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So, you are out yarn shopping and you've found a lovely new-to-you skein of goodness. You spot the little green t-shirt symbol that tells you that is GOT's certified. We all know it means something good, right? But what does it actually mean? And what does it take for yarn to be GOT's certified?

Let’s cut to the chase right away: Yarn is expensive. Traceable, ethically and sustainably produced yarn even more so. It’s not rare that a 50g skein of sustainable yarn comes in at EUR 15 or more. Which is, when you consider the factors that contribute to that number - fair compensation for everyone involved in the yarn production process, the cost of setting up sustainable, maybe even certified production processes, as well as offsetting your CO2 emissions, for example - often a fair price!

Sadly, though, it’s one that quite a lot of us cannot afford. So how do we solve the conundrum of wanting to knit with sustainable yarns, and yet not having the budget for them?

Last week, we were exploring one of our favourite fibres; Wool. We looked at its characteristics, how they differ fleece to fleece, and how that influences the outcome of our yarn. This week, we are going one step further by looking at breed-specific yarns.

George Floyd. Ahmaud Arbery. Breonna Taylor. Three names too many. Three names in a long list. Black Lives Matter. Period. Structural racism is just that - structural. It doesn't go away just because you, with your own lived experience, can't see it. It doesn't go away because you're not affected. It doesn't go away. It doesn't.

Last week, we took a look at superwash yarns and explored why they're not sustainable. TL;DR of that article was that the most common superwash process - the Chlorine-Hercosett process - uses highly toxic chemicals, additional resources compared to non-superwash production processes, and results in a yarn that is not biodegradable and sheds microplastic particles when washed.