The tapping of knitting needles, balls of yarn scattered over the carpet and a knitter, sitting in the corner counting their stitches under their breath, begging not to be interrupted. Tradition expects the knitter to be an older woman, creating the next in a long list of cardigans for their latest grandchild. Now, sitting in the corner, tapping away, is more likely a member of Gen Z.
Crafting, crochet and knitting have made a comeback and Gen Z are firmly on board, creating old and new designs, debating types of yarn, providing tutorial videos and showing off their creations of the month.
During 2020, large numbers began crafting, with embroidery kits, knitting kits, crochet hooks, paint and anything else remotely crafty that kept people away from doomscrolling flew off the shelves (or more likely into Amazon packages). And over the past three years, many people haven’t put the knitting needles down.
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In March 2023, John Lewis released a report that saw a 61% increase in haberdashery sales over the last year, coinciding with the increase in searches for “knitting for beginners” since March 2020.
The knitting resurgence is clearly in full swing, thanks in part to the rise of TikTok, an app with Gen Z as its core demographic – just searching for “how to knit” returns thousands of videos, #knittok has 1.1 billion views.
