STITCHES.(The Talk of the Town)(knitting)

To the well-worn list of the comparative advantages of suburban life--bigger houses, lower taxes, safer schools--the inhabitants of Westchester County have recently added another: better knitting. For this civic coup they can thank Kevin Lundeen and Elise Goldschlag, who live in the historic river town of Irvington and are the proprietors of Flying Fingers, a yarn store that carries hard-to-find brands like Brownsheep ("Dyed for Ewe!") and Manos of Uruguay, along with notions and such hobby-specific publications as "Men in Knits: Sweaters to Knit That He will Wear." Since the couple opened up shop a year and a half ago, their voluminous inventory has attracted customers from as far away as Canada, Ireland, and Alaska. But persuading New York knitters to make the forty-five-minute trip up the Hudson has been a harder sell. And so, to render the reverse commute sufficiently enticing, Lundeen, a former managing director at Goldman Sachs, and Goldschlag, his wife, conceived of the Yarn Bus, offering free shuttle service between Irvington and Manhattan.

The Yarn Bus is a fifteen-passenger van topped with three enormous balls of yarn and a pair of knitting needles the size of 9-irons. To build it, Lundeen and Goldschlag enlisted Prototype Source, a California company that is one of the nation's leading makers of promotional vehicles, having produced such industry icons as the Hershey Kissmobile, the Yoo-hoo Stinkin' Summer Tour Garbage Truck, and the latest Oscar Mayer Wienermobile, complete with Mustard Splattered Walkway and Official Wiener Jingle Horn. To fabricate the giant yarn balls, the designers considered marine rope (too heavy) and real yarn (prone to rot) before settling on lengths of thin plastic tubing, coated with fibreglass to evoke a fittingly woolly look. The bus cost seventy-five thousand dollars. It took six people six weeks to complete, and after being driven cross-country by a pair of college students it arrived in Irvington last month. Liz Bracken, who moved to Westchester from Atlanta several years ago and works at Flying Fingers part time, signed on to drive the bus. A retired nurse, Bracken was selected on the basis of her even demeanor and her chauffeuring resume, which, though limited to driving her daughter's Girl Scout troop on a field trip, was still more impressive than anyone else's.

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