The North Jersey Fiber Arts Festival is held at the Unitarian Society of Ridgewood's charming Arts and Crafts-era building at 113 Cottage Place in Ridgewood, on Fri. Oct. 4, 11 AM-8 PM and Sat. Oct. 5, 10 AM-5 PM.
Vendors will display colorful yarns of wool, alpaca, and silk; roving and other supplies for spinning, knitting, crocheting, felting, quilting and more; patterns for knitting, crochet and other fiber crafts; plus handmade hats, scarves, quilts, even handmade buttons. They will be happy to talk with Festival-goers about their crafts and answer questions.
Hands-on workshops at the Festival will teach a wide range of skills--everything from 3-D Felting and Beginners Drop Spinning to Knitting in the Round, Locker Hooked Rugs, Mini Art Quilt, and Nuno Felting, where participants will create a scarf or shawl using wool and silk fibers plus beads and other embellishments.
"We urge people who want to attend a workshop to register in advance online and reserve a space," said Elaine Petrowski, who chairs this year's Festival. To register, visit the Festival's website at northjerseyfiberartsfestival.wordpress.com.
"One of our highlights each year is choosing an outreach project that will benefit people in need through fiber arts," said Petrowski, a USR member and former Board president who co-founded the Festival. "Our partner for 2013 is Ricefield Collective, a collaboration between knitting teachers and designers from the U.S. and Europe and indigenous people from a region in the Philippines, the Ifugao region, that's famous for its rice terraces. The Collective's goal is to help the villagers earn enough extra income so they can stay on their ancestral land."
To participate in the Ricefield project, Festival visitors can receive instructions for knitting a combination wristband and coffee cozy that the Collective has designed as a thank you gift to its donors. The cozy passes along a message of respect for the environment: When you buy a cup of coffee, use this handmade, wearable, reusable cozy instead of a disposable coffee sleeve.
For more information email njfiberartsfest@gmail.com, visit northjerseyfiberartsfestival.wordpress.com, or call the Unitarian Society of Ridgewood at 201-444-6225.
