Wednesday 12 June 2013

Knit for Britain from Above

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Knit for Britain from Above 

Returning to another series of articles that previously appeared on Eclectic Ephemera you may recall the posts from 2011 and 2012 about the creation of the wonderful online history resource Britain From Above, which aims to catalogue and digitise over 90,000 aerial photographs of Britain taken between 1919 and 1953.  By the sounds of things the project is going well and all 95,000 images should be available at the end of the 4-year project, in 2014.  It really is a fascinating site and I urge you all to check it out if you haven't already.

Now I see that the Britain From Above people have this week started a jolly little wheeze that should appeal to the [many] knitters who I know make up my readership.  I have to say I didn't realise that it was World-Wide Knit In Public Week (I have to admit I sometimes think these things are thought up on the spur of the moment by people with a vested interest and too much time on their hands - I mean, National Sausage Week, really?!) but hurrah nonetheless.  Although I'm sure those of you who do knit do so in public any day of the year here's an opportunity to have a bit of fun and get a bit involved in the Britain From Above project.

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The team behind the site invite you to knit an aeroplane (they even helpfully provide a pattern if you don't have one of your own) and then, finding an historic aerial photo of an area near you, take a snap of your knitted aircraft in the same spot and post it on the website.  It sounds like a splendid way to get out and about and, as the site says, "showcase your knitting skills and find out more about the history of the place you live in".  Not to mention raising the profile of the Britain From Above project a notch or two in a wonderfully clever way.

So how about it, then?  Any knitting-wizards out there fancy knocking up a little flying machine and maybe taking a pic or two?  If anyone does have a go, do let me know on here!

5 comments:

  1. Such a cute idea! Sadly my knitting skills are appalling, but I am sure there will be a national "bake a biscuit in the shape of..." event eventually!

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  2. Oh wow, I must see if I can do this! Aeroplanes and knitting- tis right up my street. Right, I’m off to check it out and make sure I can participate (would make for a rather good RAF Friday no?!). Oh and our Jennie may be interested in this too?!
    Anyway, thanks for the heads up on this. :D

    Tups x

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  3. What a fab idea! I need to learn to knit properly and then I can take part in projects like this :-)

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  4. I'm afraid I'm no knitter. Anything I ever attempted resembled a badly made string vest by the end.

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  5. Thanks for posting this, Bruce, as its the first I heard about it. Cracking wheeze, eh? Will check out the link and take a look at the pattern.

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