PIGMENT & PLY

Inspired by a background in fashion and a love of art, Jessica Sharpe uses her sketchbooks to develop palettes for her hand-dyed yarns, as she tells

“THERE IS something magical about being able to make something with just some yarn, needles and my hands,” says Jessica Sharpe, the woman behind the Pigment & Ply artisan yarn brand. “I really love the process of knitting each stitch and watching the fabric grow and change.” Jessica’s enjoyment of the craft began at a young age, when her mother taught her how to knit - but little did she know that this hobby would become her living.

It was during her art foundation course, which she started at the age of 18, that Jessica’s hobby became a passion, attending a local knitting club each week with her mum. Later, she went on to study for a fashion degree at Kingston University, specialising in knitwear design. “I was drawn to the industrial hand-powered knitting machines, which enabled me to create my own fabric in any colour combination I wanted,” she explains.

Captivated by colour

Jessica soon decided to try dyeing yarns herself, despite her university not having the facilities to do so. “I have always been one for just giving something a go, so I bought a few dyes and some old pans from a charity shop, and I began!” she says.

Jessica’s final degree collection included her frugally self-dyed yarns and lace.

“Lots of companies have minimum order quantities of 10kg per colour, especially with yarn suitable for using on knitting machines, so dyeing my own seemed like the best option!” she recalls. “I would buy the colours I could from a UK-based wool merchant, which bought old stock from design houses and sold it on at a discounted rate.”

After graduation, as well as working as a knitwear technician at two universities in London, Jessica started her own small accessories business. But when the Covid-19 pandemic hit the UK in March 2020, she was furloughed from her day job. This gave her the time to hand-dye more yarn and to launch her own business, Pigment & Ply. It has, she says, been a whirlwind ever since, juggling her burgeoning business with her return to work as a knitwear technician.

“I don’t quite know how I managed to keep on top of everything, but I have really been concentrating nd on time management and trying not to take on too much at work and with Pigment & Ply!” Jessica says. Amidst all this hard work have been many highlights. “My favourite thing about launching Pigment & Ply has definitely been the amazing community that I have found, and I love seeing people’s finished items made with my yarn!” Jessica plans to introduce her yarns to more people in the future by exhibiting at yarn shows.

Artistic influences

Pigment & Ply’s online shop sells Jessica’s colourways, dyed on various yarn bases and weights. Each month, she introduces a speciality colourway for her ‘Muse to Mood’ club, where the hues are inspired by her own sketchbooks, a classic painting, and “a little bit of reverie”.

Jessica says: “I really enjoy the process of creating a colourway. I like to study my reference source and consider what combination of colours within the source make it new and unique.” Her most popular colourways with customers are those inspired by famous paintings, such as ‘Autumn Leaves’, ‘The Lady of Shallot’, and ‘Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose’.

At the time of writing, Jessica was working on a collection based on paintings by the landscape artist John Constable. “My main colourways are inspired by works of art; some famous paintings, and some that are less known, which I hope that I get to introduce you to,” she says.

Jessica is donating a portion of each sale to Macmillan Cancer Research.

On top of her busy schedule, Jessica test-knits for a range of knitwear designers including Leila Raven and Wool & Pine. She also loves Jeanette Sloan’s patterns: “Not only is Jeanette an incredibly talented designer, but she is one of the nicest people I’ve ever met!” Jessica says.

Going forward, as her degree was in knitwear design, Jessica would like to release her own knitting patterns. Yet the mainstay of her business remains hand-dyed yarn. “All I want to do is create beautiful yarn for people to enjoy,” she says. Jessica particularly hopes that people like her rich, intricate colourways, and that “when a colourway is based on a painting, people can instantly see that the mood and colours are echoed from the painting onto the yarn.”