The crofting year has a task for every season but mostly generates income in kind. Income comes from a surprising range of economic activity.
Many islanders combine several part-time jobs with their croft work.
The ferry, school and other public service jobs are important but income also comes from the knitwear co-op, wildlife tourism, a local building firm and the shop and post office. Fair Isle boasts a violin maker, a stained glass artist, a builder of traditional wooden boats and makers of traditional chairs and spinning wheels. The term 'Fair Isle Knitting' is now used worldwide for a type of stranded colour knitting with horizontal bands of geometric patterns. But this unique style developed on Fair Isle long ago, when local knitters discovered that fine yarns stranded into a double layer produce durable, warm, yet lightweight garments. For hundreds of years demand for hand-knitting kept Fair Isle women busy.