Achtercairn

My apologies, everyone. Yesterday afternoon I was working on a draft of today’s (Friday’s) post, and managed to precipitately and mistakenly hit the publish button. Like many of us, I am clearly still getting back into the January swing of things, but can now definitely say that today is the day for our Knitting Wester Ross club to resume again with the publication of the pattern which provided the initial spark of inspiration for the whole project: Achtercairn.

A few years ago, when Tom and I were visiting Wester Ross, we popped into the Gairloch Museum and picked up a wee map. The map showed the route of an interesting-looking guided trail around the hillside behind the museum: we got the dogs out of the car, and immediately set off.

Following the map and waymarkers, we walked up the hillside to discover the bronze and iron age roundhouses of the Achtercairn Archaeology Trail. We were able to examine ancient dwelling walls and boundary markers, together with the well-preserved remains of a huge structure which immediately conveyed that sense of ritual you sometimes get in ancient Scottish places. Facing west, it commanded an extraordinary view over the sea, towards the hills of Skye, and the distant sunset. A massive block of pink-ish sandstone marked what had evidently been a hearth, in the centre of a huge circle made up of other local stones.

Achtercairn’s archaeology was both fascinating, and well-presented, and as we followed the trail, I was not only thinking about the pre-historic inhabitants of the landscape, but its more recent custodians as well. I’ve visited so many places in Scotland where it can be extremely difficult to unravel a site’s interesting archaeology from an invasive blanket of gorse and bracken, but the ancient structures of Achtercairn were easy to view because the hillside had clearly been very carefully managed and maintained.

Bracken had been stamped down, brambles and gorse had been cut back, and the heathery undergrowth and grass which might easily have concealed each low-lying roundhouse site had been recently and precisely strimmed. With every step I took along the trail, I became more and more aware of Achtercairn as a space that was looked after; I was only able to see these ancient dwellings, and understand their significance, because someone else cared enough about this place to do the hard work that enabled the site to be publicly shared and experienced. The sensation of treading paths that had been so thoughtfully prepared deeply enriched my experience of Achtercairn: this was a landscape brimming with humanity, and human inspiration, both ancient and contemporary.

Back in the museum, I discovered an interesting small booklet about Achtercairn and its archaeology, which included an appealing plan of the geology of the “R1” roundhouse site:

I looked at this diagram and immediately saw a colourful yoke pullover: there would be a rich dark brown for the peaty landscape, pale grey gneiss, pink sandstone, greenish amphibolite.

Later, I drew a sketch of my planned pullover in my journal, and thought about the richness of the human stories that the wonderful landscape of Wester Ross contained. Might we begin another project exploring a few of those stories? Tom was enjoying photographing the area; I could perhaps collaborate with the curators of the area’s excellent local museums on the project’s research content, and I could also get in touch with the man who had written the interesting booklet I’d bought about Achtercairn. This man, it became clear, had also been responsible for developing the archeological trail, and his name is Jeremy Fenton. It was Jeremy’s care and thoughtfulness that had become so apparent to me as I moved around the landscape, and I’m thrilled that he has written a wonderful essay for us about his work at Achtercairn, which club members will be able to read on Sunday.

Back to my design, then, which is round like an ancient roundhouse and incorporates all the colours of the stones of Achtercairn. The pullover body is worked, without shaping, from the bottom up to your preferred length; but the yoke is where things get really interesting.

I wanted purl-bump texture to suggest the uneven, nubbly surfaces of an ancient archaeological site . . .

. . .and achieved this effect by turning the work after sleeves and body are joined together, and knitting the yoke effectively inside out.

When doing this, you have to hold the unworked yarn strand at the front of your needles, which can sometimes feel a little counter intuitive. If you don’t like that idea, you can easily create the reverse stockinette colourwork effect by ignoring my inside-out instructions, and purling the chart from the right side, but do be aware when doing this that your “lozenges” will then travel in the opposite direction.

The structure of interlocking, colourwork lozenges worked around a circular yoke has fascinated me for years, and I’ve explored it previously (from the knit side) in Allover’s Yomp. It is part of the nature of being a designer to push at a fun idea in several different ways, and I really like this iteration, which for me has just the right combination of textural interest and graphic rhythm.

I find the slightly-staggered shade changes and purl bumps very satisfying, and if you enjoy interesting circular yoke constructions as much as I do, you’ll find Achtercairn a lot of fun to knit.

Karen, who is a good friend of Jeremy’s, kindly agreed to be our Achtercairn model, and I must also give a shout-out to Jim, who did sterling work with the reflector and diffuser on what was a very changeable and windy day. Thanks, Jim!

The Achtercairn pattern will be winging its way to the Ravelry libraries and inboxes of Wester Ross club members very shortly. I hope that you enjoy this design!