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FUZZY GALORE |
We've been for a long while admirers of Esther Bozak's knitting, and in this case especially of her really good set of free patterns for reversible scarves. We don't particularly like to wear scarves that need to be carefully draped and maintained in place so only the Right Side shows, it takes way more coordination than we're capable of. Esther's done a great job of designing patterns that either look the same on both sides, or better yet look interesting and complementary on both sides, and that don't curl or do anything weird in draping. And they are, as advertised, actually simple to knit and easy to memorize, another big plus in our book.
We feel her stuff's been under-appreciated in part because of lack of pictures, and we figured we should show you what good results we've been getting from using our Crystal Palace yarns with her patterns. Our usual laziness has led us to knit these at a much larger scale than that suggested by Esther, but we like the results. We've also gone on to figure out some more reversible patterns of our own.
Our favorite here is the shadow box pattern, originally published in Jane Neighbors' "Reversible Two-Color Knitting". It's much warmer than an ordinary fabric would be because of all the little pockets that trap the warmth, and its two sides look nicely complementary. We love it in 2 colors of Merino Frappe, a yarn whose light, soft and warm properties work extremely well with the pattern. It would also look well in a combination of solid and printed yarn, such as 2 matching colors of Iceland. Or 2 colors of chenille would also look great. This would probably not be a good very first project because of the unusual slide thing and the carried loops, but it's easy enough for a comfortable beginner, and really comes down to memorizing two 4-stitch patterns.
Here is a sample knit from 2 balls of Merino Frappe (088 split pea and 101 dusty sky), on size 10.5 needles, 32 stitches for a total of about 11 in.
We also really like the 'mistake rib' pattern. This is one of those incredibly bad misnomers, like 'lazy kate'... It's a very straightforward stitch, which gives a fabric with nice stretch but that doesn't all disappear into one big knot like a regular 2x2 rib would. The rib pattern is definite enough to show even in a kind of dull-colored soft yarn like the purple Merino Frappe, but it's not aggressive, it'd even be suitable for a sartorially boring guy :-). You couldn't get any more bang for the bucks in terms of knitting grunt work vs effect, and yet it's very easy. This one could even be a first project.
This sample is knit from 2 balls of Merino Frappe (123 purple denim) with size 10.5 needles, 35 stitches for a total of about 12 in.
and this one is knit from 1 ball each of Iceland (4320 leaf) and Whisper (9263 tidepool) with size 11 needles, 15 stitches for a total of about 6" (15cm) wide, and 45" (120cm) long.
Brioche stitch is a very good scarf pattern in general, both very elastic and very bulky, quite the thermal thing we're aiming for. The syncopated variation alternates 2 versions, so you get a pattern going horizontally as well as the strong vertical of ordinary brioche stitch. I have a bit of trouble keeping track of row counts myself :-), but if you don't this one is a real winner.
Our example is another done for a guy friend, since we try not to fall asleep doing those dull colors. It's knit from 2 balls of Iceland (3433 bark) with size 15 needles, 14 stitches for a total of about 8 in.
This is an ankward term for a very interesting pattern. It forms strong natural folds, I guess as if it were a pleated kilt. Each fold is agremented with rows of neat little triangles. Alice Starmore made great use of this in one of her gansey patterns, and we've been in love ever since we've seen it. This is not the easiest of the bunch, but certainely not overwhelming, as it's still easy to see what you're doing.
We feel that this is best knit at a fairly small gauge, since a scarf with our usual 20+ stitches would have so few pleats as to be a bit strange. This example is knit from Tekapo on size 8 needles, at a gauge of 5 st/in. But the sample, unblocked, shows shows something closer to a pleat per inch.
First published: 4 nov 02
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