Located 28 nautical miles from Galway off the west coast of Ireland, Inis Meáin (pronounced IN-ish MAAN) is not a place you'd stumble upon by chance, nor is it where you'd find a state-of-the-art factory producing one of the most popular and oft-copied sweaters on the market.
Founder Tarrach de Blacombe didn't come to make crewnecks: he studied Irish and Celtic at Trinity College, Dublin, and came to the area in the late 1960s to improve his language skills, then married local Aine Ní Chonhaill. In 1976, the couple founded a knitting co-operative to make ends meet in a tough economic climate.
“Ireland was about 50 years behind the rest of the world, and the island was about 50 years behind Ireland,” says de Blacombe's son Ruairi, who serves as the company's managing director. The company had a large pool of skilled workers making Aran sweaters, named after the three islands in Galway Bay. Once primarily a utilitarian garment, the distinctive ivory-colored cable knit was made from undyed wool and tightly woven to protect fishermen from the elements. At the time, tourist shops in Cork and Dublin were crammed with cheap goods, crowding out the real thing. Innis Maene reclaimed the island's traditions, ensuring a generation of artisans didn't have to leave their homes to find work.
Among the company's most striking designs is a rendition of the classic Aran pattern, enhancing the pattern's twisted rope motif with interwoven, colorful, two-tone yarn. Copycats abounded, so the de Blacombes applied for a patent, which was granted in 1999, but this did not prevent a knock-off from appearing at Pitti Uomo, Italy's biennial men's fashion trade fair, in 2004. It wasn't long before the patented Aran pattern was placed on permanent display at the National Museum of Ireland.
While the company has never shied away from using technology to expand its capabilities, it has always stuck to small-batch production. “We're ridiculously small,” Ruairi says. “We're ridiculously small.” Because of tight supply and affordable prices (their most expensive design, a cashmere zip-up, costs about $975), these pieces are notorious for selling out quickly. So if you see an Inis Meáin knit you like, like the patent Aran featured here and on the next page, snap it up fast.
1. Landscape inspiration
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
The company has long drawn inspiration from nature, with particularly striking sunrises sometimes inspiring the five- or six-color threads that form the theme of a collection: “We're on an island surrounded by blue sea, blue skies and grey limestone,” says Ruairi, hence the common plum, orange and red versions.
2. Combine the old and the new
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
Referencing archival images of traditional garments and weaving techniques is an important part of the design process. Yet the company employs modern technology to ensure product consistency and speed up production. While hand knitting varies subtly from knitter to knitter, machines standardize tension, resulting in a much more predictable outcome.
3. Changing the pattern
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
Many of the latest commercial knitting systems come preloaded with patterns, and many other companies are happy to use them. “We try to make the machines work in our own way,” says Marie-Thérèse de Blacam, Ruairi's wife and the company's marketing director. Inis Mearn programs the machines according to its own designs, which are based on historical precedents.
4. Color Selection
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
The wool for this sweater is imported from Italy, where spinners run the desired color palette through a machine. The patented Aran requires six cones of wool, so the machine setup alone takes an hour.
5. Two-tone effect
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
Aran knitting patterns are complex and require multiple machines to achieve the characteristic two-tone effect across the sweater front, back, sleeves and trim.
6. Double Effort
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
A circular linking machine holds the sweater sections together, and workers align the pieces stitch by stitch to create neat lines. “It takes a lot of manual skill to get the cables to line up perfectly,” says Marie-Thérèse.
7. Compliance Requirements
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
The sweaters are placed on lighted forms, allowing workers to easily identify and repair holes, fraying and other anomalies.
8. Cleaning and felting
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
Because the company knits with unwashed yarn, the finished garments are sent through highly specialized washing machines (with purified water) before drying, allowing for the natural felting process to condense the fibers. The transition from a loose to a tight stitch allows the garments to shrink to half their original size when they are removed from the dryer, helping them to maintain their shape.
9. Edge Smoothing
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
The sweaters are hand steamed to smooth and flatten hems and seams, and the surface is steamed to give them a finished look before the hand sewn brand label is applied.
10. Final Measurement
Image credit: Jamie Ferguson
Fascinatingly, even though specific sizes are programmed in from the start and the washing process is a sophisticated science, the team still rely on old-fashioned tape to check that each sweater is the right size.
author
Naomi Rougeau
Naomi Rougeau is a writer, editor, and creative consultant who has been based in New York for over a decade but continues to wear cowboy boots in her native Texas. These days…
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