This Northumberland Knitter Has Reimagined Ganseys for Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade
The historic gansey has been reimagined for Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade to raise money to help support their vital work on our coast
Jo is an internationally-recognised knitwear designer and product developer and she’s the founder of Jo Storie Knit Design Consultancy, The Knit Expert, working with brands and makers to create knitwear collections. Through her design consultancy, Jo has launched A BareFaced Collaboration, for projects rooted in cultural storytelling and meaningful design. Her first collaboration is with the Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade: a recreation of an 1864 gansey once worn by the Brigade’s founding members.
‘Around four or five years ago they announced that they wanted local industries to get involved to help them raise funds for the charity. Everything they do is by charitable donations so they put out a call and makers in the area were promoting Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade,’ says Jo. ‘I was probably the only knitter there at the time but decided that I was going to help them recreate their original knitwear and took that idea and ran with it, just to see if it could be done. It was an experiment really because developing anything costs money but I absorbed the cost myself in the hope that, in the end, it was going to become something of value, which it has. The Brigade’s volunteers were the first to purchase one which was fantastic, and now buyers tend to be those who have a link to the area and want to be a part of it.’
Each gansey is made in England from 100 percent British wool, and every garment has been hand-numbered and logged in a register held in the historic Watch House Museum. They’ve been designed in Northumberland and knitted in Cumbria where wool is spun on a Yorkshire Mill, and they’ve been embroidered in Whitley Bay.
‘It’s a reproduction, or a replica, of a gansey they have in their museum, which is incredible if you get a chance to go there and see it,’ says Jo. ‘Everything about it is 100 percent British, which we’re very proud about. Currently, the sweater comes with the embroidery for the Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade on it but we’re also selling it without because we realise some people don’t want to be mistaken for an actual volunteer! Every sweater comes with a little leather identifier that has a number and that number is logged in he museum archives to say that that sweater belongs to a particular person – sort of harking back to when the number of the volunteer would be sewn onto their sweater so that in the event of an accident they could be identified.’
Every gansey is different, and the stitch work is unique. ‘We did some swatches and the factory had to replicate the stitches,’ Jo explains. ‘There’s what’s called a moss stitch at the top of the sweater and it’s got a ripple stitch underneath and that distinguishes it and ties it to a particular part of the world. Once the swatches were approved, I created a technical specification which is a sheet with all the measurements on it, and a size grade. There are some females on the team so we made sure it worked for women as well. It became a bit of a unisex product. It’s such a lovely thing to do, to bring it back to life.
‘We did make some technical changes to it. These garments would’ve been handmade with knitting needles and we’ve put it on highly digital knitting machines so already there was a compromise, but everything else was designed to mimic the original. The neckline is a bit more wearable but wool is great because it’s temperature regulating, flame retardant and it’s like a super fibre. Using 100 percent wool wasn’t a difficult decision.
‘It just felt like a nice project to do – something that’s meaningful. It felt like knitwear with a purpose and not just for fashion. Hopefully, whoever buys one will have it for a very long time, and treasure it. The identifier keeps them relevant, but we also made some gift boxes as well so that people can store them as a keepsake.’
All the sweaters are numbered, and every volunteer now wears one with pride but they’re not the only local heroes with one. ‘We kept number 17 aside for Sam [Fender] because of his single,’ says Jo. ‘We gifted it to him, and we got a cheeky little selfie of him in it which was great!’
All profits go directly to the Brigade. ‘I just hope it helps put some well-needed funds into the Brigade and help them ease up on fundraising so they can concentrate on doing what they do, which is keeping the shores safe,’ admits Jo. ‘Having to think about how they fund themselves must be hard, especially as volunteers; none of them are being paid to do this but the job they’re doing is so vital. The goal is to increase the momentum, to increase the sales volume a little bit which means more profit for them. Maybe it will encourage people to come and visit the museum too, which is an incredible place. It just highlights what important work they do.’
The Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade was founded in 1864 following the loss of 32 individuals from the stricken ships of the S.S. Stanley and the schooner Friendship on 24th November at the Black Middens Rocks at Tynemouth. One of just three remaining active Volunteer Life Brigades in the UK, it provides a 24-hour multi-disciplinary shore-based coastal rescue service, and the team of 20 volunteers respond to an average of 120 calls a year, but are of course usually busiest in summer.
