The Story of The Honeycomb

One of the things I love about knitting is that each project has a story -- a history -- that sometimes only we as the Makers know, but regardless always serves as a secret source of pleasure each time we wear a handknit garment, or better, see a loved one wearing one. Mostly I'm reminded of the places I was at the time I was knitting, or the things that I was thinking about and exploring during that period. It's funny the things you remember based on the texture and fiber you had in your hands at the time.

So today I look at a small project that carries a random collection of memories from the last few years. Not such a long time in the grand scheme of things, but my life has changed so much during this period, that I feel particularly nostalgic and grateful looking back on it.

I'll often remember where I was when I cast-on for a new project. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's the whole genesis moment of something you hope will be a lifetime heirloom, or maybe it's just that heightened feeling of excitement when your hands, in anticipatory delight, finally get to test-drive a special new yarn. This memory usually serves as a channel marker for how long a project has been in-process. See, my knitting memory is very random -- it doesn't serve well for dates, durations or time periods but rather sensory and emotional outposts. In this case I know that this scarf has been hanging around for about three years, because I distinctly remember casting on in my old Brooklyn apartment on a Fall afternoon. Funny I thought then that I'd be done with it in time for winter, but projects tend to have their own plan.

The pattern for this scarf is another story too -- which brings back other funny memories. It was a free pattern I found in a random knitter's flickr photostream during one of my many unhappy days at my (former) 9-5 office job with eyes glazed in front of a computer screen. I spent many of those long days wishing I was home knitting and escaping by finding beautiful and inspiring knitting online to dream about.

Well, as it turns out, the pattern was posted on flickr illegally and taken down shortly thereafter by the request of the original author who, despite lots of sleuthing, I have been unable to locate again. [ETA -- the pattern has been found! See the notes at the end of the post for details] At that point, however, I had the pattern in hand (your partially-knitted fabric is the best pattern you can get!) and did little to worry about the fact that it had up and disappeared.

Fast forward to late summer 2009 when I stumbled across this half-knit gem at the bottom of one of my drawers, just in time for giddy Fall knitting -- an almost finished Yak scarf with cables in my favorite shade of grey? Perfection. And back into the light of day it came until its finish just weeks ago.

The yarn is a special one, too: a 50/50 Yak Merino blend with a smooth, 6-ply construction (perfect for popping cables) which I purchased at one of my favorite Manhattan locations, School Products. Because SP carries so many one-of-a-kind yarn imports from Italy, you never know what beautiful things you'll discover behind their doors, often finding yarns you'll never have the opportunity for again (which makes yardage planning more important than usual!)

A good old fashioned cabled scarf is never out of fashion in my mind -- This one is great, super simple - but very elegant and, in the right yarn, a new scarf staple for the steadfast lover of Classics.

ETA: The pattern has been found! Thanks to those of you so speedily joined the hunt! The scarf was designed by Beth Walker O'Brien and is entitled the "Aran Cashmere Scarf" [Ravelry Link] The pattern can be found in the book Simple 1-2-3 Knitting

It's my most favorite time of year for hunkering down at home surrounded by wool yarns and half-knit projects to quietly work and enjoy the start of Winter telling you to stay inside, enjoy what you have, and make beautiful things you feel proud of. Whether gift knitting or diligently keeping pace on long-term heirloom projects, I find the simple act of making stitches even more rewarding than usual this time of year. I hope you're enjoying yours as well.

New Look. Same Great Wool.

I'm proud to say that today welcomes a woefully overdue makeover to Brooklyn Tweed Proper. I've been slowly but surely redesigning my website with hopes of finishing it up by the first of the month. I may have missed my mark by a day or two, but I'm happy to show you my new duds at the new fangled www.brooklyntweed.net!

Click the image above for a peek.

Most notably, my travel schedule is now available all in one place for easy viewing, and easy locating! I have all my scheduled workshops through the end of the year listed presently and will be listing 2010 dates shortly. Additionally, the design section of the site has all my patterns in one place for ease in looking up pattern specifics or for purchasing where applicable.

I've gone for a clean, light look with hopes that things are easy to find and the space is nice on your eyes. I hope you like it! As for the blog -- my blogger site is linked directly from the main site at the moment. I intend on a more seamless (har, har) integration in the future, but I think we shouldn't change too much too fast, for fear of overstimulation or disorientation!

As for the knitting. Well. It's cable season.

I've been spending a good portion of my days on airplanes or in hotels and therefore have filled my life with small (portable) cable projects in some of my favorite yarns. Projects that don't require carrying anything other than a good sturdy circular needle and the knitting that's hanging off of it. Leave the cable needles and papers at home. That's my kind of travel!

I even squeezed in a little time for some... wait for it... handspinning. I know. I can hear you gasping from across The Expanse. It's been awhile! It felt wonderful hearing that comforting whirrrr of the wheel and letting the fiber flow.

This is a skein of 70% alpaca, 30% blue faced leicester wool spun rather lazily into a bulky, textural single. I'm new to alpaca spinning so this was a fun experiment. I intentionally fulled the yarn a bit during washing and love the finished texture. Who knows what this skein will become one day... for now I'm happy petting it on my way out the door.

AND. I finished something. (Audible Gasp #2) It's nice to know that when life is spiraling, we can at least finish a little luxuries for ourselves here and there, isn't it? This scarf has been 3 years in the making and will get a post of its own... but here's a sneak preview:

I'm off to Texas tomorrow and then jetting on to the West Coast (home!) to get a little reminder of how great Fall in the Pacific NW is. That and, oh did I mention, I'm an uncle now?! Prepare yourself for the Wool Onslaught, little one! (You have no idea what you've been born into....)

Fall Loves You, Wool. And So Do I.

Well. It's been a wild month of travel for me -- from Oklahoma City, to Philadelphia, to Texas, to New England and many a space in between. I've had the wonderful fortune of knitting with folks from all over the country and it has been an absolute pleasure. When I returned to Brooklyn on Monday for a two week break from airplanes, I sat down at my knitting window and realized that transition-time was over and Fall has, in my absence, made itself quite at home here in the city.

The click of the seasons is something that gives me pleasure beyond words, and Summer to Fall, not surprisingly, has got to be the most special time of year for us knitters. It's usually about the second week of October when my fingers start to twitch even more than usual for soft, wool sweaters on my needles and my eyes desire a bath of materials in rich, autumn heathers.

What else does October mean? It's the one time of year that I knowingly cast my self-control to the wind and embrace even my most irrational wool cravings, which means I generally acquire more during this period than any other. So, in the spirit of full disclosure, I might as well share with you some recent acquisitions from my travels and yarns that are frankly keeping me up at night with giddy anticipation.

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of visiting Historic Harrisville in New Hampshire -- home of some of my very favorite American-milled yarns and a historic treasure for our national textile tradition. I've been on a major lace knitting stint lately (before the sweater monster came to bite) and these are both slated for woollie shawls.

Harrisville Designs is like a wool-lovers paradise: walls of colorful, sturdy wools housed in a 2-century-old brick building nestled directly over a stream (if you peak through a knot-hole in the floor boards you'll see the flowing waters of the stream below). A destination for any knitter's New England itinerary... and a destination I hope to return to in the future.

Another wool that has recently sent me headlong into infatuation comes from the opposite coast and my home region of the Pacific Northwest. Imperial Stock Ranch makes beautiful, Oregon-grown yarns from their 125+ year old flock of Columbia Sheep (the farm, which is a National Historic District, has been responsible in part for developing this wonderful breed). The yarns are minimally processed using antique spinning techniques (a la many other favorite yarns you've heard me wax poetic about in the past -- Beaverslide Dry Goods in MT and Marr Haven in MI, most notably) and come in both two-ply woolen spun yarns (yum!) and a wonderful unspun bulky "puck", similar to Unspun Icelandic Wool. While the company has been in business for decades, their recent push into the world of hand knitting is one that I think is a very welcome addition to the industry.

And no Fall knitting would be complete without a healthy dose of Shetland Jumper-Weight wools straight from the island. You may be sick of me talking about my wool-standby, but I do start to get nervous if I'm away from this stuff for too long. To me, Shetland yarns are truly fine wines in our world of materials. With these? More lace. Always more lace.

I must sound like a glutton at this point, pulling in all this wool for Fall (there's more too...but we won't go there today) but if you can't be a wool glutton in the Fall, when can you be? And there's no better way to spend the afternoon than quietly working stitches in a good, solid wool as you watch the fading golden light play across the increasingly bare branches.

Despite the natural world telling us that Fall symbolizes the end of something, to me it represents a new beginning and a new inspiration. I hope you are feeling inspired by the wools under your roof and the cooler breezes that are causing us to grab our woolens on the way out the door. Lets enjoy it while it's here!

EZ Was Here

I'm a bit behind on sharing some of the wonderful experiences I've had in the past couple of months -- like, oh I don't know.... the day an original Elizabeth Zimmermann came walking through my door?

Many of you have hopefully already read about the surfacing of this historic garment over at Twist Collective and, if you haven't, don't worry -- I'll be directing you to the good stuff in just a moment.

Back in the spring, the lovely ladies of Twist came a calling with a question: Would I be interested in photographing an Elizabeth Zimmermann sweater that had recently surfaced through an old family friend in New Jersey? I paused momentarily to wonder seriously if I had slipped into one of my many knitting-fantasy-daydreams. When it seemed that, yes, this was actually happening, I mustered all of my self-control in an attempt to respond in a professional manner. "Yes. Yes, that would be fine."

Juuuuust fine.

The sweater, knit with a heathered green, firmly spun, single ply wool, entered the apartment with a palpable silence, and, upon immediate inspection I found myself admiring its industrious, masterful technique. Right away the sheer Integrity with which this sweater was achieved became evident: not just its obvious cleverness, or knitterly construction (EZ's Hallmark) but rather the serendipitous balance of tenacity and care that is so clearly present as your eyes maneuver over mitered hems, prim buttonholes and directional details.

At that point I muttered to myself something colossally obvious yet seemingly so epiphanous: "Elizabeth could really knit!"

Sunday Holm recreated the sweater after it was presented to her at a New Jersey LYS by Joan Morhard Smith, a childhood neighbor and friend of Elizabeth and Arnold. Read Sunday's account of decoding and re-knitting the original here, and Joan Morhard Smith's recollections of Elizabeth ("Betty") here.

What a pleasure to spend an afternoon with this sweater and its re-incarnated version. I was truly grateful for the experience.

The original sweater, so well-worn after two generations of love and adoration under Joan's roof, is a testament to the lasting power of good materials, good technique, and a good home -- all the ingredients for Knitting's finest heirlooms. Elbow holes aside (which I find make the sweater even more endearing, if that's possible) this garment has taken its ardent wearers through two lifetimes with strength and grace. What could be better than that?

Among the other appreciations this garment conjured up that day, it incited me to reflect on one of our loftiest and most noble knitting aspirations -- to spend a life making beautiful, lasting, technique-rich garments whose value and worth can never diminish.

Adding to the the thousands of times I've uttered these same words before in my life, both privately and publicly: Thank you, Elizabeth.

Baby Leggings

I've been doing a fair bit of traveling in the last two weeks and have committed to finishing a gaggle of small projects that I have lying around the house half-done. Knowing that I'll want to tackle lots of large, woolly projects in the very near future (hello, Fall weather!), I feel the need to do a little bit of project-house-cleaning. Consider yourself warned - you may see a few baby knits and old, forgotten accessories cropping up around here in the next couple of weeks. And today - the first one!

I put the finishing touches on the baby leggings last week and finally got around to shooting them this morning. Oh how I love those rich, golden colors! Seems fitting for those ghostly hints of Fall crispness that are taunting me these days.

Pattern: A modified version of Shibui Knits Baby Leggings by Heather Saal [Rav Link]

Size: 1 Year Old

Materials: Shibui Sock in "Honey"

Amount: 98g -- skating in at just barely under 2 skeins (Pattern Size calls for 3)

Needles: US 3 Circulars

I made a small number of modifications to the pattern. The original is written to be knit flat and seamed up at center front during finishing. That wasn't gonna fly around here, so the first item of business was to convert the pattern to in-the-round knitting, which wasn't hard at all. I didn't change any stitch counts, just ignored the back and forth instructions in favor of joining the end of the row to the beginning and working circularly.

I also opted for twisted stitch ribbing at the waist band and ankle-cuffs - a choice made to achieve a bit more elasticity - a great little perk of knitting things through the back loops. Since babies have stumpy little limbs, I figured the more elasticity the better.

The rest of the pattern is sweet and simple -- sizing for both 6 mos. and 1 year are given. I like to knit the larger sizes so the little growers can wear them longer. Plus, how cute is a 6 month-year-old in oversized baby pants?

The "diaper shaping" as I like to call it incorporates short rows and increases down center back to create an extra pouch-like space for baby 'bulk' (See Above Photo). The cord running through the eyelets at the waist band is crocheted (nice and firm but still elastic due to the nature of this bouncy, bouncy yarn) -- I tied two small knots on either end to keep it from slipping out of the holes.

All in all, a simple pattern with a charming result. You know I'm not a huge fan of The Superwash, but sometimes you gotta do it for the kids (and the parents, too)! And they really do suck up those saturated colors brilliantly, so there's plenty of hypnotic stitching to be had.

If you're interested in knitting a pair, be sure to check out Shibui's Pattern Page - lots of great patterns there to peruse if you have a few minutes! Now... time to send these babies back to Portland, from whence they came!

Made in Brooklyn | Accessories

Today we wrap up with a few stragglers from the collection who haven't fit into any other category yet. Both projects make great travel or gift knitting. And while I don't fancy myself an expert crocheter by any means, I thought I'd be crazy and throw something in for fun for the hook-lovers.

Meet Grove.

These mittens are an ornate little treasure for the hands. I've always loved the relief-like quality of twisted stitch knitting (knitting all knit stitches through the back loops) and how sculptural and graceful they look when used in travelling-stitch and lace patterns.

The interesting thing about the main motif on the tops of the hands is that there is no cabling involved - the motif is formed by yarn overs and twisted knit decreases so I guess technically should be considered lace, albeit a well-disguised version. The cuffs on both hands do utilize traveling stitches in a spiral pattern that is mirror-imaged on either side to add that special detail.

There's something enticing about mitten knitting - maybe the way they remind us of childhood winters, or how they don't really make sense for adults who are constantly in need of finger dexterity (mittens are a great way to drop expensive little electronics down a large flight of stairs - ask me, I know), or that they're just more enjoyable to knit than other things for your hands? Nevertheless, it seems that mitten knitting is alive and well, and that makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

And finally, Metropolitan.

So these. I spent a lot of time staring at a few big, beautiful hanks of Aspen - a super bulky, heathered wool/alpaca blend that comes in a gorgeous array of autumnal colors - thinking What, Oh What am I to do with you? Super bulky presents a funny problem: it's fun to knit for the instant gratification and larger-than-life sculptural quality of your stitches, but not as practical for daily wear because it's, well... super bulky. The other sticking point is that the yardage isn't exactly what you'd call generous - the fiber you could use for thousands of yards of lace schlumps itself into mere double digits in the super-bulky arena.

So my personal design challenge was this: what can you do with one skein (approx. 51 yards) of Aspen that isn't a hat? And as I was mulling this over on my morning commutes to and from school, I found myself marveling at how all of my fellow commuters, while jammed together on a crowded train, were so perfectly isolated from one another by virtue of a fantastic modern wonder that we call Noise Cancelling Headphones. You know, the big, shell-like headphones that make you look like a cool, urban fighter pilot? Do you see where I'm going with this?

Then: the light bulb. Earmuffs! Inspired by these insular electronic devices! Or even, earmuffs to wear over your insular electronic devices! Well, now I was getting a little carried away, but more or less this is how these things came to be.

Metropolitan is a simple crochet project, worked on two different sizes of giant hooks (Huge and Really Huge) for a structural pair of muffs. The ear "shell" is shaped by changing hook size - trust me, I'm not fancy enough to design other means of shaping in crochet with super-bulky yarn - we're keeping it simple.

But the best news about this is that they use just under one skein (including tassels), can be worked in about an hour or less and are perfect for last minute gifts for that person in your life with quirky winter style. And if I can hook it, so can you - trust me.

And with that, we wrap up our official coverage of Made in Brooklyn - I hope you enjoy the collection and thank you already to all of you who have sent such supportive and wonderful e-mails about the work. It is very much appreciated.

In travel news - I'll be headed out to Western Mass this weekend with the trunk show for some teaching workshops. Be sure to stop by WEBS to see the garments in person if you're a local and need a knitting fix!

ETA: If you've been searching for a copy of Made in Brooklyn and haven't been able to find a retailer, you can use CE's "Where to Buy" page to find local shops that stock it here.

The booklet is also available online through CE's website here.

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RAVELRY LINKS

Grove on Ravelry

Metropolitan on Ravelry

Made in Brooklyn | Sweaters for Her

More sweaters today - this time for the ladies!

OH! Before we get in to that, though, I wanted to remember to mention this: although MiB's sweaters may be written out for men or women, I encourage everyone to experiment! Sometimes the only difference between a men's sweater and a women's sweater is the presence of waist shaping and some simple proportion changes (like yoke depth, arm/body length). If you've fallen for a specific design but it's for the wrong gender, please feel free to use the pattern as a guide: take measurements off of a sweater you love (and whose fit you agree with) and go for it! And with that brief soap-box moment out of the way, I present the sweaters:

Meet Stilwell.

More colorwork. More tweed. When I first got the colorcard for Portland Tweed, I was playing with a lot of combos and this one kept coming back to me as something I'd like to knit with. A rich, chocolaty brown coupled with a very dusty, subtle, almost grey (my favorite adjectives for almost any color) shade of pink.

It's a good old fashioned seamless raglan ("If it ain't broke, don't fix it" comes to mind) with some colorwork detailing on the yokes and cuffs. I wanted to do a bit of mixing and matching of styles with traditional Norwegian star motifs and more contemporary elements like a fitted body, 3 quarter length sleeves and shaped collar.

The piece is worked with a henley neck as well. For colorwork patterns, I instruct knitters to use one needle size for one-color stockinette portions, and a larger needle size (2 or 3 sizes up, whatever gets you correct gauge) for all colorwork portions. This is necessary to obtain the same stitch gauge between two different fabrics within one garment. Row gauge is significantly different in colorwork, but that's been accounted for in the design, so stitch gauge is the key - in this way the tension in the fabric is kept constant throughout.

I remember knitting a colorwork yoke sweater from a pattern years ago, all with the same needle size, and how the tension change in the yoke drove me crazy. I've since been experimenting with ways of never making that happen again. This works for me! Anyway - I guess what I'm trying to say is, to save time and frustration when knitting projects with both one-color and two-color stockinette portions, find what gets you the same stitch gauge for each and use those two needle sizes for best results.

Tangents! Tangents! Ahem.

Meet Redhook.

One of the reasons I love Fall so much is the prevalence of layering. People are rocking the layered look everywhere you look and that makes for interesting and inspiring style, not to mention a good way to mix up a wardrobe that can start to feel reeeeaally boring after all those stifling summer months of wearing one thing at a time. Layering is all about contrast: long and short garments, fabric weights and warmths, and maybe most importantly, color! So with all of that in mind, Redhook was conceived as a fun monkey wrench to throw into your layering mix. Vests in general are great for this type of thing because they can be worn under outerwear with no bulk at the arms, and less overheating.

I wanted a garment that could be worn as a stand-alone, or layered easily, had a simple shape and a couple of nice details - like a luxurious collar! I can't get enough of those.

I also fell in love with this color. Moorland is a single-ply heathered yarn that comes in a wonderful group of earthtones (very, very hard to make color decisions on this one). The thing that really floored me about the yarn was the drape after washing - it got super silky and smooth, and very much took me by surprise after I picked it up off the blocking board (who am I kidding, the carpet of a guest room in Portland, Oregon). It was warm and light, and even more perfect for pairing with other clothes. Bonus points!

Redhook involves lots of fun with short-rows. Both sleeve caps and shawl collar/buttonband are all worked directly off of the body fabric from picked-up sts and shaped with short rows.

And finally, Seneca.

Sometimes, scratch that, most times, design ideas hit you at the oddest times. Like when you're sitting, twitching, in jury duty (which makes it even more unbearable, as you're already thinking about how much you'd rather be at home knitting). I had been wanting to knit a rounded yoke pullover with cables that weren't vertical, and desperately wanted to keep it all in one piece. I had been chewing on that idea until BAM! Jury duty brought me to sideways cables.

Sideways cables are interesting - if you've never worked them, here's how they roll: They seem as if to appear out of nowhere on a stockinette or reverse stockinette background. This occurs by a severe increase, usually 5 stitches into one and working the cable directly from that point. When the cable is done, you use a fancy 5-to-1 decrease and you're back to your stockinette fabric. They're like little intermissions from your mindless stockinette meditation.

AND - they perfectly suit round yoke sweaters, which are shaped with intermittent decrease rings throughout the yoke - in Seneca, they're stashed between cable motifs, so that the stitch counts are never interrupted when cabling, which is a major sigh of relief.

A note before I forget about this one: Because of the rather dramatic nature of the fabric manipulation - the severe increasing for the cables and severe decreasing for the round yoke - you'll definitely want to do an official blocking job (I really recommend full-immersion for this) to smooth all of that out after completion. Sweater fabric always looks better after this process, (always) but this sweater benefits from it especially.

Sidways cables are also thrown in on the cuffs for a little extra interest and weight there. Because the sweater is a worsted weight fabric, I generally advise about 3-5" of ease for a classic fit. My model was about 5-6" smaller than the garment and liked the cozy feeling of a little ease added in. I'm a big fan of a little room in my sweaters, especially in warmer fibers like angora.

That rounds out the sweater portion of this tour. Stay tuned for the last two stragglers from the booklet in the next couple of days.

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RAVELRY Links

Stilwell on Ravelry

Redhook on Ravelry

Seneca on Ravelry (Also available as an individual PDF download)