Well it’s that time again when we need to pull on our woolies and accept that winter has truly arrived. There was a time when wool was seen as comfortable but dull, well over the years designers such as Mark Fast and Sonia Rykiel have turned wool into a must have item and now wool is seriously sexy. A few weeks ago I was invited to attend the Wool Re-Fashioned exhibition in the picturesque town of Saltaire near Leeds, which is an innovative collaboration between the Yorkshire Fashion Archive and The Woolmark Company. The exhibition celebrates the impact that the Yorkshire manufacturing industry has had on Britain’s fashion industry. It showcase vintage pieces from fashion icons such as Ossie Clark, Comme Des Garcons and Issey Miyake as well as high street brands like Laura Ashley and Marks & Spencer. Their work has been remastered by students from the School of Design at the University of Leeds with the objective of showing how pieces from the past can be brought up to date while using modern techniques. A few weeks ago I took the train up to Leeds with Ashanti from AdornGirl, Kit from Style Slicker, Sian from FashionBite, and Lena Weber from Queens of Vintage.

After that we took a trip down to Guiseley to visit Abraham Moon & Sons, one of the UK’s top wool mills who make Lambswool, Shetland and Cashmere, to see the spinners and weavers in action. Abraham Moon & Sons is where the likes of Ralph Lauren, Dolce & Gabbana, Burberry, Lacoste, Paul Smith and Marks and Spencer go to for their wool clothing. We saw the process of how a wool garment is made from the dyeing of the fabric, blending, carding, spinning, weaving and finishing.

Wool Re-Fashioned runs till Sunday 11th November 2012 and is open from Monday to Friday 10am- 5:30pm and weekends from 10am- 6pm.

Check out the rest of my images from Wool-Re-Fashioned.