Yarn bombing — covering stuff on the street with crocheted or knitted cozies — has become a common enough practice that it merited the dreaded “trend” treatment in The New York Times a couple of weeks ago.
That doesn’t mean that it can’t still be very cool. And this little video is about an especially sweet case of yarn bombing. Someone forwarded it to in an email with a subject line that said it was about “about a team of gentle yarn guerrillas and a very special tree.” I had to watch.
A couple of store owners in New York’s Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood have covered the trunk of a tree outside their shop with a colorful sleeve that is constantly changing. It includes memorials to two neighborhood children who have died recently.
The creators say that the best part of the project has been watching how people react to it. The tree surprises them. It makes them stop and think. It creates connection, and a sense of place, and a sense of mystery.
The filmmakers, Martha Garvey and Gabe Stein, say it’s an example of a case in which people feel like they have to make art “or else.” Nice.
