The other day there was a story about “yarn bombing” in The Vancouver Sun. It resulted in numerous comments, either praising or criticizing these public acts of crafting. It’s amazing how people have to get either really excited or really pissed off to comment on newspaper articles. Six in one, half-dozen the other, it’s “What geniuses! The toast of the town!” vs. “What kind of crazy art school dropouts made this crap?” It makes you wonder what all the people who were too non-plussed to hit the “Comment” button thought while reading it? Call me a dreamer, but I’m thinking they thought it was pretty cool, too.

But I digress.

I think the article missed a very important point surrounding all of this. These knitted cozies and covers are also tokens of love to the cities and towns that they grace. They are emblems of creativity finding its place among the concrete jungle, and artifacts of thankfulness to the streets we walk down or the lamp posts we pass each day. Our city is ours, not the domain of someone up in City Hall or in the Chamber of Commerce.

While maybe not noticeable at first, cities, like us, have pulses and beats and soundtracks. London sounds different than Cairo, Mumbai moves to a different beat than Milan. Some small mountain towns run on the sounds of snow plows, while others on the steady sound of tourists.

Make your city your own again, and see what it has to teach you. And once you listen and learn a bit, think again about public acts of crafting. These items are more than something to cast aside, they are our tiny thank yous to our towns, cities and hamlets. They are thank yous, they are makeovers, they are love letters.

Suggested Reading:
Walter Benjamin’s The Arcades Project
Anything by Jane Jacobs
City A-Z: Urban Fragments
Sharon Zukin’s The Culture of Cities

The photo, taken from the article, is from the upcoming book, Yarn Bombing.