News for 2015

I know it's only the end of September, but I've been busy thinking ahead to what exciting plans I have for you for 2015.

2015 Programme of workshops at Hazel Court, Swansea.

 

I've been busily compiling the 2015 programme of workshops at Hazel Court, Swansea which are now available to book here. There are a few new subjects for next year as well as some 'staple' ones that continue to be in demand,  so hopefully there will be something of interest for you all. I'm particularly excited about Lavish Lace, for developing your lace skills further - this is ideal for those of you who will have attended  An Introduction to Lace Knitting, but don't worry if you missed out on that - if you can knit and purl and follow a simple pattern you will be able to undertake this class.

As many of you may know, I love colour so I'm really looking forward to  Fathoming Fairisle which will provide you with a solid introduction to this popular technique.


I'm sure many of you will be delighted to know that the lovely Alison Crowther-Smith and I will be undertaking another 'foreign tutor exchange' scheme where we cross the border to teach a workshop at each others' venue - This year I will be teaching Intermediate Crochet on 21 February at Alison's wonderfully cosy Somerset studio, and Alison will be joining us at Hazel Court for a frill bonanza with Frill Seekers on 21 March.

All workshops (excluding those with a guest tutor) are available to book at the 2014 price of £30 if booked by the end of this year.

New Workshop Loyalty Reward Club

 

As a thank you to those of you who regularly attend workshops at Hazel Court we now have a Loyalty Reward Club where if you attend 3 or more fyberknitics workshops over the course of a year you'll receive a £10 voucher to spend at workshops or in the fyberknitics online shop. Don't worry I'll keep track of this for you and make sure you get your voucher after attending your 3rd workshop of the year.

We've nearly completed the second year of fyberknitics workshops and I am grateful for the support (and banter) I have received from  those who have attended and made the workshops such a success - so I'm going to start the Loyalty Reward Club retrospectively  and  if you  have attended 3 or more classes this year, you will receive your voucher very soon.

If you'd like to be kept informed why not sign up below to be one of the first to hear  news of further posts and updates? 

New Knitting Design from Start to Finish

Meet 'Marilyn', my latest knitting design which I created especially for my workshop Cables & Bobbles & Beads, Oh My! According to this cowl’s namesake, diamonds are a girl’s best friend, and this cabled cowl with bead-jewelled diamonds will certainly add a touch of glamour to your wardrobe.

Marilyn Cowl by fyberknitics

I thought I'd share with you the design process for this project. First I had a rough idea that I wanted to make an item that used these particular techniques - my starting point for a design will often differ from this, but as this piece has a  specific purpose, i.e. to consolidate new skills and techniques learned at the workshop, this was an appropriate jumping off point.

I played around with some ideas on paper to start, with some very rough working sketches giving me an idea of the dimensions etc I wanted the cowl to be. I also made a decision about what yarn to use which I posted about previously here, plus I had chosen some lovely buttons already. Having decided on the type of yarn I then fine tuned my ideas with a generous swatch before charting the stitch pattern properly, and writing myself a rough pattern.

Although I'd swatched in a lovely teal colour, I opted for  purple in the end as I really like the zing of the yellow buttons against this. Then of course came the knitting which I thoroughly enjoyed as cabling makes for an interesting knit - and in fact got a bit carried away with as it was too long for what I had in mind. So after some pulling back a good chunk of it and finishing off, the cowl was ready to block. Here it is pinned out on my ironing board.

With the addition of those lovely yellow buttons Marilyn was then born.

Cable knitting has a long tradition and its enduring appeal never seems to fade, and indeed we see a wealth of attractive and fashionable designs available at the present time. These can seem very highly complex, but are in fact made using of a few simple techniques which  can be easily mastered. My workshop provides a thorough introduction to using and combining these techniques for great textural effects, and improve your confidence in undertaking such a project. I'll also be showing how you can make some quick fixes if you should make a mistake - and as a gal who makes a lot of mistakes with my knitting I love a few good quick fixes!

If you live in the Swansea area, I am offering this workshop again in Oct 2015 and still have just a couple of places left for the workshop which you can book here.

The Marilyn Cowl design has now been professionally checked and is available to buy as a PDF knitting pattern in my shop or via ravelry. Alternatively watch this space as I will be providing an online course which I hope to launch in spring/summer 2015.

Over to you

Have you done any cable knitting? If so how did you find it? Have you seen some of the lovely new Autumn Winter designs featuring cables - which is your favourite?

If you've enjoyed this post why not sign up below to be one of the first to hear  news of further posts and updates? 

An Overdue Studio Tidy Up

I know I'm not the only one who tends to be a messy worker, particularly when doing anything creative - Lincoln based textile artist Hilary Beattie for one is a gal after my own heart when it comes to creating chaos, and like me she has no shame in showing you the full glory of her unbridled messyness - see here for her recent reveal.

The thing is, worrying about keeping everything tidy as you go along can really disrupt your creative flow, and as time can be so pressured this means there is often a direct choice as to whether you create something or just tidy up - and I know which of those  I prefer to spend my valuable life seconds on! However, this has to balance against the need for some sort of order too, so you can actually function, and every now and again a major mucking out is required - and that's exactly what I have just spent a number of days doing.

So, brace yourself for this spectacularly shambolic 'before shot' - and if you are of a very nervous or mess-phobic disposition I would strongly urge you to look away now and skip ahead to the 'after shot'...so here goes:

Yes it's true, I have indeed got a bad case of interior shed syndrome going on in that loft of mine, and I think I'd really outdone myself this time. So after spending rather a loooooooooooooooong time undertaking a major excavation, general scrubbing, and being sidetracked by amazing finds of stuff I'd forgotten I had (like a table - who knew?), it now looks like this:

It was long overdue, and I needed to reclaim my studio and return it to a usable state. It's now such an inspiring room again I can't wait to get creating (mess) in there again - hurrah! Having a pleasant space of my own to work in is really important to me and was the main motivation for the serious mucking out, but there was another reason for this which I'm looking forward to sharing with you another time....am I a tease or what??
 
In my previous post I talked about choosing yarn for a new cable knit cowl and  promised to show you how it progresses,  so here it is:

I'm afraid the photo hasn't captured the colour very well which is in fact a lovely soft teal, but it does show off the stitches quite nicely. I've planned the stitch pattern and made a swatch, though I've also decided to knit it up in the Bilberry  after all,  as I think those yellow buttons will sing out beautifully against the plummy coloured yarn.

Well, I'd better get on with knitting it now hadn't I? Tootle Pip til next time!

PS - I'd love to know if you are as messy as me - or are you super neat and ordered? Leave a comment below if you feel like confessing any sinful stash habits...

If you've enjoyed this post why not sign up below for news of further posts and updates?

 

Choosing the best yarn for the job: Cables and fancy stitchwork

Decisions, decisions....

When designing and/or knitting an item it's important to consider what type of yarn is going to be most suitable for the project you have in mind. Getting this right means an enjoyable and deeply rewarding knit. Getting it wrong, however, can be a truly disheartening and costly experience in terms of the time and money you'll feel you will have wasted. There is such a plethora of different  yarns  available out there to choose from, but how do you go about choosing the one that's going to work best for your project?

The key is to consider the different characteristics of the yarn which includes the weight (i.e. thickness or fineness), texture, colour, fibre and handle. I touched on  some of these previously in my tutorial on substituting yarns, but here I'm going to talk you through a specific example.

Tip:
I think it is a good idea to consider this before you start looking at the yarns, otherwise you will not be focussed on the job in hand and, once surrounded by all that knitterly loveliness, you will be seduced by whatever most catches your eye and pay less attention to your mission - which is to ensure a wonderfully successful and satisfying result for your intended item.

 

What is the brief?

If you are designing you will have some ideas in mind, but even if you are knitting someone else's pattern it is helpful to consider the following questions: Who/what it is for? Will it require frequent washing? How hard wearing does it need to be? Any relevant factors about the wearer - do they have a wool allergy for example? What season is going to be worn for? These are by no means exhaustive, and you may have other questions or considerations of your own.

So for my brief, I am looking to make a women's neckwear item for the early autumn. As it is worn around the neck it can't be 'scratchy' as your skin is very sensitive in that area. Also it will probably be worn very regularly so will need to wash well and easily. I intend to have plenty of stitch detail with cables, textured stitches and maybe some beads to boot. A good range of colours is always a plus so you have plenty of choice, and I like my colours to be rich but not harsh. I always like to use a quality yarn if I'm investing all those valuable life seconds into something, but I'm not looking for anything too luxurious. So putting all that into the equation, I've plumped for Rowan Wool Cotton. A staple and real workhorse of the Rowan range, this yarn's characteristics and reasonable price make it an ideal choice:

Weight: A DK yarn knitted on 4mm needles, this won't be the quickest knit, but is a great weight for showing off detailed stitchwork such as cables. The thicker the yarn, the bigger the scale of the cables, and as this is for a relatively small area I need to keep it to a pretty small scale.

Fibre & Handle: 50% wool and 50% cotton makes for a very soft, non-scratchy feeling fibre. With some of the  the plump springiness of wool but with the coolness and drape of cotton, this is a great choice for early Autumn wear

Texture: The smooth texture and high twist spin of the yarn makes for excellent stitch definition which is hard to be beat - great for showing off all that lovely cable stitchwork

Colour: Wool Cotton comes in a wide range of delicious solid colours, ideal for showing off detail and  stitchwork which would be obscured by a fancier colour treatment. With 20 shades to choose from, there's bound to be at least one colour the intended wearer is going to love.

Aftercare: Machine washable at 40% this yarn washes exceptionally well, softening even more in the process.

So now I've come to a decision on the type of yarn I just need to make a decision about the colour - now that is a tough choice to make but I've got it down to either of these two - which one do you prefer?

Ship Shape

Bilberry

Cables and textured stitches can seem really complicated, and certainly look the part, but they are surprising easy once you know how. If you haven't tried it yet, it's a great string to add to your knitterly bow. If you live in the Swansea area you may be interested in my September Workshop on the subject. I'll be making a design as per the brief above and I'll show how this progresses in future posts. The plan is for this be offered as a free pattern to all those that attend the workshop, and will also be available to purchase on my website and via Ravelry at a later date.

If you've enjoyed this post why not sign up below for news of further posts and updates?

 

Jam-packed July

Well I think you will agree we have had a surprisingly summery summer so far, and I don't know about you but this has increasingly become one of the busiest times of the year for me, and this July has been particularly busy. As well as going to Stitch Camp earlier in the month, I did the 10k Cardiff Race for life which proved to be a great day out. Here we are with the finish line in view (actually the real finish line was the pub afterwards....):

Next on the agenda was a long weekend at Warwick Folk Festival. As well as enjoying some great music and festival fun it was a great opportunity for me to meet up with my family who live a fair distance away. I volunteered as a steward which I can recommend - not just because it pays your ticket, but it is an enjoyable experience to be part of the event and supporting the organisers to make it a pleasurable and relaxed experience for everyone. It's also an opportunity to give Betsy (my tent) an outing - Betsy is very popular with other campers and I reckon she has her own fanclub. Quite a few folks were taking pictures of her so I dare say she's doing the rounds on the internet.

It was a real roaster of a weekend so I was glad to be pitched next to the fire buckets!

Then, before I'd finished unpacking from the weekend, it was all systems go setting up the Stitches Coven creative textiles exhibition, followed by our  launch event the following day. This year's work has been inspired by architecture, and here's a picture of our group installation of doors within a door - I'm afraid it's not the best photo so do urge you to pop in to see it and all the other pieces in the flesh at Swansea Grand Theatre (1st floor, white room). The exhibition runs up to and including Fri 15th August - if you are able to go, do leave us a comment/message in the comments book -  it would be lovely to hear from you.

Group Installation, Doors

One of my offerings, called Bridging

And if you fancy seeing more textile creations (you can't have too much of that now, can you??) why not go along to see the Dylan Thomas inspired exhibition by 'big sister' group, Itchy Fingers. This will include the show stopping Llareggub Village Installation Piece, a miniature manifestation of this imaginary village in textile form - definitely not to be missed. “Dylan in Stitches” will be showing at the Taliesin Art Centre, Swansea University, Singleton Park, Swansea. SA2 8PZ. Our private view will be on Friday 15th August 2014 from 6-8pm. Sarah Hopkins will be opening the event and you are invited to what promises to be an exciting evening. The exhibition will run from 15th August until 20th September 2014. 

Well, with all this going on you may not be surprised to hear that after some early enthusiasm my garden has been languishing somewhat from neglect! - But I have had the beginnings of a runner been harvest - whoooop!

Over to you

Well that's it for now - I hope you are having a lovely summer. Have you been busy too, or are you wisely taking time to relax in the glorious sunshine we've been having? Let me know what you've been up to by commenting below - I'd love to hear from you about your summer frolics.

If you've enjoyed this post, why not sign up below for news and updates?