A local businesswoman started free crochet classes and almost gave up a few times, but now, a year later, she is seeing the fruit of her perseverance.
Carleen Luyt, of Portland, is the owner of Carlie’s Darlings, a crochet product business that caters to tourists and international clients. A few years ago she got the idea to do crochet classes for the unemployed.
The first attempt didn’t gain momentum but last year Luyt tried again — and this time she was able to get two classes going at Lentegeur Library on Thursday mornings and at Westridge Library on Saturday mornings.
Getting hooked
“The classes are free, so I tell people to bring some yarn and a crochet hook, but if they do get stuck in sourcing those materials, they can arrange with me and I can get them. I keep some hooks and a yarn stash at home for those that need it,” Luyt said.
The idea was to train people to start their own crochet businesses in a sustainable way by making use of waste materials and recycling yarn and thrifted items, but the classes soon took on their own dimensions and became much more.
For Vivienne Fortune of Woodlands, the classes became a place of employment and solace.
“I have major depressive disorder and bipolar,” she said. “And this just gets me up.”
When the depression hits, Fortune said, she picks up a hook.
“I know I can get to that, so it gets me up. And when I’m up, then I say, ‘Oh yeah, by the way, I must do the washing. Oh, by the way, I didn’t clean the room for a long time. Okay, let me focus on one task at a time.”
‘A crochet cult’
But crochet doesn’t only get her up and going, Fortune said, it also helps her avoid conflict.
“It calms me down,” she said. “When my family irritates me, I just grab the hook before I chop that person.”
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Luyt laughs, adding that the club has a T-shirt that says: “I crochet so that I don’t choke people.”
For others, the classes became a place to socialise and gain confidence. Luyt said it gratifies her to watch how some women are shy and withdrawn when they join the classes but slowly become more open and confident as they interact with the other participants and become more proficient with a hook and yarn.
“We’ve become like a sisterhood,” Fortune said.
Luyt added: “This is not just a crochet class. It’s become like a movement.”
“Don’t call it a movement,” fellow classmate Audrey Gradwell piped up. “That makes it sound like a cult.”
“It’s a crochet cult,” Luyt said laughing. “We’re a group of women empowering and supporting each other.”
Sustainable employement
The initial goal of creating employment is still the class’s core, Luyt said, adding that many women leave and start their own business when they become proficient. Others, however, come back again.
“The whole reason for the classes is so that we can empower ladies to be able to start their own little businesses, but I always say in the introduction, if you get stuck and you can’t make it in that market, you can always come to me and join my production team because I’ve always got dolls that need to be made.
“Vivienne is a recipient of that and Audrey made coasters at one stage and I’ve paid them for it and now the two of them have started to assemble with me when there’s a bottleneck. That is where my business gives them that platform to generate income.”
The final part of the short course is all about sustainability. Luyt teaches the crocheters how to make products out of recycled materials, how to reuse off-cuts and how to make plarn — plastic yarn.
“We had a class with CDs. We said: ‘let’s see how we can recycle CDs.’ ”
Participants made bags and pictures frames from the CDs and one woman went a step further and made earrings out of plastic bottles.
“We also had some fabric that I brought to class and we saw how we could make T-shirt yarn.
Sustainability is one of the important things that Carlie’s Darlings practices, and we bring that out in the class as well.”
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