Life on the Ice: Antarctic Knitters Share What It’s Like to Knit at the Bottom of Earth

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What is it like to knit in Antarctica? First, it pays to know that the continent is the coldest, driest place on Earth. There is wind beyond imagination. It’s harsh with a capital H. It does not often snow because any moisture in the air freezes, officially classifying it as a desert.

Above: During winter in Antarctica, auroras paint the skies inspiring shades of green. | Photo courtesy of Anthony Powell.

Second, people come from all over the United States and the world to McMurdo Station. They are all thrown together in shared housing and close quarters in one of the most isolated places on the planet. Still, there are knitters—more than you’d think—and there are many opportunities to learn new knitting skills. Knitting knowledge typically expands for everyone who attends the Tuesday night Stitch & Bitch club, which is open to everyone, including stitchers from New Zealand’s nearby facility, Scott Base. Knitting in Antarctica may conjure up images of shivering knitters with frozen fingers, clad in thick gloves—but, to the contrary, knitting is (mostly) done indoors. 

How Knitters Arrive in Antarctica

Participants leave home and fly commercially to New Zealand. Knitters who return yearly to Antarctica plan their projects prior to departing home. They know they can obtain supplies in Christchurch, the last stop before flying to Antarctica. The opportunity to purchase wool and supplies in New Zealand is a knitter’s dream. The place has more sheep than people and is world-renowned for its merino wool and alpaca fiber and possum fur blended yarn. Then there are those who arrive on Ice, discover Stitch & Bitch, and pick up knitting again after many years. The group is incredibly supportive of anyone who wants to learn, and many new knitters are born there.  

When it’s time to depart for the Great Southern Continent, everyone boards a C-17 Globemaster aircraft and packs in like sardines. Stuffed in the abundant pockets of the “Big Red” parkas, which are standard issue, are skeins of yarn that didn’t fit in the suitcase. Five hours later, the giant plane lands on a runway made of ice. Knitting in Antarctica really is nothing like knitting anywhere else.  

The Antarctic Attitude

Like everything there, knitting is done with a can-do attitude forged from living on an Antarctic base. “Can’t” doesn’t exist. In part, this comes from a sense of the potential deadliness of the environment and the history of those that have come before and survived (or didn’t).

At times, in the course of being there, people must work together to avoid a potential calamity, and it is always in the back of the mind that a situation could arise that could be life-threatening, begging the question: What would I do to save myself? My friends? The station?

As a science support employee, the workday often runs more than 10 hours and the workweek spans six days. Certain tasks such as cleaning shared spaces and shoveling snow is everyone’s responsibility. Everybody knows who does what: who takes care of the power plant, the Waste Barn; who cooks and cleans; who runs the medical clinic and firehouse; who fixes and builds things; and who works in the Crary Lab, the world-class facility where all the Antarctic science happens.

During the winter, this is especially true as the population shrinks from 1,100 to fewer than 200. The feeling is like being in a big family. A friend made in Antarctica is a friend for life. More than any other job, it is life-changing to spend a season on “the Ice.”   

Hardship Breeds Resourceful Knitters

The place spawns resourcefulness that you didn’t know you had. If you don’t have it, you find it or make it. You had no idea there would be knitters in Antarctica? Didn’t bring your needles? No problem. Pencils or random wooden dowels—with the help of a pencil sharpener—become knitting needles and the legs of an upside-down chair become a rigid swift. Paper clips, metal washers, or scraps of twine become stitch markers. Yarn can be repurposed by unraveling sweaters left behind by previous workers.  

Inspiration on the Ice

Inspiration comes from everywhere, but in Antarctica, it can be derived more from what you don’t see than from what you do. There are no trees, no green growing things, and not much color at all except white, black, and multiple shades of gray. It’s this lack of color that encourages knits to be bright, bold, and expressive.

Still, sunset colors can be incredible, especially against the white canvas of the Antarctic landscape. And you will find no more brilliant hues of blue anywhere else. Prismatic rainbows can be seen in the crystals of sparkling of snow. During the winter, there are stars and auroras that paint the skies in brilliant displays of green, undulating light. Missing fresh fruit might make one drawn to the red of strawberries or the yellow of bananas, for example. Most people miss the color green, and it often shows up in knitted things.  

The Impact of COVID-19

COVID-19 changed lives all around the world, and Antarctica was no exception. Every effort was made to prevent the virus from making it to the continent. An outbreak of COVID-19 in such an isolated place would be disastrous. Bases in Antarctica struggle every austral summer with illness, even without COVID-19 added to the mix, with a variety of bugs brought in from all over the world. People thrown together in shared bunkrooms and in close working quarters bring on the dreaded “crud,” a seasonal assault on the health of the community. It is no easy feat that both the American and New Zealand Antarctic programs managed to keep COVID-19 off their corner of the continent. 

Quarantining in Antarctica

This last austral summer, participants of the American and New Zealand Antarctic programs went through an extensive array of preventive measures, both before and after arriving on the Ice. A 10-day quarantine in New Zealand was mandatory, along with numerous PCR tests, while holed up in hotels in downtown Christchurch. People had to remain in their hotel rooms at all times, with meals brought to them, and only let outdoors for a short time each day for fresh air and a walk around in circles within a fenced area. When new personnel arrived in Antarctica, all staffers were separated for weeks on end, with required mask-wearing and social distancing.

Workers at McMurdo Station, normally used to the pleasure of socializing with one another during mealtimes, had to pick up their meals and retreat to the seclusion of their dorm rooms, to eat alone. During work hours, social distancing was practiced, and workers separated. Antarctica is a stark place and people are a long way from home. Workdays are long and exhausting, so off-time socializing, playing games and sports, listening to music, and knitting groups are some of the ways the experience is softened.  

Knitting In Isolation

Knitters and those who engage in crafts seem to fare a bit better in isolation. For some, the idea of being in a room alone with their yarn and knitting sounds like a dream come true. But even this gets tedious if you undergo several months of it. Still, being creative and making things with yarn and needles are extremely soothing and therapeutic, going a long way to making any hardship more bearable, as we all know too well.

Of spending weeks of time secluded in her dorm room, Allison (widely known by the nickname “Sandwich”), a highly creative, self-described extrovert summed it up by saying, “Crafting saved me.” Even with all the restrictions, Sandwich said, the predominate feeling of those on the Ice last summer was one of gratitude for being in a place without COVID-19. News from the United States—the deaths, the many small businesses going under, including favorite local yarn shops—seemed very far away.  

With all the mask and vaccine mandates, guilds and other knitting groups moved to online meetings and carried on knitting and spinning, adapting to the new ways of gathering together. Creative people will always find a way. As knitting guru Elizabeth Zimmermann once said: “Knit on with confidence and hope, through all crises.” 

Aren’t we fortunate to have this meditative and soothing outlet during these stressful times? Knit on, my friends. Knit on. 

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Lynn Hamann and Christine Powell are co-authors of the book Knitting in Antarctica: 28 Beautiful Hat Patterns With Stories of Life on the Ice [affiliate link]. 

The complete version of this article was originally published in Interweave Knits Gifts 2022. Get the issue to read the complete article.

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