I firmly believe that hand-dyed yarns need to have soul, and if you’re looking for yarn crammed full of personality and joy, the one-of-a-kind skeins created by THE #OOAKSkeinQueen Rachel Barrett are truly the way to go. Rachel’s incredible colour combinations and unique patterns speak to the creativity and passion she pours into each hank, and she’s truly someone to follow if you need your yarn to be truly, well, flyy.

As well as being fortunate enough to call Rachel a dear friend of mine, I’ve been a huge fan of her brand Flyy Dyed for many years now, ever since we unexpectedly bonded over a mutual love of pineapples (not only as a food but because of how cool they look), and the rest is history! Aside from her gorgeous yarn, I fell in love with Rachel’s warmth and dedication to her art – I adore her themed yarn sets with matching postcards, bags, stitch markers and other cool accessories: we love a cohesive identity at Emmaknitty – as well as her no-nonsense, honest and authentic approach to making in general. Rachel’s journey as an indie dyer is not only inspiring but also reflective of her resilience and commitment to her craft, and I’m so excited to be interviewing the lady herself today.

In this interview, we’ll be delving into her beginnings as an indie dyer, the fact that she’s the only Black Woman Indie Dyer in Wolverhampton, her ever-developing FLYY Dyed Studio (and how her Dad kindly shifted his tools about to accomodate her growing small business), and the vibrant community she has nurtured around her work. We’ll explore her creative process, where she gets her inspiration from and how she hopes the creative world will grow and become more colourful and inclusive in future in future, in all senses.

Rachel, it’s so amazing to be interviewing you today. What first drew you to dyeing yarn and yarn crafts in general? Was there anyone in your family or local community that got you into it, or was it something you discovered yourself?

I was my Grandma’s favourite and spent most weekends and almost all my school holidays at her house. My Grandma was (and is) my everything – she cooked and baked for at least three family weddings that I can remember – and, most importantly for me, Grandma sewed. She sewed lingerie, whole outfits, gowns, bridesmaid dresses… I used to sit with her in the middle room where she sewed on her Singer machine, playing with elastic and lace and scrap fabric.

There was always a drawer (or two) filled with ‘stuff’ and, at some point, I happened upon a pair of knitting needles. Grandma probably hadn’t knitted for going on 30 years by this point, but she happily taught me to knit and purl (she was much better at the latter). To be honest, I doubt I made anything of note (or length), and my first foray into yarn crafts maybe lasted about a week or so; the needles were shoved back into the drawer forever and (seemingly) that was it.

Oh – one of my Aunties is a knitter… I refuse to use the past tense here, as I’m actively encouraging her pursuit of getting back into it! When I was younger, she knitted the cutest jumpers – I distinctly remember bright colours and mohair… I think it’s fair to say that I’ve always been a lover of colour and texture!

Obviously, yarn dyeing is a thing, but I was a whole adult paying tax when I realised that yarn dyeing is a THING! Until the lost years of the pandemic, dyeing yarn wasn’t a hobby that I had ever considered pursuing, but I’m glad I did and here I am.

I cannot be or do anything without being unashamedly, unapologetically, and authentically me – anything else just isn’t cutting it.

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Do you remember the exact moment you first became curious about dyeing yarn, and before you started dyeing professionally, what did your early experiments look like? Be honest – how many times did you accidentally create a less-than-pretty colourway before realising you actually knew what you were doing?

Picture the scene; Wolverhampton, October 2019, and my American Bestie sent me three skeins of cotton yarn that she’d picked up from Michael’s or Joann’s. My interest was piqued, so I bought myself a Procion dye kit for plant fibres – luckily, I’d done enough basic research to know that acid dyes won’t work with cotton, but at this point don’t ask me about a speckle, low or high immersion – nothing.

You know those plastic containers that salads are sold in at the supermarket? That’s what the skeins were dyed in. They didn’t come out too badly for a first attempt, and I enjoyed it that much that within a month I’d put together my very first dyeing arsenal – two shallow roasting pans, a packet of zip ties, a pair of kitchen tongs, rubber gloves, measuring spoons, cling film, and a turkey baster!

The first thing I dyed after those cotton skeins were three project bags. I bought them from a big-box craft store (Hobbycraft) and dip-dyed each of them in a single colour for an ombre effect.

I got myself a little book on yarn dyeing and bought another kit that included some undyed yarn.

At this point, I was working in the tiny galley kitchen at home, on the stove, trying to make as little mess as possible. I count Lemon Berry Snowcone as my first real successful dye; I knitted myself a beanie hat with it and, as much as I love it, it’s a bit too cute and special for me to wear.

Then the COVID pandemic happened and I started dyeing for fun whilst being furloughed from my 9-5, and that’s really where FLYY Dyed was born! I was buying yarn by the handful (I still do) and dyeing for friends and a couple of my Instagram followers.

I remember it being a creatively intense time, as I was crocheting or knitting and dyeing pretty much every day – my content creation was on ten and the Instagram algorithm absolutely loved me!

People were really interested in and liked what I was doing; dyeing one-of-a-kind (OOAK) yarns that nobody else would ever have, and as well as wanting to buy them, some were even requesting custom colours.

To answer your question as honestly as possible, quite a few of my dyes start off in my eyes as ‘less-than-pretty’, but once they’re rinsed and dried and twisted, I grow a new kind of love for them. I do have some horror show skeins – not very many, but there have been a few! They mostly get added to the ‘Oopsie’ pile and are sold at a discounted price.

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Many indie dyers start in kitchens, garages, or tiny makeshift spaces. What did your original setup actually look like and how has it changed over the years?

Once I started to get going with yarn dyeing, working in the kitchen on the stove just wasn’t working anymore. A friend gave me the idea of crowdfunding to help purchase my first few pieces of large equipment, and thanks to some kind people I was able to buy Marie, my bain-marie, and a couple of large chafing dishes. Another dyer here in the UK blew my mind when they bought me a spin-dryer (aptly named Spinderella!).

Now I had the goods, I needed a space, and my Dad shuffled around a few tools in his brick-built shed at the bottom of the garden, and I took over a (very) small space at one end. I’m pretty good at making things work, but I don’t know how I pulled it off for so long – dyeing yarn in that space, on that tiny table, was comical, but I did some brilliant work!

Within a week of moving in, I upgraded with a bigger and more stable table and acquired a few more dyeing-related accoutrements – I was a proper Indie Yarn Dyer!

That was the summer of 2020.

Fast forward to May 2023 and I was not happy with the space I was working in. FLYY Dyed was doing well and I was dyeing every chance I could get around the day job. It was important to me to stay as local as possible, so I investigated renting a garage from the council, a small warehouse unit… I even visited and applied for a space with a local arts collective, and they rejected my application, saying that my work didn’t really go with whatever vision they had for the space… I’m still very salty and in my feelings about that, I won’t lie!

That summer, my Dad and I came up with a plan; he was giving me half of the garage to use as my very own dye studio! We spent about a month moving out a ton of unwanted/unused stuff until we had an empty space. Dad brought some timber and built a partition wall and, between me and my nephew, we did a decent paint job.

FLYY Dyed Studio is my space – I can hide away in there for hours! I’m working on getting rid of the chest freezer, tumble dryer, and chiller, but I have space for everything I need; I have enough dye pans and pots for my four portable hobs, there’s shelving to store undyed yarn, a space for my yarn twister, and I’m about to run out of space for dyes!

The unpredictability in the way I work is a learning process, and it’s the end results that never fail to amaze me.

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One thing I love about your yarn and brand identity is that it’s unashamedly authentic, very recognisable, and there’s a clear story behind every colourway. I remember ordering a bespoke skein from you (I still have some left, actually!) and falling in love with its depth and thoughtful colour combinations. Where do you get inspiration for your colourways? How much influence has your heritage and background had on what you make?

Awwwhh, thank you so much for saying that! You got it right, though – I cannot be or do anything without being unashamedly, unapologetically, and authentically me – anything else just isn’t cutting it.

As much as my thing at FLYY Dyed is creating OOAK One Skein Wonders, each one does have a story and evokes a memory. I’m very much inspired and influenced by everything around me; my life, my experiences, travels I’ve taken, things and people I’ve seen, music I listen to, foods I’ve eaten, plants, flowers, the books I read…

One of the first collections I dyed was my Christmas Socktails way back in 2020. Other yarn dyers were creating Advent boxes covering the month of December (obviously!), and me being a small-batch dyer and a newbie in the yarn dyeing streets, wanted to create something that was unmistakably mine and special for the recipient, keeping the exclusivity that being OOAK brings.

I dyed a full skein and a contrasting mini skein based on popular Christmas cocktails. There were only 12 sets (for the 12 Days of Christmas), and each one came with a recipe card for the cocktail it was based on, with some other treats all packaged in a personalised Christmas stocking!

Next up was a slightly larger collection of five themed colourways in summer 2021, all based on my memories of summer holidays spent with friends and family; Back Yard BBQ, Tropic Dreams, Carnival Capers, Summer Sizzlers, and Block Party.

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Have you always had a fascination with colour theory and how colours work together?

As a failed A-Level Art student, the answer should probably be yes, but the truth is I have an appreciation and respect for art in different forms. I’ve tried to pay attention to colour theory and the colour wheel, and I’ve played with colour swatch cards when planning dyes, but to know me is to understand that there isn’t always a plan… and if there is, I might not always stick to it!

I’ll see something – the way a display has been put together, wiring in the comms room at work, an album cover – and the way the colours play with each other really excites me, and I try to translate that to yarn.

If I like how it looks together, chances are it’ll appear in a colourway at some point, but my hard and fast rules are borrowed from the fashion world; Navy and Black don’t go together and Red and Green should never be seen!

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Yarn dyeing combines chemistry, unpredictability, and artistry. What part of that process appeals to you the most?

When I go into the studio, my agenda goes no further than “today I will mostly be dyeing yarn.”

I’ll have thought about what and how much I’ll dye, but unless I’m doing custom work or dyeing the latest chapter of Literary Threads, the colours I use are picked at random.

My day job isn’t that exciting, so not being bound to hard and fast rules in the studio is wonderful – my thought process runs something like this; “these three colours look good on paper… I wonder what they’ll look like in the pans” or, “oh, I forgot I had this colour, let’s see what happens!”

Recently, I’ve been playing with the alchemy of mixing the colours of some liquid dyes that I use, and that’s been a lot of fun. The unpredictability in the way I work (which I expect is very different to the way other dyers work) is a learning process, and it’s the end results that never fail to amaze me.

If you could radically change one thing about the indie yarn or maker world overnight, what would it be? Is there anything you’d like to see more – and less – of?

More colour. Not just in the yarn itself, but within the yarn community. Less gatekeeping.

I’m totally with you there. What has been your proudest moment and biggest achievement as a maker so far?

I’ve been featured in magazines and nominated for industry awards. I won a grant for Indie Makers not long after starting FLYY Dyed. My yarn has been squished at yarn shows and events in so many places and has been on the hooks and needles of makers globally – pretty sure I’m in 44 out of 51 States of America!

I’ve been “Insta Famous” for a week or two because a hot dyer, designer, or maker has invited me to take part in a live, tagged me in a post, or spoken about me and showed off my yarn on their Blog/Vlog. FLYY Dyed has been seen in LYS and pop-up shops…

The cherry on top for me must be that I am the only Black Woman Indie Dyer from Wolverhampton – I’m as OOAK as the skeins that I dye, and that’s kind of like a big deal.

You take part in many yarn festivals and events around the UK. What is it that you enjoy the most about these kinds of events? Are they as exhausting to take part in as they look?

Love that you say ‘many’ when I feel like I only do a few! I’m going to keep it 100 with you.

Taking part in yarn festivals and events as a vendor is not for the weak. For instance, I’m doing a yarn show this weekend and for me it means taking two days off work to get there and recover afterwards – it’s a lot; packing the car, travelling to the event and setting up… smiling and talking for hours, being on your feet all day, and then packing up and travelling home… and most of the time I’m doing this on my own – shout out to the Booth Buddies I’ve had over the years, and organisers who have a team available to cover if you need a comfort break or to hide in a dark corner somewhere!

But before all of that, there’s the mental logistics of checking inventory, making lists of what I want to take, planning how I want my space to look on the day… and possibly revising it once I’ve set up!

Yarn shows can be exhausting, I won’t lie, but I don’t think anyone who attends as a vendor would trade the experience.

It’s great meeting new people and having someone discover you for the first time. Reconnecting with dyers and makers that you don’t see often or only know through social media definitely gives you the warm and fuzzies!

What is the future of FLYY Dyed going forward?

The yarn world is my oyster!

I’m going to keep dyeing yarn and I’m going to keep showing up and taking up space!

Of course, I’d love to do (a lot) more shows, but I’m the kind of girl that likes to get in where I fit in, you know?!

There are some excellent people that I’ve worked with a few times in the past couple of years, and my plan is to get a bit more involved with their events and put down a firm FLYY Dyed footprint in Wolverhampton and the West Midlands!

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I’d like to thank Rachel for taking the time to answer these questions today, and if you’d like to see more of her work, you can find her on Instagram, shop her yarn on her website and see all the news over on her Facebook page.