1940s Wartime Fair Isle Slippers Vintage Knitting Pattern

How to make 1940s fair isle slippers- knitting

This pattern was originally designed in the wartime 1940s when Fair Isle designs were very popular. Part of their popularity was that everything was in short supply including yarns and wools. Every little scrap of left over yarns were needed to be used and housewifes often unravelled old worn out knitted items to reuse the yarn. Fair isle designs were perfect for the times as they used small amounts of lots of different colours, and very often the more colours used, the prettier the finished item.

These slippers would have been a popular design as they used very little yarn and would also have made great gifts for birthdays and Christmas. They would also have been popular as they performed a function and kept feet warm- lets not forget in those days, the UK did not have central heating and toes needed to be kept warm!

These slippers are great for 1940s re enacters, but also very pretty for today to- you can make them in creams and whites to make them quite classy, or lots of bright colours to give them quite an ethnic and funky look too.

Please note that this pattern does use a little crochet to finish off the slippers