We are very conscious of sustainability and environment, and our impact on our planet. It’s important to us to minimise our use of resources and waste, to obtain our base yarns from ethical sources, and to work with local businesses whenever possible.
Luxury Yarns
Our yarns are the most luxurious we can find from all over the globe. Different breeds of sheep are better suited to different climates, meaning that those that live in the UK need to cope with our wetter, cooler climate. This means their fleeces and coats tend to be more hardwearing, and often not as fine as animals living in dryer, warmer climates.
Of course there are always exceptions! Bases that we source from the UK are Bluefaced Leicester wool and sometimes alpaca, although these are often blended with other fibres such as silk.
Ethical Sources
We stock yarns from trusted wholesalers and manufacturers with credible, ethical sources.
All of the merino wool that we use is mulesing-free.
We stock mainly natural fibre yarns, although some sock yarn bases have a nylon element for durability.
We are trialling a bio-nylon sock yarn blended with UK alpaca & British Bluefaced Leicester wool. The bio-nylon degrades without leaving any plastic residue but still adds durability.
Supporting Local Business
We are switching to yarn dyes manufactured and supplied within the UK.
The acetic acid we use to set the dyes onto the yarns is food-grade white vinegar, which is manufactured within the UK and bought locally.
Printing of our skein labels and pattern prints is done by a local, small print company within Cornwall.
We print our invoices, postage labels, and event display signs in-house using an EcoTank printer, which uses refillable ink tanks rather than disposable ink cartridges.
When my husband built our dye studio, we used UK-manufactured wool insulation throughout.
We collaborate with other UK designers and artists to create beautiful colourways plus knit and crochet kits.
Sustainable Processes
It’s important to us to make careful use of dyes, energy, & water to avoid waste.
Our dye pans are exhausted of dye before the water is removed.
We rinse out dye pots to get every last bit of dye powder out before recycling the pots. We use the solutions from these rinses to create non-repeatable, one-off colourways!
Recyclable Packaging
We use recyclable cardboard boxes or bio-degradable sugarcane bags for our order packaging.
We post single-skein orders untwisted in Large Letter boxes, which can be pushed through a standard letterbox. As a result, this means that parcels usually don’t need to be left in a safe place on delivery.
For larger orders, we save and re-use cardboard packaging from our own deliveries where possible. We prefer non-branded packaging for this. We have therefore made a conscious decision not to buy branded packaging for our Perran Yarns business. The intention is that this gives our customers more opportunity to re-use the packaging that their orders arrive in too!
Our hand-dyed and undyed recycled sari silk ribbons can be bought packaged in either recyclable paper bags or reusable plastic bags.
Our knit and crochet kits are available without packaging, or in a recyclable gift box.
