Knitty Friday

A Knitty, we are big fans of the “deceptively simple” – a piece that looks effortless to wear. A piece that seems to be simple in construction but has a clever twist. A piece with a clever variation that makes you look at something in a whole new way. Laura Barker’s Pinwheel shawl, from our most recent issue, checks all three boxes. It’s a large rectangular shawl, worked from the center out – so no pesky purling! – and which allows you to show off a gradient yarn. And she provides a neat way to pin it so it drapes like a vest – ideal for summer-time, when you need a bit ...

I love Joline’s Stiorra sweater. It’s just so very elegant. This tweedy version of Inhabit  by Esuzabeth is a winner! Franzfranz‘s alpaca Gocce is splendid. Making me wish the warmer weather would hurry up, Fishie‘s version of Lake Diamond is worked in fingering weight yarn held triple – very clever! Designer and friend of Knitty Laura Nelkin is proud to wear this lovely pair of Rectify socks, made for her by a friend of hers. Aw, @lkgervitz made me socks…. feeling lucky (and clearly it is working to be very vocal about not being a sock knitter!!!) They are Rectify by @baldguyknits ...

The designer of this issue’s fabulous Stiorra sweater writes about the design on her blog. We adore this sweater: it’s lacy, but not too delicate, and just so very wearable. I think my favourite detail is the shirt-tail hem. Ewelina’s blog post also has links to a bunch of helpful resources, too. The sweater uses a clever “horizontal rib” technique around the neck, to avoid it stretching. She’s created a very helpful tutorial. And she’s also got both written instructions, and a full version of the Back Lace chart. Speaking of charts, we’ve also got an alternative chart ...

It’s spring! Apparently. Where I am, it’s still grey and brown, and it’s going to be a few more weeks before we see much in the way of greenery or flowers. Although the cold and snowy winter days get tiresome, I think this ‘season’ – after the snow but before things start growing – can feel the longest here in the Northeast of North America. It’s just so very drab. You’re still mostly wearing your dark winter clothes, mornings are darker with the shift to Daylight Savings Times, and there’s no colour outdoors, and with all that pre-summer rain, there seems ...

Our Surprises launched a couple of weeks ago, there’s already some terrific projects taking shape. Genesneaky‘s Here Be Dragons socks are looking terrific. A dramatic color choice, but not so dark that you can’t see the patterning. Fab. AndreaFL‘s Talula looks very promising… I adore this color choice. And bonus points for a really beautiful swatch…. And Calenia‘s Stars in the Twilight shawl is absolutely gorgeous in an unexpected but fantastic colour.

In the northeast of North America, after a very warm fall and year-end, winter has finally hit with a vengeance. It’s messed me up terribly. We didn’t experience that slow slide into colder weather that we typically do in November and December: early this month we had about a week of transition and then boom it’s well below freezing and there’s snow on the ground. This mean that there wasn’t the usual slow wardrobe transition, when you progressively dig through the strata of winter gear in the closest. Just two weeks ago, I was wearing a light coat and a single layer of mittens and no ...

The Winter issue features a new design from one our favourite hat designers,  Woolly Wormhead. Bimtral is classic Woolly: flattering and easy to wear, and all sorts of fun to knit. It’s worked sideways – not just for fun, but to address the properties of the yarn that Woolly chose. The yarn is a wonderful blend of camel and silk, which is soft but not wildly stretchy. So Woolly turned the hat 90 degrees, substituting sideways garter for the usual lower-edge ribbing. But because it’s worked sideways, it requires a graft to finish. But this graft is not your usual – it’s grafted in a very ...

I’m grateful for all the love for my Sidekick boot socks. (Funny story: You can’t tell in these pictures, but the boots I was wearing had just developed a hole, and needed replacing. Shortly after we took these pictures, I got myself a new pair, and the first thing I did was make sure they still worked with socks. Because priorities.) I’m not going to bang on about how you’ve probably got a lot of variegated sock yarn in your stash that needs using up, and how this is a great way to use up and tame a busy variegated yarn. And I’m not going to talk about how longer sock legs can take a ...

Today we have another in a series of occasional guest posts from JC Briar, developer of the Stitch Maps charting solution. Let’s get something straight right up front. I don’t mind “no stitch” symbols, at least when they’re used appropriately. I get that sometimes they’re needed in grid-based charts to show where the stitch count changes. But, the charts for Cameo Flower have a lot of “no stitch” symbols, don’t they? So many “no stitch” symbols, in fact, that they make it a little hard to see what’s going on in the pattern. Take the Filigree chart, for example. Although the designer placed these “no ...

Hello! This is Kate with her Technical Editor Hat on! The topic of blocking came up a few times when I was editing the patterns for this most recent issue, and I thought it was worth discussing… The word “block” tends to send knitters into a bit of a tizzy. (It did me, for years. I’m not ashamed to admit it.) It seems so complicated, with all these pieces of equipment like mats and wires and pins and buckets and towels and special washes and goodness knows what else. The word “block” is actually a very general term: think of it like “cook”. When you “cook” ...