By: Kate Davies Designs
colour, Colours of Shetland, design, Kate Davies, Kate Davies Designs, knitting, Shetland, , , , ,

Scatness Tunic

Here is the next design from Colours of Shetland — the Scatness Tunic

This design was the last in the collection to be completed. For many reasons, it is one of my favourites in the book.

Here is some behind the scenes footage from the day that my friends at Old Scatness kindly allowed us to shoot some photographs around the site.

Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t the best that day, and the photographs we managed to take in between the squally rain showers were a little grey . . .

. . .but there was a peat fire blazing in the reconstruction Pictish wheelhouse, which meant that we had somewhere to get dry and stay warm, just like Shetland’s early inhabitants.

The following day, in typical Shetland fashion, the weather and the light were totally amazing, and we were able to get out to take these pictures.


The two Scatness designs are all about circles. In the case of the tunic, this means that you knit everything in the round, cut a steek up the middle, and complete the edges with corrugated rib, icord, and neat, lined facings.

The finishing touch to the tunic is created with a set of signature wheelhouse buttons, whose colours pick up the rich shades used in the yoke and ribbing, and whose shape echoes the concentric spoked structure of the Pictish wheelhouses at Old Scatness.

The book includes a tutorial to enable you to make your own wheelhouse buttons. When I was producing this part of the book, I might have got a little obsessed with making buttons . . . they are somewhat addictive.

I love everything about this tunic inordinately: it is a very versatile garment, equally at home as an outdoor windcheater, or taking the chill off one’s shoulders in an air conditioned office. I love the rich autumnal hues of the yoke and the shifting colours in the rib, and for me, there is always something uniquely satisfying in the construction of a yoked garment.

I’ve now added the Scatness Tunic it to the Colours of Shetland collection on Ravelry, and if I get my skates on, I might be able to share another design with you later today.

See you again shortly!