When Margaret Richardson packed up her life on a South African farm and immigrated to New Zealand at age 69, people commented, “How can you do this at your age?”
With a polite smile, she would tell them, “It’s the last great adventure of my life.”
There was, however, one more adventure to be had. Two years ago, at the age of 86, Margaret fulfilled a long-held dream to start a business and open a hand-dyed knitwear store.
“The only things I brought over to New Zealand were the mohair for knitting and my stainless steel vats from the farm [which used to hold cattle semen], packed with inks and dyes,” tells Margaret, who initially settled on a lifestyle block near Hokitika with her late husband Jimmy.
“We moved up to Auckland in 2012. Then I decided to buy a retail space at the very beginning of the pandemic in 2020. Because I thought if I waited for it to end, I might look back in a few years and say, ‘I was only 86 then and now I’m 90 – it’s too late!’ So I seized the day.”
Amy Maria Kid Mohair opened for business in February 2021. The next day, however, Auckland went into Level 3 lockdown.
“In my first eight months of trading, I was closed for five of them. I was nearly kiboshed. But I couldn’t just give up, so I stayed at home and knitted to get my stock up because I knew the lockdowns had to end sometime,” shares Margaret, now 88.
The clever crafter doesn’t follow patterns.
When the Weekly visits her cosy Albany-based shop, Margaret points out that she wanted it to be like an extension of her home. And the technicolour yarns are, well, to dye for.
All the dyeing of the mohair silk is done in the vats in her garage – “that’s my favourite part!” – robustly stirred, then hung out to dry on her washing line before the knitting begins.
And she doesn’t use patterns.
“I’ve got little domestic knitting machines, but most of the work is handwork, crochet, sewing up, blocking and pressing.”
The shop also displays handmade children’s knitwear made by fellow knitter Jenny Hopkins, 80, after the two women met at a local market and connected over their shared love of the craft.
With fellow knitter Jenny, who creates kids’ clothing for the store.
Margaret works “24/7” and happily uses all forms of social media to engage with clients or showcase her photos of garments.
After recently appearing on television, she jokes her index finger is sore from pressing “like” on so many positive Facebook comments.
“I have a lovely young friend, Melissa, who calls me her surrogate granny,” says Margaret. “She’s my IT guru, who’s taught me everything I need to know. And I don’t find it tricky at all.”
In fact, it seems nothing fazes this spry entrepreneur.
Born in the Transkei region of South Africa, Margaret learned to knit with a pair of six-inch nails as a little girl.
“During World War II, when I was about eight, my Uncle Jock ended up in an Italian prisoner of war camp,” she recalls.
“I loved him because he used to make me lovely wooden toys. So I begged my mother to let me knit using the only wool there was – allocated khaki-coloured wool that was strictly to be knitted for the troops.
“So my mother let me knit him a scarf. It was about a metre-long, and nice and wide, and my mother put tassels on the ends. The Red Cross sent it to him and he used it. I never saw him again, but just before we moved to New Zealand, I heard that Uncle Jock still had that scarf tucked away amongst his socks.”
Margaret’s father worked as a compound manager in gold mines, but when he died suddenly at 49, it spelled the end of her schooling.
“It was terrible,” she reflects. “We buried my dad, and the next day I was working in the bank to support my mother and younger siblings. But I kept going with my personal learning – I try and learn something new every day.”
In 1976, Margaret and Jimmy set up South Seas handcrafts in the Eastern Cape of South Africa. They trained rural African women in many different crafts and these women went on to run their own businesses.
“I love all crafts,” she enthuses. “Crochet, tapestry… I sew all my own clothes too. My problem is, I want to try everything!
“If something new comes along, I have to do it. But my big dream was to have exactly what I have now. A dear little shop with its own porch and its own garden out the front. I’ve been having so much fun.”
