Kaffe Fasset visits South Africa

Kaffe Fassett will visit South Africa again in June-July this year. I first came across his work in his book Glorious Knitting and I was immediately hooked by the wonderful colours and designs.

With the new book Glorious Needlepoint recently out and a visit to London coming up I wrote (snail mail back then!) to Kaffe's publisher and asked if he'd be giving any lectures at the time of my visit. Yes, came the reply, at the Albert Hall in Nottingham.

Albert Hall, Nottingham

To book my ticket, we had to phone the organizer in Nottingham. When she heard we were phoning via an international call from Cape Town South Africa there was just a long stunned silence. Later when I collected my ticket from her - at this lovely knitting shop - she told me that she was so surprised by the call she had to sit down.

My biggest surprise was when in a packed hall Kaffe opened by welcoming everyone and then welcomed the 'lady who had travelled all the way from Cape Town'. Not just that, he then asked me to stand up and thanked me for coming! Overseas travel for South Africans was fairly unusual back in 1989.

Albert Hall interior

While my new stitching friend Janice Jowett very kindly kept my seat in the third row from the front, I dashed to the back of the hall to capture the moment. The gentle classical guitar music was hair-raisingly beautiful. And then, after checking his watch Kaffe, on the left in the photo above, began by sharing the story of his introduction to knitting with us.

The lecture was inspiring and there were long queues up on the stage afterwards for the book signing. My accent must have stood out because when I thanked Kaffe for signing my book, he stopped, looked up and we had a few words. I wanted to know if he had any plans to visit South Africa. But at that time he said no, not yet but maybe one day.

Kaffe Fasset

Since then Kaffe has visited South Africa a number of times and on one occasion my daughter and I were lucky enough to see some of his marvellous quilts at a lecture here in Cape Town.

Together with Brandon Mably, Kaffe Fasset will be present both knitting and patchwork workshops and lectures at the South African National Quilt Festival in Durban. He has scheduled visits to Johannesburg and Pretoria too and you will find more about the tour in the calendar of events on his website here. How I would love to be going to Durban in July! A quilt festival and the opportunity to hear Kaffe speak and see some of his work are not to be missed.

Till next time, happy stitching!