In da Club III: Handu

In Strickmich! Club 2015, we will broaden our horizons, and I am very thrilled to present the third yarn source: Ilona Korhonen from Finland and her exciting Handu yarns! Ilona (nicknamed “Ilu”) is a professional musician who has a PhD in music. Runosong, a traditional finnish singing style, is her genre, and she also teaches music and singing. As if that’s not impressive enough, she dyes beautiful yarns that make knitters’ eyes light up and hands tremble in anticipation!

Ilu started dyeing just for fun and showed the results on her blog. “Because indie-dyer scene did not exist in Finland at that time, my readers started to ask me to sell them. That´s how it started, but quite soon I launched a small webshop and a firm.” She offers an impressive range of colors, but her personal favorites are the very dark and autumn shades. In her shop you will find the workhorse basic sock yarns but also luxury blends. “I want to know that my yarns and dyeing process is sustainable – as ecological and ethical as possible”, Ilu says.

Colorful, fun sock yarns are her specialty – maybe because woolen socks are a bare necessity in a cold place like Finland? “Of course! But sock yarn is very popular too, and the reason is that socks are quite small and an easy knit.” Ilu herself knits all the time and also designs knitting patterns. With her two sweet daughters (5 and 9 years old) she spends a lot of time in her garden: “I do ambitious gardening during summer. I´m still just practising with vegetables, but I learn all the time!”

Next year, Ilu will not only be dyeing a very special, exclusive yarn for Strickmich! Club and keep her Online-Store running. She won a prestigious grant for composers by the Finnish government and will be creating beautiful pieces of music as well. I am very much looking forward to all her creations!