Knot Knecessarily Known Knitting

Wow! There is just so much to see around here. SCAD FASH continues their amazing run of exhibitions. Closing this Sunday 22 September is Kaleidoscope Katrantzou . This is a 10-year retrospective of the work Greek-born, London-based designer Mary Katrantzou. Her work begins with digital printing on fabric, but evolved beyond that. Often she uses unusual materials. Some pictures: Printed images of landscapes in black and white combine with bold, simplified, sculptural forms. I love the full moon on the shoulder of the foreground dress with the cherry blossom tree. The partly obscured dress immediately behind is printed on a diaphanous material, creating an intriguing layered effect with the image. Here couches and upholstery serve as the source of inspiration. On the left, I love how the jacket looks like an overstuffed chair. The quilt pattern on the skirt reminds me of a handmade blanket thrown across the back of a couch. The dress on the right is reminiscent of an orien...

We all have those moments when we don't think things through. Right now, I'm working on a versa lace circle jacket. It is lace weight yarn on 60-inch Addi needles. Most yarn shops do not carry the 60-inch length. Even many of the online retailers either do not carry the length or they carry it only in the larger-sized needles. I, of course, somehow came up with a project that needed a couple of 2.5mm needles in the long length. I had to order them from Paradise Fibers in Spokane, Washington. Yes, even Webs (yarn.com) did not stock long Addi needles in the fine lace sizes. I'm working on a versa lace project. I am knitting it center-out, growing the project to the desired size. The yarn is changing gauge when wet-blocked, so I'm dunking the project as I go and checking what size it really is. A couple weeks ago, I did this in the evening around 6 or 7 PM. I had three needles in the project — two of the working size and a third even smaller even harder-to-find size I...

Here's an update to my previous post. At this point, Small Expressions is on display at Southeast Fiber Arts Alliance . The quality of work is high. There is a nice range of weaving techniques — wedge weave, multi-shaft, tapestry, even some basketry and three-dimensional sewing. The exhibition is on display through Thursday 12 September 2019. You can view it: Sundays from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm Tuesdays from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm Wednesdays from 6:00 pm. to 8:00 pm and Thursdays from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm Also just opened at the DeKalb History Museum on the main floor of the historic DeKalb County Courthouse is Silk and Stitch . I haven't been yet; and I'm not sure how long it is up. The description indicates it highlights embellishing techniques in women's fashion from the 19th century through the mid-20th century.  Hours are: Monday - Friday from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm and Saturday 10:00 am to 2:00 pm. And a late reminder that tomorrow is North Georgia Knitting Gu...

There are several opportunities in the area right now to see fiber art on display. The Prince Cherrywood Challenge 2018 Tribute Tour has been touring through the area. I first saw these on display at the Pittsburgh Creative Arts Festival back in March. These quilts were also on display at STITCHES United a month ago. Thank you to East Cobb Quilters Guild for one more opportunity to enjoy these beautiful art quilts! Right now, the quilts are finishing up a one-week run here in my neighborhood at the Mable House Arts Center . They will be on display for one more day on Thursday 11 July 2019 from 9 AM to 5 PM. There are actually three separate groups of art quilts touring the country. Follow the Cherrywood Challenge link above to see the places and dates. I may get to cross paths with the quilts again at STITCHES Salt Lake in early October. There is a yarn bombing at the Rose Creek Library on Towne Lake in Woodstock. This is right next to Hillside United Methodist Church, whe...

Who knew the physical embodiment of unbridled joy and unconditional love was a shaggy black cat? In that miserable summer of 2009, something good happened. Scenter's cats/familiars came into my life. They were already six years old. At the time, I remember thinking I would be replacing cats between the 2016 and the 2020 election cycle. I remember thinking if I could get ten years out of them, that would be about right. Well, Brûlée checked out during the week of the 2018 midterm election, the very middle of the presidential election cycle. And now, I've lost Vincent as we come up on exactly ten years. Having those two cats in my life made a huge difference . They taught me love was possible again after losing Copernicus and Sophia . When Cuddly Hubby went to work in another state in 2013, the feline contingent in our household was an important source of morale and support. Brûlée was the more extroverted. Similar to Copernicus, he liked to supervise suspicious hu...

I had all of three days between STITCHES United and Blue Ridge Fiber Fest. This festival in Sparta, North Carolina, is only in its second year. The six-hour drive put it right on the edge of doable. It was worth it. The drive up was lovely. The mountains are beautiful most times of the year. Of course, in June the hills are freshly green. There is one piece of the drive that is six miles of very winding road. I'm sorry there was no easy way for me to grab a picture of my Garmin's screen while I was driving. Sparta is a small town. There is one hotel, which is where I stayed. Fortunately, there is a nice locally-owned restaurant right out front. It was definitely the place for breakfast — if you walked in at the wrong moment, it was hard to find an empty table! I must remember for next year that many of the businesses in Sparta are cash-only. I don't mind it; but I need to know before I leave. Fortunately, one of the locals was able to point me towards an ATM. The fest...

I must say how grateful I am that STITCHES was back in Atlanta this year after a five-year hiatus. Many of you know the last few months have had a lot of change in my personal life. Spending a weekend of teaching, learning, and just hanging out with my creative tribe was exactly what I needed. I didn't know how much I really needed it. I also must thank my students. Both of my classes, "Brioche Rosetta Stone" and "Knit Faster with Combination Knitting" sold out during the early registration period. Thank you! Of course, by now you all know that if I'm not teaching, I'm probably taking. For STITCHES I chose three classes. Thursday was Xandy Peters' all-day "Fox Paws Technique" class. Yes, I could probably have figured out this pattern on my own. This was one of those I-want-this-on-my-résumé choices. Plus, I wanted to meet the creative genius behind Fox Paws. Xandy is an excellent teacher. She walked us through the technique, first...

On the second day of the workshop, Rita showed us Irish and Aran crochet techniques. In class we worked samples using size 10 crochet cotton. Yes, the fineness of the materials can be a challenge, especially if your hands shake or your eyes no longer see in high definition. But the patterns are lovely and definitely worth the effort. For reference here on the blog, I've worked these motifs in the same worsted-weight yarn as the other posts. bullion stitches at top, limpet stitches at bottom Possibly the toughest stitch we did was the bullion stitch. Like the Tunisian stitches, this is another technique where a crochet hook with a long plain throat is better than one with a thumb rest. The bullion stitch makes fabulous texture by wrapping the yarn multiple times around the throat of the crochet hook and then pulling a loop through this long spiral worm. As you might guess, part of the trick is not catching the spiral loops on the hook. Scrunching the spiral worm together h...

In the afternoon on the first day of Rita's workshop we learned Tunisian crochet. Tunisian stitches are characterized by a right-to-left ("forward") pass creating loops, then a left-to-right ("backward") pass crocheting them off. You don't turn the work; the public side is always facing you. When you are at the right-hand edge of a piece of Tunisian crochet it looks like you are crocheting — there is a single loop on a crochet hook. But when you are at the left-hand edge, there is a strange hybrid of a crochet hook with lots of live loops on it as if it were in costume pretending to be a knitting needle. If you think of Tunisian stitches as a grid, you can think of the forward loop-creating pass as making vertical posts and the backward binding-off pass as making horizontal lintels. —   —   —   —   —    — |    |    |    |    |    | For class we were able to work swatches on r...

On the first day of Rita de Maintenon's workshop we learned two related techniques — broomstick lace and hairpin lace. In all the pictures below, the swatches are oriented in the direction they were worked, from bottom to top. a sample of broomstick lace Broomstick lace is a technique where large loops are created over a broomstick or other oversized dowel, such as a size 35 or 50 knitting needle. As in knitting but unlike ordinary crochet, there are many loops. These loops are crocheted together in groups, as in the example above. You can see how a group of loops forms and "eye," with a "crown" of single-crochet stitches at the top. In the photograph below, loops have been crocheted individually to make a mesh reminiscent of condo knitting. broomstick mesh alternating rows over two different-sized dowels In either case, this is a technique that would lends itself to showing off a pretty yarn. I can definitely see this done with a ribbon yarn; and ...