As a newbie spinner, I have been enjoying trying different fibers. Some folks may think that wool is wool, but that just ain’t the case. Different breeds of sheep produce very different types of wool with many different qualities that suit many different uses. It’s a lot of fun to try spinning different kinds of wool. I’ve spun Peruvian Highland wool, a mohair-Shetland blend (mohair comes from goats), Corriedale, Blue-Faced Leicester, and Polwarth.

I shared with you in an earlier post this picture of the Polwarth fiber I purchased from Sunset Fibers on Etsy. The colorway is Blue Lagoon.

4 ounces of Polwarth in Blue Lagoon from Sunset Fibers

I spun the fiber,

then plied it from a plying ball. After skeining and washing and drying, I ended up with 100g/446 yards of lovely 2-ply yarn that is destined to become a pair of socks.

Blue Lagoon washed, dried, and skeined

Blue Lagoon close up

The fiber is combed top, which is a commercial wool preparation that is used for fiber that is going to be mill spun and it is well suited to handspinning. But when the fiber is dyed, it tends to mat a bit and can sometimes be a little difficult to draft. The hand-dyed fiber from Sunset Fibers is pin drafted after dyeing, and the pin drafting loosens up the fiber so that it drafts easily and doesn’t need any pre-drafting. Polwarth isn’t quite as soft a BFL, but it still feels very nice against the skin. It isn’t at all scratchy. There is definitely more Polwarth yarn in my future.