Inspiration
Wooly Bats and Sabbath Hats
It’s a Saturday in July 2025. Birmingham (UK) is practically vibrating with excitement. Metalheads have descended on the city, their big black boots thudding against the pavement as they make their pilgrimage to Villa Park. It’s far too warm for leather, but no one seems to care—Ozzy is in town.
This is his last gig, and while the stadium screens promise fire and fanfare, what catches my eye is something far smaller and stranger: crocheted postbox toppers, scattered across the city like secret shrines.
Each one is a wooly tribute to a Black Sabbath album, lovingly reimagined in yarn. It’s fifteen seconds of joy for every passer-by.
Birmingham is the undisputed birthplace of heavy metal. In 1968, out of the smoke and steel of the West Midlands, four working-class lads formed Black Sabbath—and with them, a sound the world had never heard before.
Their music was thunderous, their lyrics bleak and beautiful, echoing the industrial backdrop of a city still finding its post-war footing. And at the helm: Ozzy Osbourne, equal parts mischief, menace, and magnetic frontman.
Across decades, breakups, reunions, and bat-related scandals, Ozzy carved out a legacy both with Sabbath and as a solo artist. But in 2017, he stepped away from touring. Not long after, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.
By early 2025, complications from the illness meant he could no longer walk, let alone ride the Crazy Train. Which is why this moment matters so much. This isn’t just a final gig, it’s a farewell tour down the road to nowhere, one last bow before the curtains close. It’s a homecoming. A goodbye.
For Birmingham, it’s a celebration of one of its loudest, proudest exports. For fans, it’s a chance to say thank you. For Ozzy, it’s a moment of recognition: no longer the wild man of metal, but something softer, stranger, and maybe more powerful: a legend wrapped in wool and memory.
Laina Davis is the woman behind Birmingham’s most metal postboxes. She taught herself to crochet from a library book at the age of nine, inspired by a friend who was making a poncho. “I just wanted to see if I could do it,” she says. And she could.
She grew up just streets away from where Black Sabbath themselves took shape. “Around 12 years old, my school pal and future husband got into Sabbath,” she tells me, “and I did too. But only the Ozzy era. Always the Ozzy era.”
She saw them live twice in the ’70s. That music, loud, heavy, full of grief and grit, became the sound of her youth.
Now, decades later, during a period of deep depression and longing for the past, she found herself obsessively researching the band again. Childhood homes. Old interviews. Lost details. “I yearned for the ’70s again,” she says.
An idea hit. She’d seen postbox toppers before, but they felt a bit samey. “What if,” she thought, “I could freeform crochet one of the Sabbath albums?”
She started sketching. She had no idea if the pieces would work together until they were done. “It kind of evolved slowly,” she explains. “But hyperfocus kicked in. It helped me forget about my troubles. It even transported me out of this turbulent modern age.”
The first topper, inspired by Master of Reality, was placed quietly on a postbox. She felt silly doing it but what happened next was surreal: fans started sharing it online, and then band member Geezer Butler himself posted a photo of her work. “I cried tears of joy,” she says. “That honor inspired me to keep going.”
Next came Vol. 4, complete with a 3D Ozzy throwing the peace sign, then Paranoid, which quickly became a local favorite. She added a set of handmade vinyl doll werewolves dressed as Sabbath—Pack Sabbath—and the whole project took on a life of its own.
To date, the postbox hats (as Geezer lovingly called them) have been seen by over five million people, thanks to a feature in the fan-made documentary Back to the Beginning. “This art came from a need to feel better,” she tells me. “I never expected it to make others feel better too.”
At first glance, it’s hard to imagine two worlds more different than heavy metal and knitting. One screams; the other soothes. One distorts guitars; the other counts stitches. But look a little closer, and the threads start to twist together.
Craft has always been a space for tribute and rebellion. We yarnbomb statues. We stitch protest banners. We knit in public when we’re told to sit down and be quiet.
And here in Birmingham, someone looked at a Black Sabbath album cover and thought: that needs to be yarn. That instinct isn’t silly—it’s radical. It says this music matters so much, it deserves to be remade by hand.
It’s not merch. It’s memory. And in its own quiet way, it’s metal as hell.
Later that evening, as Ozzy’s final notes echo through the city, I walk past one last topper. It’s a fuzzy rendition of Paranoid, slightly wonky on a red postbox outside a corner shop. Someone’s tucked a tiny plastic bat under the brim. It’s ridiculous. It’s perfect. It makes me smile so hard I forget to take a photo.
Sometimes, the loudest tribute is the quietest one. No bats, no fire, just a little postbox wearing its love on its sleeve. Black Sabbath once asked, “Can you help me occupy my brain?”
And someone answered, not with noise, but with needles.
On July 22, 2025, Ozzy Osbourne died at the age of 76.
beautiful crochet hommage !!
Trend prediction: Tiny Tributes – Free-form-crochet edition. Pithy instructions, YouTube videos, kit support, special mention on MDK, shout-outs from Arne& Carlos and Kate from Last Homely House. Little. Tiny. Bats. on stitch markers. (Seriously, once you can do a good bat in free-form crochet, pretty much everything else is in your reach.).
Brilliant. Simply brilliant. The writing, the content, the message. Thank you.
Agree completely.
This made me cry for so many reasos.
This article is a testament to the relationship of our crafts and creativity to *everything* – our well-being, our past, our community, what makes us happy, and how we bring happiness to other people. Thank you, Ashleigh-ellan and Laina Davis – a great journey through Birmingham!
Loved this essay, so insightful and really fun! I was never a fan but I wish you RIP Ozzy.
What a wonderful essay; thank you. As an early fan of Black Sabbath, I love the postbox toppers!
RIP Ozzy.
Beautifully said. Thank you.
Wonderful art, and a beautifully written story about it. Thank you!
Love this! Thank you so much for sharing.
So good! Thanks.
Wonderful tribute!
“Laina”= wool. Love this so much. Rock ‘n roll !
Enjoyed the entire article, especially the last line.
Thank you!
What lovely story!
Incredibly moving, unexpected. Thank you so much.
Beautiful! Thanks for writing such a wonderful tribute to an awesome tribute.
This was so fun to read. RIP Ozzie.
I am a fan of obituary reading, the ultimate short story. Thanks much for a lovely essay and tribute.
Oh my. You got me crying over heavy metal and post box toppers.
Goodnight Ozzy.