Welcome to the website for In the Loop, the Knitting Reference Library and Knitting Collections
Welcome to the website for everything relating to our work with the Knitting Collections held by the University of Southampton Library.
Our activities and the information on the website cover: the Knitting Reference Library located at the Winchester Campus, the Knitting Collections held by Special Collections at the Hartley Library on the Highfield Campus, Southampton, and all aspects of In the loop, the series of international, interdisciplinary conferences held bi-annually since 2008.
The success of In the loop has been due to the wide range of topics covered and the variety of speakers and delegates who have attended the conferences. The collections have richly contributed to the conferences success and the broader profile of knitting whether by hand or machine, on a domestic or industrial scale, for art, craft or industry.
Our work with the collections is primarily about disseminating information and ensuring this specialist resource develops and remains relevant to both University researchers and students, also the wider community, locally, nationally and globally.
This has included regularly updating the range of published works with new acquisitions and scoping the collections through the media including published articles and radio interviews. We also provide specialist reading lists and concentrate on cataloguing, indexing and digitising parts of the collection. In addition we have curated exhibitions, delivered public talks and participated in outreach events. More recently we have assisted with developing student projects the most recent is taking place now with Rowan.
We welcome all those interested in the many aspects of knitting - artists and designers, academic researchers and practical knitters, students and members of the public.
