New pattern: Brownlow Wristwarmers!

I wasn’t sure I would have time to get this up on Ravelry before Unwind, but managed to squeeze it in this morning!

I have a new pattern for autumn. Super simple and super quick, the Brownlow Wristwarmers developed out of a successful swatching session with a beautifully bouncy, super-twisted Bluefaced Leicester blend that I fell in love with and became TWIST, as my day job – located in London’s Bloomsbury – was a stone’s throw from the historic house of Charles Dickens, author of the famous Oliver Twist novel!

© Linda Lencovic

While swatching this blend with my new naturally heathered HEATH – 100% ethical Merino – I couldn’t help but notice how perfect it is for garter stitch variations and decided to design something that would showcase both the yarns’ hardwearing qualities, while echoing the Dickensian brick and cobble lined streets filling my daily cityscape in London.

© Linda Lencovic

Mentally, I’ve always pictured Fagin’s crew wearing ratty fingerless gloves in Georgian London, however, these wristwarmers are less street-urchin and much more more elegant! Worked in a delicate garter rib with a flattering stripe of stockinette up the inside wrist to add texture contrast, these are simply knit in the round. The thumbhole is created by simply turning the work and working flat for a number of rows then rejoining to continue in round.

© Linda Lencovic

These beauties are really simple and perfect for knitting two at a time magic loop or for beginners and knit up in a couple evenings.

The pattern is available for download now on Ravelry and will be available free with yarn purchase of both TWIST and HEATH yarns for the pattern till the end of the month as a special promotion for those of you that can’t make the yarn fairs coming up here in the UK! For those of you at Unwind and Fibre-East I will have the yarns available and will email you the pattern on purchase.

I am hoping to have a Knit Along with these in August, so stay tuned for details!

Advertisement

Have you voted?

I was pleasantly surprised early this week when I saw the shortlist for Dani’s Unwind Brighton design competition and realised that not one, but TWO of the fantastic entries use Kettle Yarn Co. yarns! Wheee! How amazing.

In the shortlist for the competition are Rachel Brown’s adorable, squishy-looking Brighton Dome socks:

These beauties are knit in TWIST fingering, a beautiful bouncy yarn in  100% British superwash BFL. This yarn is a great all around blend as it is super soft and perfect for warm shawls, tops, gloves, etc., but also perfect for socks as the Bluefaced Leicester fibre is long-staple so hardwearing with lots of natural tensile strength and abrasion resistance.

Rachel blogged on her design earlier in the week so you can see more details on the design process there along with closeups of the yarn. Now I just need to get someone to knit these for me! ;-D

I have solid colourways of this yarn in this weeks update, and am planning on getting more of this polka dot colourway dyed up for Unwind so watch for it in the shop!

I just noticed that currently first in the running is Helen Stewart’s Pebble Beach Shawlette, knit in my hand painted WESTMINSTER, the softest, slinkiest baby camel/silk!

Helen blogs as Curious Handmade and you can listen to her talk about how much she loved my yarn on her recent podcast!

Using only a single skein of this luxury yarn the shawl drapes like liquid gold over the throat! I am currently carrying this blend in light fingering which gives you even MORE bang for your buck at at  533 m • 583 yds per 100g skeins for a slightly lighter but larger shawl!

I’ve used 2 golds in the Gold Rush colourway so that the colour shimmers across the shawl even when not moving!

You can vote for your favourite now. The winning design will be published with the show programme so you can get it for free!

(do it, do it, do it!)

Antiprism – first Kettle Kit exclusive!

I have been wanting to share this with all of you for ages and can finally let you all see one of the amazing projects I have been working on – Antiprism!

Some of you got a chance to see this beauty in the flesh at Wonderwool last weekend, and may have even seen me wearing it to keep warm in the chilly hall. The wrap was like a warm hug in the damp cold!

The garter-stitch shawl/scarf/wrap is a collaboration with designer extraordinaire Renee Callahan – aka Eastlondonknit – and uses my bouncy, super-soft, 100% Superwash British Bluefaced Leicester fingering, TWIST.

Lightweight and bouncy the shawl is worked from side to side and features a frame of simple lace filled with wedges of alternating colour to show off the ombre combination of shades. A lace border is picked up and knit along the bottom of the finished shawl and then a binding is worked across the graceful undulating waves at the top of the piece.

The finished piece is large enough to be worn as a wrap, shawl or scarf and is a perfect year round piece to add a shot of boldness to an outfit. 
There are 5 colourways currently in shop for the kit. The groupings will change with available hues, and may not be repeated.

The kit includes yarn quantities needed for one shawl – 4 skeins of TWIST and a Ravelry pattern download code. Each skein is 50g = approx. 183 m | 200 y with the total yardage adding up to 732 m / 800 y.

I am having troubles deciding which colours to cast on! Which will you pick?

Show me your poms!

A little something to brighten up your Monday morning…

I don’t have a lot of time to troll my beloved blogosphere lately so was WAY chuffed (little British-ism there for you non-Brits!) to get this link sent to me by the lovely Dirtymartini104 from the Mr Printables blog… a tutorial on how to make fabulous pom pom FRUIT.

You could use TWIST skeins for these as I have many colours of these smaller skeins needed in stock… If you don’t see a colour you need just email me as I have more in the studio that I haven’t had time to list just yet.

(Thanks again Alison!)

Blown away!

I had the pleasure over the weekend of hearing a glowing review of my TWIST BFL fingering by Louise over at KnitBritish! (Just a note – these skeins were formally TWIST Mini. I’ve removed the ‘mini’ as I discovered this was making people assume the yardage was much less than its generous 200 yards.)

When Louise purchased a skein of the ‘Soot’ colourway a few weeks ago, I had no idea she had plans to review the yarn on her website!

So I  had a pleasant surprise Sunday when I got back to the computer after a dyeing session to see a bunch of Twitter mentions on the podcast. I couldn’t wait to hear what was said so I headed straight over to check it out.

She was recording on a blustery night and I was literally blown away at how pleased  she was with her ‘Soot’ skein. She had the most eloquent descriptions of the yarn that I simply have to share an excerpt with you:

‘…it is sensuous and the colour variations are glowing. Is a dark grey…but there are these highlights of …liquid metal – mercury – just dazzling out. Its more than semi solid it’s burnished with… these lighter metallic tones. It was stunning to look at on the skein…[I] looked at how [the yarn] caught the light and realized a lot of the light was already in it…it wasn’t catching [the light] it was just shining… ‘

Louise has recently started podcasting on her KnitBritish and I thoroughly recommend listening. Her beautifully lilting  accent along with the carefully considered reviews and lovely turns of phrase make the recording a true pleasure to listen to.

*note – the next shop update will be this Sunday at 5pm!

Shop update with new colourways!

I managed to squeeze in quite a few photos this weekend and am posting a number of the yarns for Friday on the shop…just for the week until the morning of Dec 6th, and then they are off to PARTY! So if you see anything you like, grab them before they go…

I’ve dyed a number of new colourways in the glorious Westminster baby camel/silk:

I’ve also dyed a gazillion little Twist superwash BFL mini skeins and took a quick photo of a handful for the shop:

I am trying a new method of listing – variations – and am hoping it goes smoothly as it doesn’t let you give an indication of how much in each colour is available!  Fingers crossed.

I also decided to try this method for the hat kit and have listed the colours I posted previously this way as well to make it easier for people to order until Friday.

LASTLY …there are also more Islington and Kensington greys going up and a few surprise colours! Phew.

Shop update is today Sunday December 1st at 5pm GMT – check your local time.

Onwards to Falkland!

**Just a note that this is the last weekend for the special Purlside special 15% discount. If you are not seeing a colour you like, or something has run out, email me and I can always dye it up for you on a custom order!

I have been paying a lot more attention to fashion runways than I have for decades lately. I don’t plan on following fashion colours religiously in the dye pot, but it is fun to see what is out at the moment and use it for inspiration. Here are some runway pairings I made with Falkland – 80% Merino/20% Bamboo – another fully tested and hard wearing (but deliciously soft) blend!

Caramel yellow – a variation on mustard what I like to call the ‘new neutral’!

Maria Grachvogel — FALKLAND, Peanut Brittle

Well known for its remarkable spongy loft, British Falklands merino is dense and highly insulating while still light enough for wraps and shawls, with a downy, powdery handle perfect for the most sensitive skins.

Peanut Brittle

A mere 20% bamboo adds strength, a soft organic lustre to the dye quality and a gentle drape for beautiful garments or accessories.The resulting fabric is hardwearing, low pilling and butter soft for next to skin wear. Bamboo’s additional natural anti-bacterial and moisture wicking properties make this the perfect fibre blend for both summer and winter knitting, keeping you cool in the summer and warm in winter by removing moisture next to the skin!

On blocking the stitches plump up and create the fullest, most even fabric…this is one of my favourite blends, resulting in immensely wearable garments with the added benefit of being superwash – so ideal for baby garments.

Emerald accents with camel (I am loving the trend of bright accents with classic camel tones.  Darwin green would made an amazing bright shawl/scarf to wear with a camel coat!):

Burberry — FALKLAND 80% Merino/20% Bamboo – Darwin

And very much OFF catwalk and on a much more day to day level ….also in ‘Darwin’ green…

Me! In my newly finished Amelie. I truly ❤ this one…and another pleasure to knit by Gudrun. I know I have said this before, but credit where credit’s due – her patterns are such a joy to knit!

I made the sleeves longer as we are already freezing here in London, and even managed to get the decreases for my sway back right this time. I shortened the stitches across the back and made a few more decreases than the front. Perfect!

(Though my partner insists on taking the back photos top-down and making me look like a Linebacker!!! Eeesh) ;-P

I wore this out last weekend and didn’t realise I’d forgotten to cut the yarn I’d woven in on the ties…but no one mentioned it and I was around a bunch of knitters, so just hoping no one noticed.

The Falkland yarn is SO cozy and warm. I even had to fend off a fellow Yarn Crawler who couldn’t stop petting me as she loved the feel of the yarn! I’d say that’s a ringing endorsement for how it feels! hah.

(You know who you are, groper.)  ;-B

I am off to Yorkshire this weekend, so shipping will be a little delayed and will resume Tuesday.

Happy knitting, all, and if you see me at Yarndale, please come say hello…!