I first started sketching this project after a long rainy afternoon at a village fête where a Morris troupe warmed up under canvas canopies. The dancers’ faces—lined, laughing, intense—stayed with me, as did the tiny knitted fox I’d bought from a stall, complete with a stitched scarf that made it look like it had just arrived from a brisk country lane. I realised then that people carry their stories in small, tangible ways: a favourite hat, a well-worn program from a festival’s first year, or a toy knitted by a grandmother. The Community Archive Project grew from that feeling: collecting oral histories through knitted character portraits that translate memory into craft, and craft back into memory.

Why knitted character portraits?

Knitted characters are more than cute objects. They’re mnemonic devices that invite storytelling. A tiny jumper can prompt an elder to recall a winter spent teaching marching steps to a youth band; a finger puppet can evoke a childhood spent in the front row of a folk concert. Creating a knitted portrait—small, portable, and tactile—lets us open doors that formal interviews sometimes can’t.

I wanted an archive that felt accessible and playful, one that honoured oral histories without making them solemn museum pieces. Knitted portraits allow participants to co-create: they pick colours, suggest little props, or recount the scent of the wool used in a childhood jumper. These choices become documentary evidence of memory as much as any audio file.

How the project works: a step-by-step approach

Below is the workflow I’ve been refining at festivals, maker markets, and community halls. It’s flexible—designed to be portable enough for festival life, but rigorous enough to build a usable archive.

  • Recruitment and outreach: I work with festival organisers, community centres, and local sports clubs to invite participants. Word-of-mouth at the tea tent or on a noticeboard often brings the most surprising contributors.
  • Consent and context: Before any recording or knitting begins, I explain the project, how the stories will be used, and obtain written consent. I have a simple form that outlines rights, storage, and potential public uses.
  • Interview and listening session: I use open questions—“Tell me about a festival you can’t forget,” “Who taught you a special skill?”—and I record these sessions with a Zoom H4n (it’s rugged and festival-proof). I aim for 20–40 minute conversations: long enough to get depth, short enough for festival schedules.
  • Choosing a knitted avatar: After listening, participants select or co-design a small knitted character. Choices can be literal (a shepherd’s sheep) or symbolic (a bright kite to represent childhood summers).
  • Knitting or commissioning the portrait: Depending on time, I either knit a quick portrait on the spot (a basic 4–6 inch figure) or commission a maker from our network to create a more detailed piece for the archive.
  • Documentation and tagging: Every knitted character is photographed with the speaker, and the audio file is tagged with metadata—name (or pseudonym), date, location, and keywords like “dance,” “training,” or “community sport.”
  • Storage and access: Audio files, transcripts, and photographs are stored in a community-accessible archive (more on that below) with clear access levels and citation guidelines.

    • Practical knitting tips for portrait-making

    When you’re producing knitted portraits in a pop-up situation, speed and recognisability matter. Here are a few techniques I use:

  • Use DK or aran yarn and size 3.5–4.5 mm needles for fast, sturdy fabric.
  • Keep patterns modular: a cylinder body, a seeded-stitch hat, and stitched facial features. This lets you customise quickly.
  • Work in bright, high-contrast colours for festival lighting—muted greys can read as “bland” in photos.
  • Use safety eyes or embroidered features depending on the archive’s audience (safety eyes are quick but less personal than embroidered expressions).
  • Keep an “accessories box”: tiny scarves, miniature garlands, or felt props (a fiddle, a scarf, a tiny football) that immediately anchor the story’s context.

    • Interview prompts that evoke rich memories

    People wonder how to get beyond surface anecdotes. I find that concrete prompts, sensory cues, and gentle follow-ups help stories bloom:

  • “What sounds or songs do you associate with this place?”
  • “Describe the clothes or knitted pieces you remember most from your childhood.”
  • “Tell me about a proud moment at a festival—or on the playing field—that still makes you smile.”
  • “Who taught you that skill? What did their hands look like?”
  • “If your life were a little character, what would they wear?”

    • These questions often link craft, folk performance, and even sport: a woman may recall knitting a snug cap for her son before his first rugby match; a drummer might remember a festival afterparty where someone mended a sock and changed the mood of the whole crew. Sport’s physicality—practice, ritual, uniform—frequently appears in these recollections, especially in communities where local matches sit alongside fetes on the social calendar.

    Ethics, storage and making the archive useful

    Creating an oral archive carries responsibility. I follow a few principles:

  • Transparent consent: People must know how their stories will be used and who can access them. I offer options: public display, restricted archive, or anonymised excerpts.
  • Community control: The archive is co-governed where possible. Local groups help decide which pieces show online and which remain physical-only.
  • Durable storage: I use a combination of cloud backup (I’ve found services like Backblaze reliable) and an institutional partner’s servers for long-term preservation.
  • Accessible formats: Transcripts, short audio clips, and high-quality photos make the archive useful to researchers, teachers, and family members.

    • Sharing the work: exhibitions, festival stalls and sports halls

    Knitted character portraits are wonderfully portable for sharing. I’ve mounted mini-exhibitions in festival marquees, displayed a line of portraits in a village sports pavilion, and held listening stations where visitors press a button and hear a story while holding the knitted character that inspired it.

    Interactive formats work best: pair a portrait with a QR code linking to the audio clip and a small printed card with context. At a recent folk festival, we staged a “telling tent” where attendees could sit, listen, and then knit a badge to take home—another small act of participation that keeps the archive living.

    Collaborations I’ve seen work

  • Local sports clubs: partnering with a club to document pre-match rituals or the history of a team kit creates material that matters to a distinct community.
  • Festival programming: select a slot in the festival schedule for live knitting and storytelling—these sessions draw a crowd and gather new voices.
  • Makers’ networks: commission local knitters for bespoke portraits; this supports makers while keeping the archive rooted in local craft practices.

    • Every portrait we add becomes a node in a larger network: of makers, players, musicians, and listeners. The knitted character is a bridge between remembrance and present-making, a small, soft archive that invites hands, voices, and the occasional cup of tea.