A professional knitter who loves traveling has a unique way of acquiring keepsakes of the destinations he visits – he knits them.
Samuel Barsky, 45, from Baltimore, travels at least seven times a year to iconic destinations. But before he goes there, he first designs and knits the destination on a sweater, taking up as much as a month doing so, and then snaps a photo while wearing the sweater once he’s there.
Watch the video of Samuel and his sweaters below.
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Video credit: Rumble
So far, he’s done the Hollywood sign, Stonehenge, the Statue of Liberty, and London Tower Bridge among others.
Samuel has been knitting for the past 20 years and also teaches and sells merchandise. It’s no surprise that he has amassed quite a following on social media with his exploits.
Samuel said: “I first learned to knit twenty years ago, and straight away I was a natural at it.
“17 months after my first lesson, I decided to knit what I saw – and it was an experiment that went well.
“The most complex design I’ve attempted was Times Square in New York because I find it much harder to do urban scenes.
“I initially just knitted the jumpers for me and my wife Deborah, 54, a supermarket promoter.
“But whilst she’s not a massive fan of knitwear, I was surprised by the number of people online that loved my designs.
“I’ll pick a location, somewhere both Deborah and I want to travel to, and I can spend up to seven hours a night for the duration of a month, creating it.”
With more than 50k followers on Facebook alone, Samuel has had to adjust from just making jumpers. For warmer climates, he makes short-sleeved jumpers as well as dresses for his wife.
Samuel added: “I take inspiration from the world around me – I love traveling with my wife, and I’ll knit and get my creativity from the scenery.
“Anything from objects, animals to locations – they can all be designs.
“I free-knit, which means I don’t follow any patterns or anything like that.
“I do it from what’s around me, and what I’m using as inspiration.
“All I need is the multicolored yarn that I use and I take it from there.
“I even do videos to show the finished results, and how I create them.
“Now almost all fans have a favorite jumper and my passion has become my occupation, it’s great.
“Popular designs include Chicago’s skyline, New York’s skyline, the Statue of Liberty and the Hoover Dam in the Black Canyon.”
Replaced!