Sneak peek of my next pattern :)

Welcome!

This is my brand new knitting blog, to accompany my brand new Etsy shop and my brand new Ravelry account, also under the name of glowingforest. I’ll be posting free patterns here, and maybe progress reports on things I’m designing - I’m not really sure yet! It’s all very much in the beginning stages.

How to find fluorescent yarn

In Stores -

I found all of my fluorescent yarn at local stores. Not a single ball said “fluorescent” on the label, or gave any indication that it glowed. (I did see yarn labelled glow-in-the-dark once. For some bizarre reason I didn’t buy any, and I’ve regretted it ever since.)

The first step to finding fluorescent yarn in a store is to get ahold of a portable blacklight (ultraviolet light). Blacklight LED keychains are cheap and pretty easy to find. For instance, Google Product Search has tons of listings for uv led keychain. I’ve been told you can also find little blacklights at pet stores, where they are sold as pet urine finders!

Now that you have your blacklight, take it to a yarn store. You may have to shade the yarn from the store lights to see if it’s glowing in the blacklight - just like you’d do to see your glow-in-the-dark Lego glowing when you were a kid. Well no, don’t put it under your shirt and peek down the neck, but you get the idea.

This does look a bit funny. If you think a store employee suspects you are shoplifting, simply show them what you’re doing. I’ve never had a problem with it.

Cheap, bright artificial yarns are the most likely to be fluorescent. Sometimes yarns in muted colours have surprised me and turned out to be fluoro too. I believe fluorescent yarn does exist on natural fibre as well, but it is far less common than acrylic and polyester.

I have found fluorescent yarn at Zellers and at Lincraft. I’ve seen fluorescent yarn-ish stuff at army surplus stores as well - apparently it’s used in fishing lures. I have no idea if that would be suitable for knitting, but it’s worth a try if you’re having trouble finding fluorescent yarn anywhere else.

Here is a list of fluorescent yarns I've found in stores:

Yarns I found at Lincraft in Australia:
Lincraft - Double Knitting Yarn - Colour no:024 (red, DK weight)
Lincraft - Double Knitting Yarn - Colour no:026 (fuchsia, DK weight)
Lincraft - Double Knitting Yarn - Colour no:068 (spring green, weakly fluorescent, DK weight)
Lincraft - Double Knitting Yarn - Colour no:006 (sunny yellow, weakly fluorescent, DK weight)
Creative Basics - Hobby Knit Yarn - Colour no:019 (bright salmon pink, DK weight)
Sullivans International - Scruffy Fashion Knitting Yarn - Fluoro Pink (crazy fluoro pink with orange hilights. eyelash yarn. I think this will be a huge pain to knit with, but whatever I make with it will be WILD!)

Yarns I found at Zellers in Canada:
Red Heart Kids - Colour: 2652 Lime (bright green, worsted weight)
Red Heart Super Saver - Colour: 0354 Vibrant Orange (orange, worsted weight)
Bernat Super Value - Colour 07513 Scarlet (red, worsted weight)
Bernat Softee Chunky - Colour 39622 True Yellow (sunny yellow, weakly fluorescent, worsted weight)

 
(Disclaimer: these yarns were fluorescent when I bought them. I can’t guarantee anything about what those companies do with those yarn colors in the future.)

Online -

I plan to buy fluorescent yarn online at some point, but I haven’t yet. So I don’t have a list of recommended online stores aside from Lincraft, Red Heart and Bernat. I suggest searching both with Google Product Search and with regular Google. Here are some searches you could try:

fluorescent yarn
ultraviolet yarn
UV yarn
blacklight yarn
glow yarn

***
Update! I found a few places online to buy glow-in-the-dark yarn!
Nightlights Glow In The Dark Yarn is available at Woolstock Yarn Shop and Seed Stitch Fine Yarn, and Jelly Yarns have a line of glow yarn in a few different colors and two weights. How exciting! I plan to order some - not sure which kind yet.
***

A warning: sometimes online items are labelled “fluorescent” when they’re actually just very bright. I bought some green felt online that was labelled “fluorescent”, and it did NOT glow in blacklight! If you want to make sure, email the company before you order and ask them if the item actually glows in blacklight.

Have you found fluorescent or glow-in-the-dark yarn? I would love to know - please tell me all about it in the comments section!