Latest news with #SecretSocietyofHertfordCrafters
BBC News
27-07-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Yarn bomb display celebrates beauty of Hertford's four rivers
A town's natural beauty is being celebrated with a display of 100 yarn bomb creations. The 140 members of the Secret Society of Hertford Crafters have knitted scenes that showcase the area's four rivers - the Rib, Lea, Mimram and Beane. Debs Bonfield from the group said: "We make beautiful things for the town to enjoy, and they embrace it."The Parliament Square display will raise money for food bank charity Hertford Pantry, and feature a narrow boat called Lady Joan, in memory of Joan Brandford, a member who passed away last year. Mrs Bonfield said the group had raised money for a number of local charities since it began in 2017. She hoped its latest display would raise more than £20,000 and take it to more than £200,000 in total. It created a number of displays, including a celebration for the Queen's Platinum Jubilee, King Charles III's Coronation and the Olympics. "It's a lovely craze that's taken off. We started with 12 members and now have 140, it's just grown from there," Mrs Bonfield said. The river theme was chosen because Hertford "is unique"."It has a chalk river bed, and there are only a few of those in the country. "As a small town, it has four rivers running through it, which is quite rare."We wanted to celebrate the natural beauty of Hertford." She said scenes including fish, ducks, coots, bees, butterflies and voles would "take over the whole of Parliament Square". It also includes a depiction of the annual Hertford Duck Race, complete with 200 knitted ducks, and the winner on a podium. "We're really proud of what we've achieved, we thoroughly enjoy it, we get together three times a week, we're all volunteers, we make beautiful things for the town to enjoy and the town embraces it", she added. Follow Beds, Herts and Bucks news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.
BBC News
27-04-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Wartime love story features in latest Hertford yarn bomb display
A couple who met in a potato field during World War Two have been immortalised in a town's yarn bomb display. Agnes and Gordon Taylor featured in the Secret Society of Hertford Crafters (SSOHC) latest work to commemorate the 80th anniversary of VE Day. Mrs Taylor spotted her future husband, Mr Taylor, while working as a Land Girl harvesting crops in Hertingfordbury, Hertfordshire. She has now been depicted in wool, sitting on an upturned bucket in the middle of a field, as part of the display at The Mill Garden, Melanie Delaney, from SSOHC, said. "This one is a special one, we usually do Christmas and summer displays, but this one really resonated with people as there are a lot of personal family stories in this one, including Agnes and Gordon, it's very personal", Mrs Delaney added. She said the group was only too happy to include the story of how the couple met, as Mrs Taylor was a member of the group until she passed away in 2023 at the age of 99. Mrs Delaney said Mrs Taylor (nee) Mant spotted her husband, who was a member of the Bengeo Home Guard, while he was working for his father, who was a potato merchant for the whole area during the war, and he had come to collect the crop. They married in 1950 and lived in Bengoe until Gordon's death in 2017, and in 2019, Agnes joined the knitting group. The display, which started in January, was a "woolly tribute to our military, civilian and animal heroes from 1945 and 2025", she said. "We hope people will see the inspiration of people who served in the war has carried on today."It featured a woolly Winston Churchill, a young Princess Elizabeth, evacuees, a resistance fighter and Alan Turing with a code-breaking machine, at Bletchley Park. As a proud Canadian, Mrs Delaney crocheted and knitted a Canadian Sherman tank, known as a Bomb. "For me, it's brought the past and the present together, it's been really lovely." Follow Beds, Herts and Bucks news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.
