It’s Baaack! Hallockville Museum Farm Fleece & Fiber Festival – May 21 & 22

One of Long Island’s largest Fleece and Fiber Festivals is on tap for Saturday, May 21 and Sunday, May 22 at historic Hallockville Museum Farm on the North Fork.  The festival promises to deliver an immersive fiber arts and crafts experience – from sheep to sweater – and beyond!

The Hallockville Fleece and Fiber Festival will feature dozens of fiber artisans showcasing their talents, demonstrating their traditional crafts and selling their creations. Among the exhibitors and vendors will be spinners transforming raw fiber into yarn, weavers creating cloth, and knitters and crocheters showcasing their creations. The festival will feature quilters offering hands-on demonstrations, and artisans who needle punch, hook rugs, weave baskets and carve wood, explaining their crafts and exhibiting and selling their works.

“The Fleece and Fiber Festival is a celebration of the traditional fiber arts and techniques that were once a way of life on Long Island homesteads such as Hallockville, yet continue to flourish centuries later,” said Hallockville Museum Farm Executive Director Roberta Shoten. “The festival features a unique array of handmade fiber and fabric goods that are not to be missed.”

Attendees are encouraged to explore the entire “life-cycle” of fiber – from raw goods to finished products. Sheep and llama shearing demonstrations by Tabbethia Haubold-Magee of Long Island Yarn and Farm are scheduled for each day from 11:30 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. and 1:30 to 2:15 p.m. Festival guests may visit sheep, llamas and alpacas that contribute the raw fibers that are turned into yarn, and may also say hello to Hallockville’s resident cows, pigs and chickens, who won’t want to be left out of the fun.

Docents will lead special fiber-oriented tours of Hallock Homestead, providing festival attendees a glimpse into the materials, patterns and styles within the 18th century preserved home. There will also be a display of woven bed coverlets that were made in Riverhead between 1830 and 1844 on a Jacquard Loom, which was quite “high tech” at the time. Using punch cards, a Jacquard Loom was able to produce complex patterns automatically. These punch cards were the antecedents of computer punch cards that heralded the technology revolution of the mid-20th century.

Rounding out the Fleece and Fiber Festival will be food, including homemade treats by the Hallockville Bakers and heartier fare from Golden Jalapeno.