Two bright pink houses crocheted for art installation

If you thought crocheting a scarf was hard, try crocheting a house. 

A crocheting expert and a team of female volunteers have turned two homes into bright pink art installations, as a message of support for the world’s refugees. 

The two houses in Avesta, Sweden and Kerava, Finland have been completely covered in wool, crocheted in detailed patterns by a Polish artist known as Olek.  

Olek says she wanted the project to be a ‘symbol of hope’ for refugees who have lost their homes.

“The pink house, our pink house is a symbol of a bright future filled with hope. Everybody should have a home,” she writes on her website.

“In 2015 over 21 million people lost their homes due to war and conflicts in their native countries. We can show everybody that women can build houses, women can make homes. “This is my goal: create public art, teach new skills, provide employment and empower women.”

Olek worked with a team of refugees mostly from Syria who had crossed the Mediterranean Ocean after their homes were destroyed. 

The house in Finland was donated by war refugee Karl Svensk and the yarn was donated by Red Hearts Yarn. 

Olek had first been commissioned to create smaller crocheted pieces inside a traditional house, for a museum in Sweden.

But she says she was so moved by the stories of the refugee women she was working with, she decided to destroy that house in an explosion to ‘illustrate the current unfortunate situation worldwide where hundred of thousands of people are displaced,’ she says. 

The pink houses therefore represent the possibility of a brighter future that comes after a shared struggle, and the power of collaborative efforts. 

The houses took 2 months to crochet, around the same amount of time it takes some people to make a scarf.