The invention
It isn’t just the wool that makes the difference. It’s the way we knit it.
The story of Brit and Eilif Lyngstad – knitted with air and love.
LYNGSTAD, 1994
It started because Eilif was cold
Eilif ran the farm at Lyngstad, and day after day he came home wet and cold from the forest and the farm work. Brit was a trained garment technician and had knitted all her life. She tried a new way of knitting, with far more small air pockets in the stitch.
Eilif put on the sweater, and he stopped being cold. Word spread from farm to farm, and in 1994 Brit borrowed a million kroner, bought a larger knitting machine in Switzerland and started production in the basement of the prayer house.
How the knitting method works
Wool alone isn’t the whole explanation. What insulates is the still air held in the knit – and Brit’s method builds a lot of it in.
1
2
3
- 1Air knitted into every stitch
SINTEF described the knit as “a thick and open structure” with “a lot of air between the fibres”.
- 2The air holds the warmth
Your body heat stays in the air pockets, even when you take a break. SINTEF found that the insulation follows the amount of air in the knit.
- 3The wool does the rest
Wool can absorb a lot of moisture without feeling wet, so you stay warm when you stop after being active.
Inside the knit
Two layers for the coldest days
Havbris next to the skin and Hustadvika on top. Two layers with air in the stitch, made to be worn together when it gets really cold.
- Havbris – The light layer – next to the skin
- Hustadvika – The warm layer – on top
SVALBARD, MARCH 1995
Tested by SINTEF at minus 23 degrees
Workers heading to Svalbard began ordering base layers from Brit, and she wanted to know whether what she had seen held up. In March 1995, SINTEF tested the base layer in the climate chamber in Trondheim, with test subjects alternating between hard work and rest. The conclusion was that the base layer “therefore appears to work well in conditions with varying work and rest in cold surroundings”.
The same week it was tried on Svalbard: three hours on a snowmobile at minus 23 degrees, with Lanullva as the only base layer under the suit. SINTEF called the results “very encouraging”.
From the archive
Documented from the start
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