May
12
By AnnK
This afternoon I drove through beautiful spring-clothed countryside to Harrogate to visit the new baa ram ewe shop there. What joy, both in the journey and the destination!
The shop is in a very elegant Georgian building:
(That’s April in the window, with Roseberry below it to the left.)
Inside I met the very lovely assistant, Sophie, who took me into the holy of holies below stairs, where there are many, many boxes full of skeins of the newly delivered dyed range of Titus. I brought away a skein of Eccup, a gorgeous deep teal shade. Lots of food for design thoughts…
During a fabulous conversation about colour, the obsessive kind that any knitter will understand, I noticed the absolutely fabulous shoes that Sophie was wearing. In fact, I am still consumed with jealousy! You see, Sophie owns an amazing pair of Fluevogs, prominently featuring my beloved green. Life isn’t fair! I made her take a short break from teaching knitting to 3 lovely customers (all American!) to get a photo of these covet-worthy delights:
I took a few other photos in the shop, but alas most of them are too blurry to share. However, I got a good one of my designer friend Ella Austin’s ‘Intrepid Fox’. Alas, I can’t find a link for this on the baa ram ewe website. It’s available in the Harrogate shop though. Or buy it direct from Ella.
All in all a lovely trip!
Then this evening I spent some time setting up a pattern to sell in print via MagCloud. I’ve not done this before, and found it much more straightforward than I expected. I’ll be adding more after I’ve finished Stranded Knits (more about that soon). Meanwhile if you are yearning for the joy of a shiny printed pattern to keep forever, and a fabulous lacy project for the summer, check out Summer Seas in my new MagCloud store:
8-page pattern for a stunning rectangular stole. Features ‘diamond lace’ and ‘feather and fan’ patterns. The stole is knitted from the centre outwards in rounds. Pattern includes both full written instructions and charts.
Published in categories: Uncategorized
Apr
02
By AnnK
In my Ravelry group this week Bart (a lovely American knitter) posted a picture of his new granddaughter wrapped in her beautiful new baby blanket, a square version of my Truly shawl. I was really impressed with how Bart had modified the pattern to make a square (see his project notes if you want to do this yourself):
Incredibly this was Bart’s second Truly! His first, knitted for his sister-in-law, was inspired by the Truly knitted by my good friend Mary Beth, which featured beads in the stocking stitch section.
Bart’s beaded Truly:
I love the modifications Mary Beth made, which not only featured beads, but also a picot cast-off/bind-off. And her subtle colour choices are so effective:
Do you want to knit your own Truly? Until midnight this Friday (5th — my birthday!) if you enter MADLY in the coupon code area when you buy the pattern you can have it for half price. 
)
As Bart and Mary Beth have proved, Truly is a very versatile pattern. Here are the original versions, one in DK yarn, and one in 4ply/sportweight yarn. What will you use?
Published in categories: Uncategorized
Feb
24
By AnnK
Have you seen the lovely review Jean Moss did last week for my new book, ‘Born & Bred’? This kicked off the blog tour, which will continue until the end of March with posts from a number of fellow designers who have become valued friends of mine.
Born & Bred is the book I worked on at full speed last year immediately after completing A Time To Knit. In fact I was already fitting in work on Born & Bred months before ATTK was finished. It kept distracting me!
The book is a collaborative project with the Leeds yarn shop baa ram ewe, who asked me a year ago if I would work with them to produce a book of designs for Yorkshire wools (from Yorkshire sheep breeds). I was instantly enthused, and found it really hard to focus on doing ATTK because I was flowing with ideas for Born & Bred instead!
There were many highlights in the process of producing this book. The photo-shoot at Masham Sheep fair was a special day, not least because of the wonderfully generous-spirited Ripon City Morris Dancers, who posed for loads of photos with us in their amazing morris costumes. The floral hats (real fresh flowers) were an amazing thing to behold!
I think though that the book launch itself (three days before my knee replacement operation!) was my favourite part of the journey with Born & Bred. Verity who produced the book with me had the inspirational idea to hold the launch at Betty’s tea-rooms in Harrogate. It was a truly awesome location; Edwardian elegance with Yorkshire hospitality. We invited lots of yarn shop owners and knitting magazine editors to the launch, so the room was packed with happy wool enthusiasts enjoying champagne and canapés. The icing on the cake? Brilliant musician Roger Davies played and sang for us. Here he is singing a lovely song about my home town (where I was born and grew up). Of course, this was one of the songs he sang at the launch. He also sang a song about the town where I live now — ‘Brighouse on a Saturday Night’.
BRIGHOUSE ON SATURDAY NIGHT
Can you tell I’m a fan?
Born & Bred is available as an ebook from my Ravelry shop, or in print from baa ram ewe.
Published in categories: Knitting
Feb
15
By AnnK
Last week the London Wool Company (at the time I didn’t know the owner’s name) tweeted me ‘I just had dinner with the Anstocks’. Well, I don’t have any friends in the knitting world called Anstock. Surely this wasn’t a reference to Peter Anstock, the lovely boy who used to sit opposite me in Chemistry classes nearly 30 years ago? I don’t know if I’ve ever seen him since!
It was!
‘Wow!!’ I answered. ‘Did he tell you how naughty I was at school?’
Luckily Peter doesn’t remember me being naughty at school*. I found him among my Facebook friends where we chatted about his lunch with Amelia (the London Woool Company owner). She had mentioned Ravelry and he remembered seeing me post about Ravelry. It’s a small world…
I was delighted to discover Peter has uploaded loads of old pictures from our schooldays. Here’s one of me with another classmate — Paul Wignall, who was clearly overjoyed to be next to me! ;o)
And OMG, the hair!!! :-O
Despite various troubles of the kind many children know at school, on the whole my memories of life at Royds Hall are very happy. We were a friendly bunch, and had lots of fun together, including lots of great extra-curricular stuff, and most of our teachers were great, with a few notable exceptions*. We have a year-group reunion approximately every 5 years, and occasionally the school itself invites us back for special occasions.
Thus it was that in September 2011 me, my twin-sister, my brother and his wife all once more walked through the marvellous front doors (the ones only 5th-years could use in our day) to help celebrate Royds Hall’s 90th anniversary of becoming a school (originally it was a Victorian mansion, then an army hospital during the 1st World War).
Here is the magnificent entrance, with it’s blue plaque declaring this was where Harold Wilson spent his grammar school days (it was a measly comprehensive by the time we were pupils there!)
And here are Marie and I in the quadrangle:
It’s a beautiful building huh?
Now I’m driving again (I wasn’t able to from August last year until very recently due to health problems) I hope to get more photos for you of the beautiful stone buildings like this that fill the Yorkshire landscape.
* I once overturned my desk in French and told the teacher (deputy headmistress — think Professor Umbridge) that she could stick my pen up her…
Published in categories: Uncategorized
Oct
30
By AnnK
Another of my designer friends has published a lovely book of knitting patterns. This one is ‘Boys’ Knits’ by the sweet and lovely Katya Frankel. I’ve never met Katya in real life, yet I know I would love her if I did, she has such a kind and gentle online presence.
I’ve been aware of Katya for some years now as she has frequently had designs featured in British knitting magazines that I have bought. She also regularly designs for Interweave. I like her very straightforward design style, which results in an abundance of very comfortable looking everyday wear.
This style is particularly evident in the designs in Boys’ Knits, 16 cosy hoodies, jumpers and gilets, all with a very casual feel perfectly suited to the rough and tumble lives of active lads. This is eloquently communicated in the happy scenes of boys at play that Katya has so wonderfully captured in her excellent photography in the book.
Katya clearly ‘gets’ boys. I know during the shoot for Boys’ Knits she had great fun with the models, who at one point tried to teach her a sliding tackle. Kudos!
I’ve shown my 2 youngest boys the book and asked them to pick out their favourite jumper. They both chose Dax, though Toby said he also loves the ‘nerdy glasses’ on the cover pic! When I questioned them about it, Tom admitted he likes Dax mostly because of the colour, and also because of the cable running down the arm. Basically my boys aren’t great at explaining their choices, but they both clearly love Dax! Maybe it’s time I indulged my wish to knit something for them?
As I perused my review copy of Katya’s book, I was delighted to realise that the garments have almost entirely seamless constructions. Knitting patterns for boys are a rarity in themselves, and nearly all those I have come across are knitted flat. So, to be presented with a whole book of seamless designs for boys was very exciting! I suddenly felt even more attracted to the lovely pieces she has produced.
As usual for my posts about works by fellow designers I posed a few questions to Katya that came up for me as I read her lovely book. Here are the questions and Katya’s answers:
What sizing resources do you use for designing garments for children?
The measurements’ chart I used was largely based on these sources:
ASTM standards tables of boys measurements
Sweater Design in Plain English by Maggie Righetti
Metric pattern cutting for children’s wear and baby wear by Winifred Aldrich
and a Craft Yarn Council standards
Because I have designed boys’ patterns before starting working on Boys’ Knits, I already had a measurement charts compiled, tt was just a matter of reviewing it. We also run a little survey asking for boys’ key measurements to support the charts and see how those distribute within size ranges.
How do you decide your ease scheme (how much ease to add where)?
Chest circumference was used as the main base measurement for drafting patterns, much like it is used to draft adult knitwear. And with kids always being on the move, I like boys’ sweater to have some positive ease built in, both for comfortable wearing and growth. To decide how much ease exactly to add, I always turn to yarn weight and texture of knitted fabric. DK and some finer Worsted weight sweaters need a little less ease and start with about 2 inches, but heavily cabled or chunky knits, like Deckard or Buster for example, go up to about 4 or 5 inches at the chest on average.
How did you learn and develop the seamless constructions you use?
Seamless construction is probably my favourite one and I use it often in my designs. I learnt to draft patterns as flat blocks originally, with set in sleeves and fitted shoulders, but about 6–7 years ago I was bitten by the seamless-knitting bug and since then I worked on dozens of seamless sweaters. Sweaters with different yoke constructions, worked either from the top down or from the bottom up, with set-in sleeves, raglan, saddle shoulders, round yokes, the lot. I prefer working from the bottom up because it allows me to play with decrease rates through the yoke part and create well defined back widths that I adore on men’s and boys’ sweaters. I am sure it’s all due to the way I originally drafted sleeve caps (years ago), slimmer at the front of the body and wider at the back, more tailored if you like.
Many thanks to Katya for inviting me to be part of the blog tour for Boys’ Knits!
You can purchase Boys’ Knits in print or digital formats from Cooperative Press. Details here.
Published in categories: Uncategorized
Oct
01
By AnnK
Yesterday was the photoshoot for my next book. ‘Born & Bred’ is a joint project with baa ram ewe, the world-famous Leeds yarn shop. The book will feature 9 designs by me knitted in wool from Yorkshire sheep breeds. These include Wensleydale, Swaledale, Masham, and Whitefaced Woodland. It was therefore very appropriate that we had the photoshoot on location at Masham Sheep Fair.
Verity Britton, the passionate joint owner of baa ram ewe, was photographer again. She has a great instinct for powerful picture compositions, and I’m delighted with the images she created yesterday.
One of the most popular designs amongst folk on the shoot was a swan-yoked jumper knitted in Wensleydale wool. You’re welcome to guess at the jumper’s name, which inspired my design. I’ll give you the clue that, like everything else in the book, it has a very Yorkshire origin.
This jumper has a very unique construction which I’ve not seen in anybody else’s designs. When I talked about this yesterday, Verity said I should make more noise about this, and about all the other things that make my designs special. With typical British modesty I find that difficult! I’ll do my best though…
This jumper, whose name begins with a W, has a circular yoke. Normal thus far; there are a lot of jumpers that feature stranded circular yokes. However, very few of them have a scooped front neck, and as far as I know, only 1 by another designer scoops the neck with short row shaping below the stranded pattern (Chickadee by Ysolda Teague). This method means that the stranded pattern is high on the back, but flatteringly curves down toward the bust on the front. In fact, the way I have arranged the neck shaping on W means that the scoop is deeper in the larger sizes where a very scooped front neck is particularly flattering.
Because the stranded pattern in W is reasonably short, it finishes at the shoulder point. This makes it possible to stop the circular yoke construction here and switch to a ‘simultaneous set-in sleeve’ construction. Having checked through circular yoke jumpers in the Ravelry database, I believe this combination (circular yoke with seamless set-in sleeves) is currently unique to me. I often hear knitters saying they love seamless circular yokes, yet need set-in sleeves to suit their particular figure type. Here is my answer!
Of course, from a designer’s point of view creating an excellent pattern involves much, much more than simply determining a construction method. A lot of maths goes into making a construction work across a range of sizes (this pattern is written for 32–58 inch chests!). Key measurements in generating the numbers for this construction are back width, top sleevecap width, upper arm circumference, bust circumference, and armhole depth. There are also considerations re appropriate amounts of ease at each of these points to take into account. Thank God for spreadsheets!
The sample was made to fit our beautiful model, Ruby. She looked fabulous in it and has begged her Mum, Verity’s business partner Jo, to knit one for her to keep!
If you like W, you will probably like Mallorn and April too, both of which feature this construction.
Published in categories: Uncategorized
Sep
18
By AnnK
It is several months now since the blog tour for California Revival Knits took place. I had agreed to participate, and to my shame got so busy that I flaked on the promise. Nevertheless, I was determined that I would do the promised review at some point, and have decided that point is now.
The book is a collection of designs inspired by the multiple revival styles to be found in California, Stephannie Tallent’s homeland, all of which hark back to an earlier period in history, especially the history of California and it’s neighbours. The styles include ‘Mission’, ‘Spanish Colonial’, and ‘Tudor’ among others, with some Mexican and Moorish influences too. I knew very little of these styles as they exist in America before reading Steph’s book, and loved learning about them from her.I love the vibrant colours in the wonderful photos featured in he book, showing examples of the styles in Californian architecture, tiles, carpets, and railings.
When I first received my review copy, I was immediately struck by how remarkably similar in style Steph’s designs are to mine. It was like finding a design twin! Fair isle, twisted stitch cables, lace, and intarsia are all used to evoke the revival themes Stephanie explores in this technique-rich collection.
Those of you who are familiar with my own work won’t be surprised to find that the colourwork accessories Steph has designed are my personal favourites from the collection. These include a stunning cowl (which features on the cover) and mitts set with peacock intarsia motifs, inspired by Californian peacock fountains.
There are also some truly delightful twisted stitch cable projects, inspired by wrought iron gates and railings. I especially love these socks:
All in all, Californian Revival Knits is a great little knitting book, with lots of inspiring photography and historical detail to boot. I highly recommend it!
You can buy Californian Revival Knits in either softcover or digital formats from Cooperative Press, details here.
Published in categories: Uncategorized
Aug
14
By AnnK
I am delighted to announce that I have finally finished publishing the A Time To Knit ebook. The print run is also currently ongoing and I should get the softcover books early next week, after which it will be available from baa ram ewe, here.
The final two patterns I added to the book were Anwen (the cabled coat that features on the cover) and April (a short-sleeved jumper/sweater with a stranded circular yoke). As I write this post the coat is currently at Number 3 in Ravelry’s ‘Hot Right Now’, and is proving very popular.
Although as a full-length hooded coat Anwen uses a lot of yarn, it is a relatively economical knit in the yarn I used for the sample, Artesano Aran. This is a lovely blend of alpaca and wool, making super-warm garments. Because it is so reasonably priced, it only costs approximately £120 to knit Anwen in average sizes with this yarn. This compares very favourably with ready-to-wear coat prices, yet you get something in much nicer fibre than most coats.
Yet, one lucky person will get the yarn to knit Anwen for free! Artesano have most kindly offered the yarn for one of my blog readers to knit their own Anwen. So, I have devised the following competition for this yarn and a free copy of the A Time To Knit softcover book:
Anwen is a Celtic name, chosen to reflect the Celtic cables that the coat features. It means ‘fair one’. To enter this competition please ‘comment’ telling me a little bit about another Celtic character from either British history or a Celtic folk tale. To be fair, your character must be different to those given by other competitors whose comments have appeared before you reply. I will publish all comments as quickly as possible (sleep permitting!). The competition closes next Tuesday at 12pm British Summertime, after which I will conduct a draw with all the entries to randomly select the winner.
Anwen in Artesano Aran ‘Nightfall’:
Published in categories: Uncategorized
Jul
15
By AnnK
Recently I’ve been working almost non-stop on getting my current book, A Time To Knit, finished. The book has been my main design project since early autumn last year, when I started work on it in earnest. It contains 12 designs, three each for the four seasons of the year.
This is only my second book, following on from the success of my first, Novel Knits. Although I’m very proud of the achievement that Novel Knits represents for me, I knew there was plenty of room for improvement, and I’m delighted to say that I can tell already that with A Time To Knit I have definitely taken big strides forward. The photography especially is stunning, the work of my new friend, Verity Britton, who owns baa ram ewe in Leeds.
The title of the book is somewhat poignant for me, as it references a wonderful passage in Ecclesiastes that was one of the readings we chose for my Father’s funeral two years ago. The passage expresses very poetically the idea that ‘for all things there is a season’. I love this way of seeing life, and the sense of acceptance that it brings.
Knitters are familiar with the idea that our activity has seasons, because we knit for and through those seasons, choosing yarns and projects specifically for them. A forthcoming wedding? Knit a shawl. A forthcoming birth? Knit baby clothes. Christmas approaching? Knit all the things!!
Though there are projects in A Time To Knit to fit any of these events, the patterns are arranged for the seasons of the year; Spring, Summer, Autumn (or ‘Fall’ to my American readers!), and Winter. Below I show pictures of a few of them to whet your appetite for the book, which is currently available to pre-order from baa ram ewe. The ebook version is similarly available for pre-order via Ravelry, currently with 9 of the patterns already uploaded. Both options are currently offered with a generous discount.
Published in categories: Uncategorized
Jul
13
By AnnK
Today I had the great pleasure of teaching again at Gibson Mill, Hardcastle Crags; a National Trust property in a beautiful setting near Hebden Bridge. So, not far from my beloved Brighouse. 
I love teaching. There are very particular things in the way I teach that I get great pleasure from. A key pleasure is creating a warm and friendly atmosphere in class. I do my best to quickly learn the names of my students, so that I can address them personally throughout the class, and name them as I talk about their progress to the rest of the class. That’s a key strategy in how I teach; warmly acknowledging each student’s success in mastering the skills at hand. I want my students to leave class knowing that they succeeded, and feeling good about it, so that they have the confidence to continue to use their new skills on their own.
Today’s class was about stranded knitting, aka ‘fair isle knitting’, although that term only truly belongs to the traditional knitting patterns of Fair Isle. Most of my students had never attempted stranded knitting before, and certainly not with carrying both yarns at the same time. All were English knitters, and had never used a continental yarn hold.
Due to a little lapse in communication, all had brought straight single-point needles and no yarn to class. Luckily, I had brought plenty of spare circulars, and lots of oddments of Shetland yarn. But they were nearly all long circulars. So, as well as continental yarn hold, two-handed stranded knitting, spit-splicing, wrapping floats, and Russian join, today’s students also learned magic loop. Not bad for a 3-hour class?
I left Gibson Mill with that bounce in my step that comes from knowing I have achieved something special. Just as it did when I was a schoolteacher, this matters much more to me than the pay!
Published in categories: Uncategorized
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