The Defarge Knittery started with the idea of designing classic knitwear with a contemporary edge.

It is named for literature's fiercest knitter — Madame Defarge — and its logo — sheep and bird — is a nod to its heritage.

Part of my first job as a newspaper reporter was typing up the Back in Time section, which is a sampling of items that appeared in the rural paper 100 years before, and I read once about how birds in the winter would land on the backs of sheep and then become frozen there.  The image stayed with me.  I discovered the sheep on a printing block from Portobello Road in London and had my old publisher, Jim Gardner, print it for me so that my friend and uber talented graphic designer, Karen Leddy, could perch a bird on his back and create what you see now as the Defarge Knittery mark.

I've since moved both myself and the Knittery to Philadelphia, where I'm still a reporter during the daytime and a knitter during the nighttime.

Patterns have been published in Interweave, Knitpicks, Cooperative Press, and Pom Pom.