Krista Suh plans to attend the women’s march in Washington, D.C., this week to protest Donald Trump’s presidency, and she wanted to make a statement. But she also had a more primal goal: staying warm.
“I wanted to do something more than just show up,” said the 29-year-old screenwriter who lives in downtown Los Angeles, recalling how her professors at the all-female Barnard College in New York City urged her to think about problems. “How can I visually show someone what’s going on? And I realized as a California girl, I would be really cold in D.C. — it’s not tank-top weather year-round. So I thought maybe I could knit myself a hat.”
And so the “pussyhat project” was born. Knitters — mostly women — started crafting handmade pink caps with cat ears, a reference to Trump’s vulgar statements about grabbing women’s genitals, which were revealed in a leaked video shortly before the election.
What started as a project among Suh, Jayna Zweiman and other friends at the Little Knittery in Atwater Village has turned into a global movement. Knitting groups at yarn stores, cafes and coffee shops from Seattle to Martha’s Vineyard have been churning out hats, and craft stores have reported a run on pink yarn. As word spread on social media, thousands of hats — knit with skeins of thick magenta or fuchsia yarn — have been made around the world, including in Australia and Austria. They’re all being sent to collections spots around the country and a basement in Virginia ahead of the Saturday march.
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