The Knitwear Museum

The museum presents the history of the knitwear industry in the area around Albstadt, about 60 kilometres south of Stuttgart. Knitted textiles have continuous yarn while weaving has interlaced yarn. It is used to make ‘jersey’ material, underwear and stockings in continuous tubes. It began as a domestic industry and moved into factories in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The museum is in a former building of Mayer & Cie, which today has a factory outside the town. It displays more than a century of knitted garments. There are examples of hand-worked stocking-knitting frames and big machines for circular knitting. All of them are demonstrated in working order, so visitors experience the sound and the smell of a textile factory as well seeing and understanding the operation. There is also a restored steam engine and a line for dyeing. Many of the staff are textile workers who keep the machines in working order and bring the industry to life for visitors.