Dare To Disrupt: Kelly Lim
Kellylimerick (@kllylmrck) is more than just the go-to girl for dreads and yarn braids. In fact, those owe their existence to her lifelong passion and talent for crochet and knitting. Through yarn and needle, Kelly Lim breathes to life amigurumi figures that are one-of-a-kind art pieces and endearing works of passion.
Knowing that just your pair of hands can create objects that stir emotions within yourself and others gives you a quiet sort of power. It’s how I like to express myself without words.
Dreadlocks usually refer to natural dreadlocks, which are formed with a person’s own hair. The type I work with are known as synthetic dreads. The process for synthetic and natural dreads are really quite different, and the former uses a tool I’m very familiar with: the crochet needle.
Crochet and knit are such big parts of my life that I couldn’t give it up totally. My hands automatically pick the yarn and needle up.
I wanted a catchy word that could join up with my surname, Lim. It was completely random, but I researched it a while later and found that Limerick is a city in Ireland (and ‘Kelly’ is an Irish name!) well known for the lace named after them. I’ve always had an obsession with lace so I guess I can call it a fateful coincidence!
If people did their research, they would realise that natural dreadlocks originated from not just black communities – who wear it as a protective hairstyle or for religious reasons – but also from different Asian and Caucasian communities. Everyone has hair, and it’s been styled and decorated for aesthetic purposes since ancient times.
My step towards trying to combine a job and a hobby was HANANA, and it was only a year or so ago that I realised it was a silly move. Trying to make items that would appeal to the mass market and compete with mass-manufactured items would never make me or anyone happy. It’s ironic how I loved my hobby so much that I wanted to make it my job. But in trying to make it a money-earning job I lost the enjoyment of it as a hobby.
Get to know our pick of ten rule-breaking creatives in the March 2017 issue of L'Officiel Singapore.
