathy has developed abilities in many different media before discovering her true passion in creating art through knitting! In addition to knitting, Kathy is a single mom to three daughters: Sophia, 12; Amelia, 11; and Louisa, 9. Kathy works (since knitting does not pay the bills yet) as a teacher of GED prep for high school dropouts in Allegheny and Westmoreland counties.
Susanne McNally discovered rug hooking the way many people do — by seeing an announcement of a rug show. An entire roomful of hooked rugs was enough to drive the idea of any other handicraft out of her head. Fifteen years later, she is still learning and trying new things. There doesn’t seem to be an end. Getting someone started in this great fiber art is the most fun. Susanne completed her McGown certification and teaches with Fritz Mitnick. Susanne’s Posie’s Garden was selected as one of the top hooked rugs for Celebrations 2009, an annual competition and book. It also took first place in Readers’ Choice for original designs. Susanne’s rugs have appeared in many publications including Rug Hooking Today and Rug Hooking Magazine.
Debbie Maier Jacknin turned 50 and she reinvented herself. Her mother taught her to knit and crochet when she was a young girl and her daughter, Jenn, taught her to make jewelry. Now, she teaches those skills to others at JoAnn Fabric and Craft and at the Pittsburgh Public Market. Debbie enjoys spending the week knitting, crocheting, and creating unique jewelry, which she sells with items her daughter creates at Jenn’s Jems located inside the Pittsburgh Public Market located in the Strip District on Smallman Street between 16th and 17th streets.
I come from a family of doing fancy work on both sides - sitting idly was frowned on. My mother taught me to sew as a preschooler to keep me out of her serious sewing (she'd thread a needle and give me scraps while she made clothes for herself, me and my sister). Being left handed no one taught Mother to knit or crochet, but both my grandmothers crocheted all the time. At seven I insisted on putting lace on the edge of Woolworth's finest pillow cases that I'd embroidered. By the time I was eleven, I was over pillow cases and made my father's sisters show me how to knit. This, I decided, was really fun and fortunately Aunt Emily lived in Ann Arbor, so I saw her about every 6 weeks for guidance - learning such useful things as you couldn't just keep repeating rows one and two of a cable pattern if you wanted to have it twist. I wanted to take a knitting class in high school, but my father wouldn't hear of it - one learned that sort of thing at home! I did knit during lunch hour in high school and also did a lot of knitting and helping new knitters while at U of Michigan. I've given up sewing and use crochet just for finishing now, but I knit every day. After a Masters in Teaching, working in special education administration and raising 2 children, I came full-time to my love of yarn and knitting. I worked in several yarn stores and at Rainbow Mills designing and teaching. Then I put it all together, opening my own yarn store, Bonnie Knits, from which I retired after almost 20 years. I take classes whenever the opportunity presents and avidly read knitting books and the wonderful magazines that are now available. I will have to live for a very long time to use all the yarn and ideas that I have for my knitting.
Ellen Oehlbeck is from Mercer, PA. Knitting is her first passion, teaching is her second. Her grandmother taught her to knit at the age of 5. She is a Certified Extension Master Knitter Instructor through the Craft and Yarn Council of America, and The National Homemakers’ Council, Inc. She has been teaching for over 20 years in public schools, knit shops, Knitters Fantasy and at home.
Susan Radford was born in England to an English mother and Irish father. This ancestry lent the English Fair Isle and Irish Aran knitting techniques, which are incorporated and modernized to create her unique designing styles. During the war-stricken period of her youth, clothing was rationed, and yarn and yarn goods were easier to find and she became quite clever at making something out of nothing much…….so her knitting career began.
Iris founded Artyarns in 2002. She couldn’t find yarn for her designs and decided to create it herself with her mission of elevating the art of knitting. Since then, Artyarns has made a name for itself for its luxury, sophisticated hand-dyed yarns of the highest quality. Artyarns offers a variety of richly colored, luxury yarns, including merino wool, silk, cashmere, mohair, and fiber combinations, along with embellished yarns that are enhanced with beads, sequins, and gold or silver metallic strands. Taught by her mother, Iris has been knitting since she was about six years old. She was always drawn to decorative and fanciful types of projects, and indeed, is known best for her unique designs for modular knitting, lacework, and reversible knitwear. Iris is both a fiber artist and the author of several books, including Exquisite Little Knits (with co-author Laurie Kimmelstiel), Lacy Little Knits, Modular Knits, and Iris Schreier’s Reversible Knits, and most recently One + One: Scarves, Shawls & Shrugs: 25+ Projects from Just Two Skeins, the first in a series of books of two-skein projects. Her original techniques are used in knitting workshops around the world, and her patterns have been translated into various languages. She has appeared on TV's Knitty Gritty and Shay Pendray, and has written articles and published patterns in leading magazines, most recently in Vogue Knitting.
Visit her Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/artyarns. Her designs can be viewed on her web site at www.artyarns.com and www.irisknits.com.
Kate Silberberg is a retired art teacher (22 years at West Allegheny School District, PA). She and her husband, Brad, run the Mesa Creative Arts Center near Burgettstown, PA, where they both offer a variety of classes in art, crafts, spiritual and holistic healing and celebrating who you are!
Cynthia Spencer has always cared about reading and writing — and she even expected to become a professor to study these subjects. Her Ph.D. in educational psychology was about how students learn to write. But the year after she graduated, a series of events led to her co-owning a knitting and quilting store near Penn State called Stitch Your Art Out. The store has been open for over 5 years, and Cynthia continues to care about reading and writing: She works hard to help her customers understand how to read knitting patterns, and also writes patterns for her side business, "Really Clear Instructions."
I have been knitting and crocheting for decades (literally)! Nothing pleases me more than shopping for yarn and finding new patterns. My personal stash is quite extensive and every-time I watch a hoarder episode on television, I start to worry that someday my house will be buried in yarn.
Carla Sturgis is the owner of Delightful Ewe, formerly Victoria’s House of Needleart, LLC, in Duncansville, PA. She has been crocheting for 41 years and knitting for 20+ years. She’s known by her customers and friends as a “sockaholic” because of her love to knit socks. She’s a member of TKGA, TNNA, Knitter’s Day Out Committee, and a Blair County knitting guild. She is also a partner of Tadpoles for Ewe, a hand-dyeing yarn company based in central Pennsylvania.
Eleanor Swogger is merchandise manager for Kraemer Yarns in Nazareth, PA. She works on development of new yarns and on color additions for existing yarns. She teaches at the Yarn Shop at Kraemer Textiles and at Tangled Yarns in Bethlehem, PA. Eleanor is also a sample knitter for Kathy Zimmerman and several other designers. Eleanor lived in western PA for 31 years and was active in Golden Dome and Laurel Highlands Knitting Guilds.
Heidi Todd Kozar learned to knit as a young girl. She has designed professionally under the Embraceable Ewe label for more than 20 years. Heidi has been published in Interweave Knits, Knitter’s Magazine and Vogue Knitting. She has designed for Renaissance Yarns. She also sold exclusively designed children’s sweaters through various shops in New England and Pittsburgh. Last year, she designed and knit the sweaters worn by actress Elizabeth Banks in the new Russell Crowe film, The Next Three Days. She has taught throughout the US and is currently on the staff at Knit One in Pittsburgh.
Stacey Trock is a spunky crocheter and knitter who has an affinity for stuffed animals. Stacey began crocheting at the very tender age of 6, and hasn’t stopped since… and she’s acquired more fiber arts (knitting, spinning, tatting and locker hooking) along the way! She’s the designer for FreshStitches Amigurumi and the author of Cuddly Crochet (2010) and Crocheted Softies (2011), two books that showcase her cuddly creations. Stacey’s (knitted) work has appeared in More Knitting in the Sun (Porter, 2011) and Knitty.com. Aside from designing, Stacey is a blogger, a teacher, yogi and yarn-store employee. Basically… she doesn’t believe in idle moments!
I can’t remember when I didn't knit. I have taught locally and regionally and have been fortunate to study with nationally and internationally recognized knitters. I love to lead students to the joy of knitting and then watch them become independent knitters, helping them create their own designs and make decisions about how they want to adapt patterns My special passions are cables, lace and two-color knitting such as Fair Isle and Scandinavian patterns. I feel privileged to design for several yarn companies and am published in Interweave Knits, Vogue Knitting, Knit Simple and several books; including the upcoming More Baby Quick Knits. I also spin, weave and quilt but if, perish the thought, I had to decide on one activity, it would be knitting. I also teach at LYS, Pittsburgh Knit and Crochet Festival, Chautauqua Institution and I lead and participate in knitting retreats
Jean Wise has been doing some form of needle arts since she was a little girl. She has done bobbin lace, tatting and has 29 pieces of her handmade lace in the Smithsonian! She recently moved back to PA from Ohio where she was a charter member of the Western Reserve Knitting Guild, the first chartered Knitting Guild in the US, where the dues have remained the same since its inception in 1984. She taught many knitting and crochet classes at yarn stores in Ohio, and currently is teaching classes at Yarns by Design.
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