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Denise Stanton of Birmingham works on knitting, card and band wearing. She also has a display of period fiber pieces that might be useful or enjoyable to someone today.

“I’ve been working with fiber since I was a child. Who in the 70’s didn’t do macrame?” Stanton said.  I started to seriously knit about 20 years ago always with an eye for the complicated. I’ve made huge lace

shawls (one with over 400,000 stitches) but I’ve never made a washcloth so it’s fair to say that I like complicated pieces. “

Stanton said she thinks that the fiber arts are important for several reasons.

“Fiber arts give us a link to the past and also a greater understanding of how our clothing is made,” she said. “Knitting uses math and, because it is a practical application of math,  it can help it ‘click’ for some people who were having trouble before. Also it uses spatial awareness to ‘see’ how the pattern comes together.

“As for enjoyable, I am endlessly fascinated at how I can make such a variety of things using what amounts to two sticks and some string. How could that not be enjoyable?”