Wool Factory SALE!

We've been a little bit excited about this for the last week and today it was finally the big day! The Wool Factory in Hamburg, where we buy a lot of our yarn, started their sale! This happens twice a year and lasts for a week. We did not know what to expect since we had never visited one of their sales before.

As we were on the bus towards the factory we noticed a lot of women with big empty shopping bags and trolleys. We joked that they were all on their way to the factory to stock up on cheap wool! As it turned out, they all were! We figured it was going to be busy and laughed at the thought of us all fighting over the same yarn. It turned out to be very civilized and they even had coffee and cake!

The Yarn Factory is normally one (quite small) shop, but because of the big sale they opened up a part of the warehouse to the public. Five hundred square meters of yarn on sale! Amazing!
Shopping at the Factory normally works by picking out a yarn type and color. You than have them wind it on a cone in the desired amount of ply's and weight. This normally takes some time, and as it was sale week, this was not possible. Instead all of the sale-cones were already wound into a certain thickness and a set weight. This was a little disappointing as we were hoping to get our yarn in the thickness we like to work with. With the sale being this big, it was however understandable and they still had loads to choose from!

The yarn was still plied quite thin so that it's easy to go up a hook/needle size by buying a second one or even a third one (this means you just work from 2 or 3 cones at the same time). The suggested needle sizes were all written on each box of cones.

We sort of expected a chaos of yarn, but it was organized so very very efficiently! Neatly stacked boxes, all labeled with: price per 50 grams, type of yarn (or blend) and recommended needle sizes for 1, 2 or 3 cones. It made it very clear to find what you were looking for!

There was cotton, merino, pure wool, linen, alpaca, lamb, silk, cashmere, and all possible combinations of these. The color choices per type of yarn were not as vast as we hoped for. But if you were planning to work on projects that don't need more than one or two colors, it was easy picking! 

We managed to find some great bargains! Most yarns were priced down to 1 euro per 50 grams! We also got a great deal on some angora/merino blend for 1.20 euro per 50 grams.

Once we filled our trolley with all of the sale yarn we desired, we then had to go to the main store to pay. The main store is where all the normal prized yarn is being sold. As normal there was much more choice of color and the possibility of choosing ply and weight. As you can see, a lot more (vibrant) colors to choose from!

Want to see what we bought at the sale?

 
Not all yarns were labeled, as they were one of a kind so we ended up buying a couple of cones of which we have no clue what type of yarn it is. But does it really matter... :-)?
The cones above are about 1 kg each.

Another 800 grams of a very delicate green!

1 kg of lovely faded pink and 2 kg's (1 cone is not in the picture) of white (can you ever have enough?) Both pure wool!

 Matt chose 4 cones of a very soft and warm rose. It's pure merino!

We really went a little bit crazy buying all this yarn, but it made sense to take advantage of the ridiculously low prices!

Do you want to see what we bought in the expensive part of the store?

Six bright and gorgeous colors of fabulous yarn! It's 90% wool and 10% nylon! So very very soft and squishy! Wouldn't you like to get your hands on that?

Many of you have expressed an interest in the yarn cones we use and have mentioned how they're not available in your areas, so we have decided to buy this yarn for... YOU!!!

Over the next week we will explain how you could be the new owner of 1200 grams (200 grams per color) of this lovely yarn! We're very excited to be giving this away, and can't wait to share HOW very soon!

If you have any crazy yarn sale experiences, we would love to hear them!
Hope you are all having a lovely start of the week!

Matt & Dennis xxx

This post has moved!
You can read an updated and revised version on our new blog.

Click here to read this post in full at it's new home!