About Stitch Noir

Welcome to my website!  Stitch Noir is based just outside of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada and is run by one person, Me!
My name is Amanda and I personally dye all the yarn and fibre you see on this website, in my home studio.
By purchasing yarns and fibre from Stitch Noir, you are supporting a small local artisan who creates for the love of creating!

I have been interested in fibre and yarn since 2011, which is when I learned to crochet my first granny square.  Crochet made sense…numbers, stitches, patterns….  My skills grew from there and soon I was selling finished items online (especially Skull Shawls….lots and lots of skull shawls!)

Soon I taught myself to knit and then a friend sat me down at her Ashford Traditional to try spinning and I was immediately hooked on that as well!  As I write this in 2023, I have four spinning wheels…all for spinning different kinds of yarns!

Effectively, I was following the fibre trail but moving backwards in the process.  My brother-in-law has sheep…which gave me access to raw fleece…..

Learning to dye was just a matter of time!

I started dyeing small batches of handpainted, heavily speckled and saturated yarns in 2018 and years later, I still have so much fun in my dye lab.  I love dark and saturated colours….sometimes you’ll find some pastels in the mix….but be sure, they were accidents! Lol

I specialize in unique OOAK gradient sets in a variety of bases, weights and yardage.  Due to the technique, every gradient is a one of a kind creation, even when dyed using the same colours.

I like to keep my colourways quirky and fun and I approach each dye pan and undyed skein as a work of art.
The good thing about that approach is that I get all sorts of interesting colour combinations, sometimes with little help from me at all!  The pans take on a life of their own and there’s a freedom in playing while I work that I really enjoy!

The down side to this approach is that although I keep notes about how I create colourways, my measurements aren’t exact and batch to batch, the colourway may shift slightly.  My dyeing is my creative outlet and if I bring in numbers and percentages, I will get lost in the math and lose the fun quirkiness that I really enjoy!

Does that mean you can’t buy sweater amounts?

Nope, SWEATER AMOUNTS are available.  I recommend buying the amount of yarn you need plus a bit for any project because I can’t guarantee 100% matching from batch to batch. If you need three or more skeins, and I don’t have the skeins from the same batch number available,  I will dye them to order to ensure they match as closely as possible. I say match but as with any hand-dyed yarn, one can expect some slight variation from skein to skein.  Alternating skeins in a project is highly recommended.

What about custom colours?

When I have the time and the energy, I love discussing a custom project with a customer.  I ask a lot of questions and even request reference photos to ensure what I am envisioning is what you are envisioning.  Sometimes there is a small additional fee, depending on the project and the amount of yarn involved, as well as a required deposit.