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Small textile towns were once common in New England, with stout brick buildings harnessing the power of the region’s water to mill yarn and cloth. The Colony family had been owners of a mill in Harrisville, New Hampshire, since before the Civil War, but by the mid-twentieth century, mills had begun to disappear. In 1970, 53 mills closed in New England, the Colony family’s among them. John Colony (known as Chick) returned from serving in the Coast Guard to a mill town without a working mill.
Chick saw that the small town that had centered on the mill would wither unless a new project came in to fill the gap. After considering the options, he had the idea: What better use could there be for an old mill village than to make textiles? So shortly after his father and uncle closed down the mill, Chick opened a business making woolen yarn on some of the same old equipment. The new endeavor was scaled back in scope, but yarn was coming from the old mill buildings once again under the label of a new company, Harrisville Designs.
The old mill buildings were back to manufacturing yarn, and the town itself became the center of a historic preservation effort. More than 50 years later, Harrisville is known as the best preserved early textile village in the country.
Harrisville Designs’s woolen-spun yarns are dyed in the wool, blending 12 or 13 brightly dyed fibers into dozens of subtle heathered hues. Initially developed for weaving, the yarns have become popular among knitters looking for yarns with character.
Harrisville Designs has produced a range of weaving looms for decades, but the youngest weavers probably know the company for their potholder looms. Realizing that the potholder loops and looms available for purchase were poor quality, they developed a metal loom and experimented to develop cotton loops in a range of bright colors.
The next generation, Chick’s son Nick Colony, has taken on management of the mill, developing knitting yarns such as their Nightshades color line and small-batch Shear as well as updating the company’s energy production and manufacturing facilities.
Weavers, knitters, and history enthusiasts may all know Harrisville for different reasons, but the effort that began in 1971 as a preservation project has created new futures in this small New Hampshire town.
Links
Harrisville Designs website
Historic Harrisville
Red Brick Village, a documentary about preserving historic Harrisville
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