This is the story behind the yarn I use for my Galway Shawls and it starts with a rare breed sheep called the Galway. The Galway sheep is claimed to be Ireland’s only native breed of sheep and has been given Rare Breed status.

The sheep that concern us actually live east of the Shannon in County Kilkenny. The whole wool clip is taken to Cushendale Mill in Graignamanagh to be processed.

There has been a mill on the same site since 1204 as the area was home to a Cistercian monastery, now no longer run by monks but by the sixth generation of the Cushen family.

As excited as I was to find native breed wool being processed less than 10 miles from where it was grown, finding a mill full of beautiful old machinery topped even that. The mill can take raw fleece, scour, card, dye, spin and weave it on equipment that largely dates back to the 19th century. I can’t describe the smell that hits you as you walk in through the old wooden double doors: it’s a mixture of lanolin and machine oil with equal amounts of dust and old wood. It’s a smell that to me is redolent of the mills in my West Riding childhood home.

When I bring the Cushendale yarn back to County Antrim, it is the farthest that my raw material has travelled. The traceability and sustainability of this yarn adds immeasurably to the story of my hand woven Galway shawl.