Posted in costume, london, textile on April 28, 2011 | 1 Comment »
There have been a lot of tv programmes about royal weddings recently – I took some photos of the television screen.
The story and images of Diana’s dress were particularly interesting – the second image is of David Emmanuel sorting out the cocoon after it emerged from the gilded carriage – there was so much fabric it had to be squashed in.
In the aerial views the dress looks like some kind of sea creature -
Posted in knit, mini, wicklow, wip on April 27, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Sallins, Russborough House, and Wicklow hills.
Not happy with the diagonals, but have decided to carry on and worry about the details later.
Rhododendron Gardens yesterday above, and the new hybrid below – it will have two more bands of stranding, then some lace, then a narrow band of stranding and a lace border – that’s the plan at the moment – I’m trying to use up the colours I have, so that might lead to some interesting combinations…
Posted in design, knit, pattern, yarn on April 20, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Some patterns take off and some don’t.
This one does not seem to have captured the public’s imagination, although it seemed to be quite an interesting idea, and potentially an interesting project.
It started off with an unused swatch for Cold Mountain. Then I played around with chopped up sections of photos of CM in Photoshop to invent new patterns.
I had been thinking about African textiles which sometimes have variations of patterns merging into each other – like some Kuba textiles.
Maybe I chose the wrong colours or yarn for the sample. Fortunately there are some hits to make up for the misses – and the ones that don’t even get published…
Thanks for the comments about the new stranded triangle pattern, it’s almost ready.
I’ve started a new stranded/lace hybrid, with 4 attempts to get the increasing right – it’s now increasing in an acceptable manner. The theme is Transdanubian bride. (Thanks to crocodile for the encouragement on these patterns!)
Two new lace ideas have been attempted & abandoned, and I’ve got as far as casting on for a swatch for a third, but I’m not in the mood for small needles at the moment.
Lopa on Ravelry has done a beautiful version of Kerchief – In Icelandic wool.
Posted in design, knit, new pattern, wip on April 13, 2011 | 3 Comments »
Barbara‘s second version is finished, and I’m putting the pdf together.
It’s going to be more colourful than usual.
Posted in design, garden, home, knit, latvia, mini, new pattern, pattern, ravelry, wip, yarn on April 9, 2011 | 6 Comments »
I love stranded knitting. This project was an abandoned design from around the time I started making Nine Lives. It was called Stranded Triangle – it’s quite an irregular triangle – the yarn is Rowan Pure Wool 4ply, on 3.25mm needles.
It was too small, there were too many increases in the striped stranding at the bottom, and it needed an extra lower border.
Barbara (crocodile on Ravelry) spotted the project on Ravelry and very kindly offered to do some test knitting – so the pattern has been salvaged and it’s called Mercato dei Fiori, after the Patti Pravo song. This picture shows a new version on bigger needles with fewer increases in the striped section – not enough! -
So I tried a third version of the chart, and played around with colours:
Barbara has done a second, more colourful version (which merits the fancy name) – it’s blocking at the moment! Pictures coming soon. The MC is indigo, with three different colours for the flowers, and red and deep pink stripes.
In the mean time, I unpicked the edge of the original version and added the outer border and a contrasting cast off:
I’m also trying out another drop stitch pattern in turquoise linen from Riga, and have two new lace patterns at the sketching stage.
Mini got a Spring haircut.
Posted in design, dublin, echo beach, garden, germany, knit, mini, nature, wip on April 4, 2011 | 1 Comment »
This is the variation of Echo Beach (with one dropped stitch instead of two), beautifully test knit by Teilzeitheldin with one skein of Wollmeise 100% Merino Superwash in the Uluru colourway.
When I was in Munich I was tempted to jump on a train to Pfaffenhofen to visit the Wollmeise shop, but it seems to have restricted opening hours.
Next is the first swatch for the pattern – the ktbl stitches looked funny when slanting to the right, so they needed to be twisted differently – and the single stitch between dropped stitches was too weak.
I bought a book.
It’s a small volume, full of fascinating old photos of knitters and fishermen, and charts for guernsey sweater stitch patterns – nothing too complex – inventiveness with knit and purl stitches and cables.
Finally, a trip to the Rhododendron Gardens above Howth Castle .
The yellow gorse looked spectacular against the sky and had a scent of coconut.
