Meet the makers at Johnstons of Elgin

Operating out of the same mill on the banks of the River Lossie, where it was first established in 1797 by Alexander Johnston, Johnstons of Elgin continues to produce luxury cashmere and fine woollen products here today. Despite suffering floods and fires over the years, the Newmill Elgin site remains as the core of the company. It’s still family-owned and continues the processes of dyeing, spinning, weaving and finishing in one traditional ‘vertical’ production process.

“Some of the things we do, nobody else can make,” says Alison Burgess, who marked her 25th anniversary at Johnstons in May. “It’s down to the quality. You see some woollen products other companies make and there’s just no comparison.”

Alison is an expert in twisting (the process of binding the yarns together), having trained as a spinner and picking up other skills to cover those on holiday. Now, she admits with a certain pride, people come to her for technical advice. “I’m definitely the go-to person in twisting, for the technicians and the yarn store guys as well,” she says. “But it’s a job that I’m still learning even now. New yarns are always being introduced and new techniques, so it’s always a learning curve, and you need to pass that knowledge on to others so the business can continue.”

In a quarter of a century, she’s seen a huge amount of change, not least in the increased use of technology and the pace of production. “We’ve come on such a long way from just doing basic tweed and tartans to what we do now – really fancy stuff with the jacquard loom,” she says. “But you’ll never replace everybody with machines,
because it always needs those hands-on skills and expertise.”

Kay Robertson is another long-serving employee. She now teaches her craft to the employees in the purling department, demonstrating how the product from weaving is left with the weft open, leaving a fringe of up to 20 to 30cm that needs to be pulled tight onto the combs of the machine. “Back in the day it wasn’t so hard, we only had two machines,” she explains. “Now we’ve got seven and another one coming in. The quality has to be absolutely spot on. It’s fine learning the machine, that’s the easy part. But getting trainees to realise what quality we need to put out and how things should look, that’s hard for them to get to terms with until we can say, ‘OK, they can be left on their own now’. It just takes time to look at things and see that’s right. But you need speed as much as quality, so it’s about getting them up to the right quality, and then to speed it up a bit. That’s when they can go back to making mistakes. So you need to do that without pressurising them too much.”

In all, the company employs over 1,200 staff, making it the largest producer of luxury cashmere and wool products in the UK. This also means that there are usually job opportunities. “Johnstons is always employing. There are so many different departments from the yarn through to the finished product,” says Kim Main, who works as a Tuner in the weaving department, setting the looms to ensure quality and performance. “It’s a place people stay. I was here in 2004, left in 2008 when I had my son, and I returned nine years later. I like the job. So long as I’m busy I’m happy!’

Kim was the first woman Tuner in her department, but she notes that the job roles are far less defined by gender than when she first started – the weavers, for instance, used to be predominantly women, but she’s finding a lot more men applying for roles. “We have a few young ones in weaving, too,” she says, “but there is a generational gap. Some of the youngsters treat a job as just a job because they’re used to doing part-time work in a supermarket. Mind you, if they were working somewhere else, they probably wouldn’t get 40 hours a week.”

Regardless of age, gender or background, there’s one particular character trait that everyone shares at Johnstons of Elgin. “You have to care,” says Alison. “There’s so much emphasis on the quality of the finished product, it’s not just you do your job and you go home. You have to take pride in what you’re doing.”

> Photography by Sam Walton