Arts / Wool week highlights ‘The Shetland Ways’ at opening ceremony
MORE than 500 people gathered at the Clickimin last night (Sunday) to celebrate the opening of Shetland Wool Week 2025, some having travelled thousands of miles to be there.
The opening ceremony was livestreamed on YouTube for the first time since 2016, offering wool enthusiasts all over the world the chance to be part of it.
Shetland Amenity Trust chief executive Hazel Sutherland opened the event, giving a special welcome to anyone joining virtually.
She added: “The magic of Shetland wool week is how the community comes together to share our heritage with the visitors. To those of you returning, welcome back, and to our first timers we are delighted that you’ve joined us and hope you come to love our peerie woolie festival.”
This year’s patrons are the Shetland Guild of Spinners, Knitters, Weavers and Dyers, and Sutherland joked that the success of last year’s patrons, the Doull family, “went to our heads so this year we have 80 patrons.”
Claire White hosted the event and talked about this year’s theme ‘The Shetland Ways’, saying: “It’s a product of generations of expertise, evolution and the interplay of landscape, and community”.
She explained a series of films highlighting the Shetland Ways will be released so people can participate in the conversation from far away. The films showcase some of the best of Shetland wool heritage, visiting several crofts and homes across the isles.
Curator of Wool Week, Donna Smith, elaborated on the thinking behind the theme, explaining the guild came up with the idea.
She said: “In Shetland we have different ways of doing things that are quite unique. In the past lots of things were never written down like patterns, skills and techniques so it’s really important that we pass this on from our local experts.”
“When we are deciding what classes and events to put on the traditional Shetland Ways is always important, but this year we wanted to focus on that. We’ve got classes on how to use a knitting belt, how to steek, so lots of things that are really specific to Shetland.”
Hundreds of events will run across Shetland in the coming week, from sock making, to lace edging and everything in between.
A hub will be open all week at Shetland Museum and Archives where members of the guild will be available to teach their techniques and skills. Visitors can stop by for a coffee, knit, or exchange tickets for events if they need to.
Elizabeth Williamson, Rachel Hunter, and Jenny Atkinson represented the Shetland Guild as this year’s patrons. Hunter is responsible for this year’s hat design, the Aal Ower Toorie.
Hunter said: “It was all very intense for the first couple of months of the year [designing the hat] and then I got back to my day job. But I was wandering around the town the other week and started to see lots of my hats popping around and realised this is really happening.”
She added that it was wonderful to see all the different variations of the hat in the audience.
It was a surprise for all the other members of the guild when it was announced at a special event in April that they were the patrons for this year’s Wool Week.
Williamson said: “It was only announced in April. With 80 members in the guild we had to pick who to tell. So, we decided not to tell anybody.”
She said that Shetland was a “difficult place to keep secrets”, adding: “We didn’t tell any untruths but we did divert a lot of conversations. My daughter considered sending me to a hearing specialist as I suddenly developed selective deafness.”
The second half of the night involved a ‘Who Wants to Be a Woollionaire’ quiz hosted by Jacqui Birnie, with the option to ask the audience.
Attendees were also treated to a visit from the 2025 Junior Jarl Squad, alongside a film offering a glimpse into the festival.
In the audience, Catherine McGlead, Tanya Thorson and 11-year-old Clancy Oldroyd were among the visitors who have travelled across the world to be here, coming from Australia.
McGlead said she’d been wanting to come for a decade, adding: “Tanya and I actually live 20 minutes away from each other, but we didn’t know we were both coming until I saw Tanya speaking on the forum.”
They said they were looking forward to immersing themselves in the culture across the week.
Oldroyd said he had “never even heard of Shetland” until last year, but was looking forward to getting involved in the workshops.
Music was provided by Catriona MacDonald and Inge Thomson, and Freda Leask and David Boyter.
Sutherland closed the night by thanking their sponsors, and everyone involved in putting the event together. She added: “To you who come here to support the event and those listening throughout the world thank you so much for supporting our peerie festival and we hope you have a fantastic week.”
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