Made once
Each of Karen’s pieces was made a single time. What you see is the only one of it.
Te Āhuru Mōwai · a sheltered haven
Made once, by hand, for someone small.
Karen knits and crochets each of her pieces herself at home in Robina. Nothing is made twice. If a piece has gone, she can make you another.
Browse the pieces and meet the makers. Nothing can be ordered yet.
A knitted garment is one strand of wool from beginning to end.
So is a family.
Karen wrote sixty feet of her family's whakapapa out by hand, tracing the line back generation by generation. Then she picked up her needles and started making things for the babies at the end of it.
It is the same act. One thread, joining people who will never meet.
The whole storyWhat Karen makes
Cardigans, blankets, beanies, booties.
Wooden buttons, cable and bobble stitch, feather and fan lace. Traditional work, made properly, in colours that are not shouting.
To wear
Hoodies and cardigans
Hoodies, buttoned cardigans, and sets with the beanie knitted to match.
To keep
Shawls, blankets and pram rugs
Granny square, motif and feather and fan lace. Long after the little one outgrows it the memories remain.
To give
Beanie and bootie sets
Newborn gift sets. Tie up booties with wooden or pearl beads, and a beanie to match.
Where the name comes from
Sheltered water.
The family is from the Marlborough Sounds, at the top of the South Island of New Zealand. Deep bays, bush down to the waterline, water still enough to hold the hills upside down.
Te Āhuru was Karen’s father’s name. Āhuru means warm and sheltered. Āhuru mōwai is a sheltered haven, the words used for the safest place a person is ever kept.
It seemed like the right name for things made to keep a baby warm.
Read her storyHow it works
One of a kind, made to order.
Made again
If a piece has gone, or you want it in another colour or size, Karen can make you one.
Made here
Karen’s pieces all come out of one house in Robina, Queensland, from one pair of hands.
Six books on the shelf
Written down, the same as it was knitted.
The Invisible Code, William: The One Who Carried Everything, William: The One Who Believed Everything, William: The One Who Kept Score, William, The One Who Learned the Sunshine, and Songeur: The 1982 Single-Handed Trans-Tasman Yacht Race, Both Ways sit here with Karen’s work. They do not take over her shop.
See the books