Jakobsstern [Göttingen, Germany]

My second yarn bombing for the beautiful city of Göttingen, Germany! Close to the church of St Jacob, downtown Göttingen, there is a sculpture of St Jacob with a pilgrim's staff for which I decided to knit something. I wanted to make something simple with modest colors, but also a nice pattern. My choice fell on a jacquard pattern of a star ("Stern" in German), in blue with a grey background.

I measured the circumference of the pilgrim's staff, because that was the spot I wanted my knitting to hang. After finnishing my knitting, it had the right width, but I felt the height was too big. My idea was not to cover half of the pilgrim's staff, but just to add a small detail. Therefore, I chose thinner yarn and began all over again. And indeed, my second try finally met my expectations. I'm sure I'll find another nice place where I can put the bigger one, too! ;-)
The bottom on the picture above shows both knittings: The one with the thicker wool on the left side and the second one which I chose to hang up on the right.
Also, I didn't put any label with my blogspot adress on this knitting because I didn't want to give the impression that I was advertising my own blog with this yarn bombing. Instead I want to show my appreciation to this nice place downtown and my respect for the sculpture as a beautiful piece of art.

It was already dark when I put it up, but I had the chance to come back the next day to make some more pictures in daylight. Unfortunately, the knitting is a little bit too wide so the top part is rolling up slightly. Maybe I can come back soon and tighten it up a little bit.

Since I put up my knittings and then have to leave them behind I seldom get to see the reaction of people when they find it. So always feel free to make comments here and give feedback about what you think! :-) Thanks!

Hanseflausch [Hamburg, Germany]

I've had fleecy ("flauschig" in German) yarn at home for already quite a while without using it, so I decided it's time to change that. I found a nice tiger pattern for two colors and thought that this would be the perfect opportunity to do some fleecy knitting. As the second color I chose a purple non-fluffy yarn. Unfortunately, the pattern was barely visible after I finished the knitting because of the long fluff, cutting the fluff shorter didn't help that much.

Since the colors also reminded me of water and waves I thought Hamburg, city of water and the Hanseatic League, would be a nice place for my knitting. I actually found the Speicherstadt which is an old warehouse district with both streets and water canals and beautiful old timber-pile founded buildings to be the perfect location for it. I put my knitting onto an old-fashioned street lamp, right next to a bridge over a canal and close to a street crossing. Unfortunately it was already late afternoon when I got there and the sun had already set which made it a bit hard for me to take good pictures.

Schneeflocken's first anniversary [Göttingen, Germany]

It's been exactly one year now since I hung up "Schneeflocken" in Göttingen! Now, a year later, I paid it a visit to see how it's doing.

Time and weather have left their marks on it. The white snowflakes have turned grey and become stiff, and so has the rest of the once so soft yarn. It has become a part of the tree, small bugs were crawling under it and whatever other animals left white and brown spots (including bird droppings, of course).

Also, somebody added a red plastic cord on top of it. I saw the same thing attached to another tree where it was holding a sheet of paper. On "Schneeflocken's" tree it must have served the same purpose but the paper was obviously gone.

As a birthday present, I sewed a new label on it. The writing on the old label has faded and was barely readable anymore (see picture on the right), therefore I took it off and replaced it. Now the one-year-old "Schneeflocken" is not only equipped with a brand new blog adress label but also with my blog's QR-code.

And surprisingly, exactly on "Schneeflocken's" (German for snowflakes) first birthday this season's first snow came down today! :-)

HAPPY WINTER AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

ocean pink [Miami Beach, FL]

Just for fun I started knitting with the pinkest wool I could find in my yarn collection and after it was finished I added a light blue frame to make it even more kitschy.. But then the question was, where to put such a gaudy knitting?

Miami Beach, FL actually turned out to be the perfect place, considering all those pastel-colored art déco buildings. Also, I had never tagged a palm tree before so I thought I shouldn't miss the chance. Due to the wind from the sea it wasn't that easy to sew it on but with help of one of my friends it finally worked out!

nola braids [New Orleans, LA]

It wasn't easy to find a good place for my latest knittng "nola braids" in New Orleans, LA, but finally I found a nice spot.

I left it at a public square where they do festivals and concerts, where people come together. Hopefully they will like this new "feature" there!

"nola braids" at home before being hung up.
By the way, this yarn bombing is also the first one equipped with a QR-code which brings you directly to this blog.

502 [Munich, Germany]

Yesterday I invaded the territory of the Rausfrauen: I left my first yarn bombing in Munich! Although my knitting might look slightly aggressive with its prickles and spines it's not meant that way at all. And if you touch it you will feel that it is as soft and snug as all my other knittings.

I left it close to a monument, next to a fountain in a nice recreation area on some kind of pole with the numbers "502" on it which inspired me to name my knitting "502" as well.
While I tied it up there, a woman came to me to ask for the way. She came back a minute later and asked me what I was doing. I answered that I was trying to make this place nicer (don't get me wrong, that place was actually already quite nice. But that is no reason to not leave a yarn bombing there!), and she seemed to think about my answer for a moment but then left with a smile on her face.

After I was done and was taking pictures an elderly man came to me. Apparently he hadn't seen me leaving the knitting there. He was wondering what the purpose of it might be and who it might have put there, and we talked a little bit about it (without me revealing myself because I didn't want to "influence" his reaction). He seemed to like it very much and left with a smile on his face as well.
As I already mentioned in my post about my previous yarn bombing "illusion" in Budapest, where I also had the chance to experience a very positive reaction to my knitting, such kind of feedback by people make it definitely worth all the effort! Thanks! :-)

KNIT ART FOUND in Budapest - (2)

A few minutes after leaving my own yarn bombing illusion in Budapest, I discovered another guerilla knitting near to the place where I left my one. The experiences I had made while and after hanging up my knitting had already been so positive, and finding one more knitting just a few minutes later made me even happier.
It was a much smaller one compared to those I had already found at a public square called Deák Téri.

It had slipped down onto a traffic sign so I felt free to push it up a little bit, so that it could be seen more easily.

illusion [Budapest, Hungary]

For my next knit graffiti I wanted to try something completely new: During my stay in the US I heard about a new way of knitting called illusion knitting. The basic idea in illusion knitting is that you see a pattern of stripes in two colors if you look at the knitted piece from above. But there is more to it. The hidden, „real“ pattern or picture of the knitting can only be discovered if you look at the knitting from the side in a certain angle.
Of course I had to try this knitting style immediately and it worked out quite well. As you can see on the picture below, I hid the word „illusion“.




My first plan was to wrap this knitting around a big tree or post horizontally, so that you can read the letters of the word while walking around the tree. Unfortunately, I found out that this didn't work as I had thought. The whole word was not readable at all. So I had to come up with another idea.

I decided to hang up the knitting vertically instead of horizontally, so that you can read the word while standing close under the knitting and looking up. Additionally I added a piece to it with an instruction what to do: COME CLOSE – LOOK UP.

I left the knitting in a nice place in the Jewish quarter in Budapest, next to a playground. I liked the lively and friendly streets there a lot, so I thought the people there might like my yarn bombing. Indeed, while tagging the knitting on at street lamp a bunch of kids surrounded us and spoke excitedly to us in Hungarian. Sadly, the only word which I could understand was „fire“ with which they were probably referring to the colors of the knitting.
After we were finished to fix the knitting at the lamp, we stayed some more minutes to take some pictures. A woman came to us, probably she noticed us taking pictures, and asked us ashtonished what this is and what the purpose of the knitting might be. For a second I thought about telling her, that I put it there, but then I decided not to. Instead, I just said that maybe this knitting is supposed to make the city a little bit more friendly and make people smile. And indeed, she admitted happily that it made her smile. This really made my day!
I showed her how she could read the hidden message and she was even more amazed. She called her small son and showed him the knitting and the hidden word and took pictures with her phone.
I found it so nice to witness a direct reaction to my yarn bombing and was even more happy to find out how positive the reaction was. Thank you for that so much! :-)

KNIT ART FOUND in Budapest

Amazing Budapest! Beautiful architecture, friendly people, and most of all - creative yarn bombers!

At a public place called Deák Téri we came across a photography exhibition trying to advertise the Hungarian army, but what suddenly caught my eye much more was a big and beautiful yarn bombing in between the pictures of war. What a perfect place for demonstrating love and warmth!
Small stripes dated this knit graffiti to 2012 and it looked indeed quite new.




My attention was drawn so much at this knitting that I first overlooked a second one right in the middle of the square. Following an interesting elderly lady with my eyes who inspected the knitting for quite a while and then walked to the second one (on the left side on the picture below), I discovered it. It had wonderful soft parts and lovely flowers.
After making pictures of that one, I turned around and discovered a next one right away. The most creative one as I have seen so far.
But there was even more to come! A fourth one surprised me as soon as I was finished with taking pictures of the others.
And as we left the square I came across another, smaller one. Not comparable with the other bombings at all, but still charming because of its beautiful simplicity.
What a happy welcome to this city! At that time I already felt very comfortable with planning to leave one of my own knittings illusion in this city as well.


A google search about these knittings brought information about the guerilla knitters responsible for this amazing work very quickly: A blog called vadjutka documents the process of tagging this place and states their "enthuisiasm to make our city lovelier and nicer". :-)
varrodoboz and urbanista, two other blogs, also write about this yarn bombing, but unfortunately only in Hungarian.

Today is..

.. INTERNATIONAL YARN BOMBING DAY!

Have a nice day being creative all around the world!
New discoveries and bombings will be posted here in the next few days as well :-)

See you soon!

KNIT ART FOUND in San Francisco

While exploring the city of San Francisco with my friend and looking for a nice place for dinner, we suddenly came across these big blue and red knit graffitis at a crossroad in Castro. We were pleasantly surprised, since we were talking about yarn bombing earlier that day and my friend hadn't seen any yet.

They were on the traffic lights on each side of a street, one with a darker shade of blue and the other one with a lighter one. The right hand picture on the left side is supposed to show both of them. Unfortunately you can hardly see the second one with the dark blue color on the traffic lights right across the street.

If you happen to know anything about the artist and creator of these knittings, don't hesitate to leave a comment or contact me (KaKuglaKnit@googlemail.com). I would be pleased to find out more about these tags!

stars & stripes [Santa Cruz, CA]

It's been a while since my last knit attack. But this time I conquered a new continent: North America, to be more precise. I found this beautifully grown evergreen near the Santa Cruz farmers' market and decided to tag it with "stars & stripes".

I'm convinced it'll feel comfortable there! In my experience, Santa Cruz people as super friendly, open-minded and laid-back, they will take good care of my knitting for sure!

"Stars & stripes" before it went out into the the California Sun.