Red Queen fair isle pullover: finished!

Happy Friday! Thank you for your comments on being "back". I'm still trying to catch up on life after the last several weeks. :)

As promised, I have photos to share of my latest knitted sweater. I actually started this last November if you can believe it. For some reason I only worked on this one in fits and spurts, with the final spurt being to finish it up to wear to Rhinebeck last weekend. My flight was Friday and I was setting in the sleeves Thursday night after packing. Of course, it was in the mid-60s all weekend but I wore it anyway!

The pattern is Red Queen (Ravelry link) by Lorraine Condotta. Lorraine does amazing fair isle patterns (she's also the designer of my Scare Isle beret). You can see the original is a traditional boxy style Shetland pullover:

{Copyright © Lorraine Condotta}

But I gave it a more vintage shape. I do this so often I swear I need a name for it. Maybe I "vintaged" it?

I knit this in the smallest size and changed the armhole shaping and the sleeve shape. The body was knit in the round with the armholes and neckline steeked, and the sleeves were knit together separated by steeks, then cut apart, sewn and set in. I find stranded knitting more enjoyable over a larger diameter so I like that method for sleeves.

I also added buttons across one shoulder. That modification was a happy accident. As I was furiously trying to get in a bit of knitting before my extended work project that led up to Rhinebeck, I miscalculated my neckline shaping and couldn't get me head through. Whoops. So I added a button band across one shoulder and used three small vintage buttons to close it up.

I love it!

 I just love the mix of the traditional fair isle patterns with the little crowns!

The yarn is Brooklyn Tweed LOFT, a relatively loosely-spun fingering weight. I don't generally find that yarn needs a learning curve, but this one did for sure. I already knew from Ravelry that it had a reputation of being fragile—yank too hard and it will break. This is true (though it's easy to spit splice it back). If you're a tight knitter you might have a hard time knitting with it. I also had to knit it on much smaller needles than I'd normally knit fingering weight on to get the same gauge: 2.5mm vs. 3-3.25mm.

It knits up to be a warm and dense fabric when stranded, but very lightweight and comfy! And the colors are way more gorgeous in person... difficult to capture that in photos (the lighting was really giving me troubles which didn't help).

I'm really thrilled with how this pullover came out once I finally devoted myself to finishing it almost a year after starting it! And I think it really shows you don't have to shy away from modern patterns even if your style is more retro. A few little tweaks here and there and you can make it work for you. I love vintage knitting patterns but I also love working with modern patterns and supporting knitwear designers, too!

 Hope you have a great weekend!

Simple beauty of a steek in my fair isle knit

I sat down to do a post catching you up on our painting success after my retro fail living room post, but on the camera I found photos Mel and I took a couple of weeks ago when I was cutting the armhole and neckline steeks for my current fair isle project.

So instead, I just wanted to share with you the beauty you can find (or at least I can find) in knitting photos. A simple, traditional task in a fair isle knit, cutting a bridge of stitches in your knitting to open up an armhole, neckline or cardigan front, looks so serene and pretty when followed in just a few pictures. Well okay, maybe the scissors do look a bit scary.

Armhole before the snipping begins...

Snip, snip...

Armhole after the cut....

I'm (slowly) knitting plain red sleeves (the same red as in the body), out from the armhole with shaped sleeve caps, a method outlined well in Custom Knits by Wendy Bernard. I initially planned to knit the sleeves flat two at a time, but having just done that for my Knit It In Flag Colors pullover, I needed a change. That's just too many red sleeves knit flat, two at a time! So I switched it up for this one. I'm going slowly because I haven't had much time for knitting lately (too much planning on the home decor front), and because they're kind of boring.



Sorry, not much of interest for non-knitters in this post... hm, well, here's one tidbit: that's a vintage blouse I'm wearing (probably from the 50s, and I believe home sewn), with a delightful mini strawberry and diamond print. And it's reversible to pink on the inside. How clever is that!

Fair isle beret & lace gloves for Fall

Fall! 'Tis the season for knitters everywhere to enjoy their woolies!

I was determined to get a bit of accessory knitting in early for Fall, and diligently started back in August when I first got bitten by the Fall bug. My initial plans were for a matching fair isle beret and fingerless gloves from the book Vintage Knits by Sarah Dallas, as well as a pair of gloves from this free vintage pattern and a beret in the same yarn to make a matched set. I knit the lace gloves first, and wanted to knit the fair isle beret next to break up the type of knitting I was working on, but I had a suspicion that two sets of matching beret/gloves would be asking a bit much of my attention span when I had other knits on my mind, too. So I included the yarn used for the gloves in one of the motifs in the beret, thus giving me the opportunity to wear those together as a set!

First, the beret.

The beret is knit in a mix of yarns, from Shetland to cashmere merino hand-dyed. It was fun to knit, however there was an error in the pattern in the book that I had to correct before I started. The motif in the chart was incorrect compared to the sample knit in the book and the tiny picture of the original vintage (the patterns in the book are all based on vintage patterns). I was able to tell looking at the chart as the motif wasn't mirrored, and just looking at it you could tell something was amiss. Fair isle is always well-balanced, and this obviously wasn't. So I re-charted it and knit from my chart. The only other change I made was to knit the ribbing using about 15 less stitches than called for, since I wanted it to stay nice and tight. I just made up for the difference in the number of stitches I increased in the first row after the rib.

The gloves were easy to knit, except the fingers. I always avoid knitting fingers because they are a giant pain in the rear, but I knew I wanted these to be gloves so I did it anyway. In the end I'm glad I did, even though I think the fit could be a bit better between the hand and fingers. However there's no way I would rip back 10 fingers to try and change that, so they'll be enjoyed as they are. :)

The lace pattern was easy to knit and only had 4 rows to the pattern, but I charted it on paper because knitting lace by reading rows is a bit of a chore.

The cuff was quite interesting in the pattern. It uses a picot hem on the front of the wrist, and ribbing on the back to keep them nice and tight. I couldn't quite envision how it would all work before I started knitting, so it was fun to see it take shape. Sometimes knitting can be like that, you don't really know what will happen until you do it!

I also lengthened the cuffs quite a bit compared to the original pattern, as I particularly wanted to wear them with my green jacket which has sleeves that hit just above my wrist.

Truly it's not quite cold enough to need gloves just yet so I only donned them for the photos, taken outside an interesting old apartment building in my neighborhood. But they do look swell together, I think!

Anyway, I'm quite pleased with both projects. While my head is spinning with other fun accessories, it's time to get to some sweater knitting. A big batch of yarn arrived in the mail today and I'm so excited to get to it (hint: it's for my Colorwork: 101 sweater)!

Are you knitting anything fun for Fall??

Possible Land Girl knit-along?

Hi everyone, I'm back from vacation! I love when you have a good trip but are gone long enough that it also feels really nice to be back home! I have tons of catching up to do on blogs and of course at least one vacation round-up post to write, so you'll be seeing more of me soon again!

But first, I had to post something I was mulling over on vacation. As the weather shifts more towards Fall (not that you'd know it by our weather here today!), I'm definitely thinking about cooler weather knits. I have my eye on some good basic projects, but am feeling particularly inspired by colorwork, especially fair isle. On Ravelry I've been queuing tons of fair isle and stranded projects and flagging lots of things in my patterns at home.

Are you wondering why I just made a distinction between fair isle and stranded knitting? Some people use the term fair isle to refer to any kind of knitting where you have 2 colors going in a row at the same time, alternating to form a colored pattern. Something like this...

{source}

Or this...

{source}

Both are awesome vintage patterns, but neither are truly fair isle. The first is really stranded knitting, carrying the unused color at the back of the work. The second is a mix of stranding and intarsia, which creates blocks of two or more colors by dropping a strand of one color and picking it back up in a particular manner in that location in the next row, as done in the reindeer section. Vintage patterns in particular often used the term fair isle to refer to both stranded and intarsia knitting techniques.

However, the term fair isle knitting is more appropriately used to refer to a particular type of stranded knitting, originating in the Shetland Islands of Scotland (and most specifically, the island of Fair Isle itself). It's made up of distinctive patterns including (but not limited to) Xs and Os, in bands, with no more than two colors in a row. The vest below is a recreation/interpretation of the famous fair isle sweater given to the Prince of Wales in 1921. As a result of that sweater and the Prince's incorporation of several other fair isle items into his wardrobe, fair isle gained popularity in fashion in the 20s and 30s.

© Interweave Press, from the book Folk Vests

You'll find lots of stranded knitting in published knitting patterns from the 30s through the 60s, though much of what was dubbed "fair isle" in those patterns was really just stranded knitting or intarsia, with the patterns not really resembling those originating in Shetland at all. Many knitting traditions all over the world include stranded knitting, so I personally only use the term fair isle when I'm talking about stranded patterns originating from or obviously inspired by those from Shetland. Otherwise I use the term stranded. It's really only because I'm slightly obsessed with fair isle and stranded knitting that I wanted to briefly mention this distinction. :) If you're interested in learning more about fair isle, I highly recommend either The Art of Fair Isle Knitting or Alice Starmore's Book of Fair Isle Knitting as starting points on fair isle patterns, color theory and history. Both are worth their weight in gold!

Anyway, it's no surprise that my love of stranded and fair isle knitting includes lots of vintage inspirations! In the last several weeks I've been daydreaming about fair isle patterns. Looking at vintage ones, looking at modern ones that have a vintage feel, or thinking of ways to make other patterns fit into my wardrobe.

This got me to thinking... I'd been promising for awhile that I'd organize another knit-along, after having so much fun with the Briar Rose Knit-along earlier this year, but I hadn't nailed down a pattern yet. It definitely had to be vintage or have a distinct vintage feel to it, be appropriate for fall or winter, and incorporate some interesting techniques.

And I hit on what I think is a winner! It's a pattern I was already planning to knit (in fact I'd already ordered yarn for it). I realized it might be just the thing for a fall/winter knit-along.

So, would any of you be up for a Land Girl sweater knit-along?

This is a pattern by Debbie Bliss that's been published in a few of her books and magazines, and is also available to purchase online. It's alternately titled "Land Girl Sweater" and "1940s Style Sweater" in different publications. You can find it on Ravelry is here.

It's a modern pattern with a great vintage look, inspired by vintage fair isle and stranded sweaters. It features repetitive pattern bands like fair isle border patterns. I personally would knit this with long sleeves, as sweaters like this are by nature thicker due to the stranded yarn on the back of the work, and I've determined over time that thick but short sleeves just doesn't work for me.

I love everything about the shape of this sweater. And being a bit of a nut about names, of course it's highly appealing to me that it draws inspiration (and its name!) from the Women's Land Army!

{source}

Some of the things I was thinking of covering if I do run a knit-along for this sweater...

• two-color stranded knitting for the beginner, including appropriate yarn selection and knitting with a colored chart
• upsizing the pattern (it's a modern pattern but unfortunately only written for 2 sizes)
• optionally knitting it long-sleeved
• optionally changing the neckline to a crew neck if you don't like the collar
• optionally converting the pattern to knit in the round and steeking

The pattern as written is knit flat, which is the way almost every commercially-produced vintage pattern is written. I've knit plenty of stranded knitting flat, but it's kind of a pain in the rear on the purl rows. Instead, I think this would be a great pattern to steek if you were up for it. You'd knit in the round up to the armpit and cast on for a small bridge of stitches for your armholes and center neck placket that you'd later cut. Yes, cut! It's a traditional technique that nearly eliminates the need to ever purl in stranded knitting. It's only scary the first time you try it, so try it on a couple of swatches first! Once you've done it, it feels like you've worked knitting magic, and I'd go so far as to say it's kind of thrilling. It's a great technique to have in your knitting arsenal. But for those who would prefer to knit it flat and not steek, you would of course be welcome to knit it that way, too!

I was thinking the knit-along would run at least 3 if not 4 months or longer, since this would be a pretty big project to tackle. I'd say it would be suitable for adventurous advanced beginners or intermediate knitters and up. It would be a nice first stranded sweater project as there isn't an overwhelming number of colors to try and select, and the patterning itself is repetitive. I wouldn't go into quite the level of detail on resizing as I did for Briar Rose, but there would be plenty of information on all the techniques. I'm sure those of you who followed along with my first KAL know I love to be thorough!

So, I pass it over to you to find out if anyone would actually be interested, since what works in your head doesn't necessarily appeal to others!

Would you be interested in participating in a land girl sweater knit-along?

I'm testing the waters, so please let me know in the comments or email me if you'd like to join a knit-along for this! If there is enough interest, I'll write up my ideas and come up with a kick-off date. If not, I'll just knit it myself. ;) Feel free to pass along a link to this post if you know other vintage knitters who might like to join in!

I'd love to hear your thoughts and suggestions. Thanks!!