What we do
Promoting the craft of machine knitting throughout New Zealand through:
Local clubs – workshops for beginners to advanced machine knitters.
Annual Festival – bringing together members from NZ and overseas for expert tutoring, fashion parades, tours, exhibitions, trade stalls.
Newsletter – providing hints, tips and what’s happening in the local areas. Comes out quarterly.
How to Join
Share the experience – join the New Zealand Machine Knitters’ Society, either:
- Join one of our clubs and become an associate member.
- Become an individual member, by downloading and completing the National Membership Form. Download PDF form.
How NZMKS started – A brief history
The need to learn the new craft of machine knitting resulted in the New Zealand Machine Knitters Society being formed in the early 1970’s. It grew in membership to over 3,000 in the late 1980’s.
Festivals were a highlight of the year with well over 400 attending in 1984. Other than the usual fashion/competition/yarn and equipment purchase stories there are fond memories about hotly contested card games that went into the small hours and an unexpected night-wear parade instigated by a (false) fire alarm.
Many areas held weekend workshops and knit-a-longs. The husbands would often be called in to be “The Kitchen Crew”. This still happens today although on a smaller scale.
Our Rules
To view the New Zealand Machine Knitters Society Inc rules please download the PDF.
Lengthy History
One day a lengthy history of the society will be written but in the mean time we have a list of national presidents and an article written by Shirley Anderson about the South Canterbury’s area’s history which was involved right from the early stages of the society.
Download National Presidents List.pdf
Download South Canterbury’s Area’s History.pdf