Cape Town - With Christmas now less than five days away, a local community in Wellington and dozens of knitters from across the country are beaming with pride for having crocheted a 10m Christmas tree.
The project was spearheaded by one of Wellington’s oldest charity organisations, The Afrikaanse Christelike Vroue Vereeniging (ACVV), which is now 117 years old, according to its chairperson Sorita Stoffberg.
Speaking to the Cape Argus, Stoffberg said the idea for the crocheted Christmas tree came about late last year when she was looking for ideas for a community project.
She said: “It hit me when I learnt that in Italian towns, they have these amazing beautiful crocheted Christmas trees. I thought we could do that here too. Now I’m not much of a crocherer, I’m more of a knitter, but I just knew that we could get the community involved and have this be our wonderful project.”
According to Stoffberg, soon after the idea hit, the ACVV began putting their plans in motion posting flyers around town and spreading the word amongst the knitting and crocheting communities and old age homes known for their crocheting skills to join in.
“We started at the beginning of the year, and within no time, we had a lot of people wanting to join in the project, not just from our community but from the Northern Cape, Stellenbosch and Cape Town to name a few.”
“We even began hosting and participating in fun engaging international holidays like International Crocheting Day, which was held at our local Wimpy. We met up and crocheted, conversed and connect. However, that was just the start,” Stoffberg said.
Stoffberg said soon after the organisation then began hosting meet-ups on other International holidays such as UFO day and Cheesecake day where they served cheesecake and UFO-themed pancakes, continuing to knit and connect.
She said the project grew beyond her expectations so much that while they had initially set out to crochet and collect only 2 500 boxes to build their tree, the project ended up with over 7 400 squares and using only 3 000 boxes.
“It was an amazing experience, and I couldn’t be happier. I wanted it to be about the community, to bring everyone together, and that’s exactly what we did. We had crocheters from all walks of life, places and ages. We have bonded so well that we want to continue this project,” Stoffberg said.
After Christmas, the ACVV along with its host of crocheters and knitters will be taking down the tree. However, not to store it away but use the boxes to create blankets that they will then distribute to local charity organisations in Wellington and Paarl for the chilly winter season.
Wellington’s new and unique Christmas tree is situated next to the community’s NG Moederkerk on Main Street.