There’s plenty of time to make a new top for spring!
Pattern: Embry
Designer: Rachel Henry
Available: $6 for the single pattern, or $16.95 for the 10-pattern e-book (Homestead)
Yarn: Classic Elite Yarns
Here’s what the pattern page says — I think it sums things up pretty well:
Mesa works up delightfully quick in this pretty scoop neck summer top with lace edgings at hem and cuffs and princess waist shaping for a flattering fit.
Today’s Classic Elite Web-Letter features a pattern by me!
Pattern: Braided Cable Vest
Designer: Rachel Henry
Available: FREE from Classic Elite in Web-Letter #316
Yarn: CEY Chalet (or Chateau!) — 8 to 10 skeins, depending on size
This is a super boxy vest — no shaping of any kind. All the drama is in the cables. The real secret is the amazing yarn though. Chalet is to DIE for. So lofty, so soft, so LIGHT for such a bulky yarn!
From the pattern description:
This super-cozy vest, shown in Chalet, can also be knit in Chateau, Chalet’s colorful counterpart. A great layering piece, the vest is worked
flat, beginning with the cable in back. The cable turns the corner at the front and stitches are picked up from along the side of the cable band and the body is worked in one piece to the armhole. The vest is not intended to meet in the front and can be worn belted or open at the front.
Introducing my latest pattern: the Trinette Hat and Mitten set!
(Photos from Classic Elite!)
Pattern: Trinette Hat and Trinette Mittens
Designer: Rachel Henry (that’s me!)
Available: $6 on Ravelry, or as part of the booklet #9245 “Belle” (from Classic Elite Yarns)
Yarn: CEY Liberty Wool; MC: 7815 “Bright Olive”; CC 7865 “Violet Glen”
Design/Skills Needed:
This vibrant hat use a variety of different techniques to create playful color changes and textures.
Introducing my latest pattern: Astrid!
(Photos from Classic Elite!)
Pattern: Astrid
Designer: Rachel Henry (that’s me!)
Available: $6 on Ravelry, or as part of the booklet #9236 “New Mode” (from Classic Elite Yarns)
Yarn: CEY Alpaca Sox; 4-7 balls (depending on size); sample knit in 1869 “Amethyst”
Design/Skills Needed:
Frothy lace at the hem, throat and cuffs make this cozy pullover dramatic and feminine. This pullover is worked primarily in the round. The lacy portions are worked single-stranded; the stockinette portions are worked double-stranded. This makes for a suprisingly quick knit!
This week I started two new design projects!
The first is for Classic Elite’s Spring/Summer 2014 collection — so, even though I’ll be done with the design and sample in a few short weeks, I won’t be able to share until that collection debuts early next year. But, I want to give CEY Mesa a plug! Both in swatching and in the actual garment, this 100% cotton yarn is delightfully plush. I love the subtle tonal colorways.
The second project is something you’ll get to see a bit sooner! I’m working on a one-skein project for A Hundred Ravens Lustre (aka Luster DK on Ravelry). It’s a nicely spun merino/silk blend, hand-dyed by local dyer Kate. The silk blend takes yarn differently than pure wool, with smoother blends between hues and a beautiful, well, luster. (This all makes me think of this couplet: The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow/Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below.) With only 231 yards to work with, I’ve got quite a challenge to make something dramatic! I’ve decided to go with a VERY open lacy stole, with lace patterning on both right-side and wrong-side rows.
Here’s my skein of Lustre:
I’m so pleased with my Sheep Head Hat! 🙂
I used CEY’s soft and lovely Vail, which is an alpaca/bamboo blend, available is eight naturally-dyed shades of grey and brown. When I bought the yarn for this project, only six shades were out — the other two were added with this fall’s line of new colors.
Project: Sheep Head Hat
Pattern: sheep heid
Designer: Kate Davies
Available: £2.75 GBP on Ravelry
Yarn: Classic Elite Yarn’s Moutaintop Vail, six hues
The original pattern called for nine natural sheep colors, so I had to modify my hat to use the six shades I had to work with. I lost a bit of the dynamics of the original hat, but I still love my version. The alpaca-bamboo fingering weight yarn is amazingly soft and lightweight. The standing sheep in the hat body are adorable, but I love the graphic rams-head decreases on the top. UPDATE: my hat was featured in the CEY blog!
I made something fun for the shop!
Project: Yar
Pattern: Starboard
Designer: Susan Mills
Available: $6 on Ravelry, in CE #9168 (Harbor) for $10
Yarn: CEY Seedling Handpaint in #4567
“Starboard” is a quick and fun knit, using just two hanks of soft and colorful Seedling Handpaint. I was asked to make a store sample for the shop, and I was pleased to do so! The cast-on edge of 135 elongated picots was … sorry to say … a bit tedious. But, I knew that once the edge was done, the rest would be quickly completed. I played a board game with friends while making the picots, and two hours later, I was at work on the short-row ribbed body. I finished the next day.
Thanks to my model Eli for showing off Yar for me! 🙂
This week, I cast on (and finished) Yar, a cute fringed scarf. This is a sample for the Hub Mills shop. The pattern, Starboard, is from the spring CEY booklet for Seedling Hand-Painted.
Announcing my two latest patterns: Twins and Entwined, two cabled mug cozies! Both are available FREE on Ravelry, so go download a copy today.
I designed this pair of patterns for my upcoming “Intro to Cabling” class at the Hub Mills Store. The class is two hours long and costs $20. I’m offering it twice in the near future, on Saturday, April 21st, and Saturday, May 19th, from 10AM – noon. “Twins” is the simpler of the two patterns, intended for the knitter who is totally new to cables. “Entwined” is a bit more complex (though not as much as you might think!), meant for a knitter who has done a bit of cabling before, or an adventurous novice.
If you’d like to take my class, call (978) 408-2176 or email yarn@hubmillsstore.com to reserve a seat.
Both cozies take less than 50 yards of worsted-weight yarn, plus two buttons, and can be finished in a single day. Both are also appropriate for learning how to cable without a cable needle — something I will also teach in class, because I think it makes cabling SO much quicker and easier.
I’m pleased to announce the release of my latest pattern: a two-color, knit-flat, in-the-round, cabled cowl. Bifurcate Kumara Cowl was featured in Issue 218 of Classic Elite’s Webletter (if you aren’t already a subscriber, sign up! free patterns, once a week! can’t beat that 🙂 ).
Here’s what CEY had to say about Bifurcate:
This two color cowl is a show-stopper, and its construction is incredibly clever. How’s this for a brain-teaser…the entire cowl is knit back and forth, NOT in the round. Curious? This ingenious design comes from Rachel Henry, the designer who brought us one of our most popular Web-Letters to date, the Cotton Bam Boo Kudzu Shawlette.
There is no cozier yarn than Kumara, with its soft, lofty blend of extrafine Merino and baby camel hair. The camel hair is undyed, resulting in a muted effect that performs in perfect harmony with the sophisticated palette of 23 colors. Baby camel, a fiber with a softness rivaling cashmere, is expensive on its own, but you’ll find it in this decadent blend at an affordable price. This yarn is pure luxury!
Pattern: Bifurcate Kumara Cowl
Designer: Rachel Henry (that’s me!)
Available: Free! from Classic Elite’s Web-letter (Issue 218)
Yarn: CEY Kumara in Thai Purple and Royce Mountain
Design/Skills Needed: This cowl is “knit flat” in the sense that it is worked back-and-forth, with RS and WS rows. When the colors cross, the RS and WS rows overlap a little bit — it’s easier to do than describe! However, this cowl is also “knit in the round” in the sense that it is worked row-by-row and there is no long vertical seam. If you can cable and follow directions carefully, you can make this cowl.
Inspiration: My youngest son saw me working on a lacy cowl for myself, and asked if I would make him a neckwarmer too. I showed him my stash, and he chose a dark red and light grey and instructed me to make it “half one color and half the other, like this,” holding his hands up to his own neck. This request was the initial inspiration for this two-color, knit-flat, in-the-round, cabled cowl.
I knew I wanted to use simple cables, with no separation, to make subtle overall pattern that would also give the cowl some vertical structure. Almost right away, I could see in my head how the two halves could meet and twine together using this same cable pattern. I knew I could accomplish this by knitting first one half and then the other, but I wanted to make it all at once – in the round, at least nominally.
The first prototype, now in my son’s coat pocket, looked great. “Bifurcate” is the second generation of this original cowl, and is improved in several small ways. I changed the top and bottom edge to be less flared, and used different yarn and stitch counts to create an adult-sized cowl. I chose soft, luscious Kumara for it’s to-die-for touchability and great stitch definition. When washed and block, the soft halo is lovely.
The original knit-flat, in-the-round, two-color, cabled cowl:
Remily Knits 