Tag: knitters

  • designing & publishing: part 2

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    Well, I sat down a couple of days ago and thought I’d write a quick post about the great new books I’d come across, all of which had been either produced completely independently, or had been commissioned from an independent designer. As I reflected on recent directions in hand-knit design, and digressed into my own…

  • a treasured gift

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    What’s this? A handknitted hoose? With flowers in the garden . . . . . . and a wee gate . . . . . leading to a horse-shoe adorned front door . . . . . . there are flowers in the windows too . . . . . . shrubs round the side…

  • Thinking of Shetland

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    It was this time of year when I first visited Shetland. How well I recall that crazy drive across Unst in a blizzard! The weird half-light at midday! My first feeling of the profound difference of the place, but my immediate sensation that it was somewhere I could easily feel at home. . . Anyway…

  • knitter-producers and knitter-consumers

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    (This is a body and sleeves, knitted up on her machine by Ella Gordon, onto which I’m about to hand-knit a colourwork yoke. Hundreds of thousands of such garments were – and indeed still are – made in like manner in Shetland and elsewhere.) Thanks so much for your comments on the previous post. As…

  • A conversation with Hélène Magnusson

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    (Hélène, Hiking and Knitting between Fire and Ice, against the spectacular backdrop of Eyjafjallajökull.) When I visited Iceland I had the very great pleasure of finally meeting Hélène Magnusson, whose research and designs I have admired for many years. I visited Hélène in her lovely home in Reykjavik, where we drank tea, ate some delicious…

  • Puffin Post

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    One of the many things that makes me very happy as a designer is seeing different interpretations of a sweater I’ve created. I often learn a lot from the modifications knitters make to my patterns, and sometimes a simple change of shade can make a design look like a completely different garment. The Puffin sweater…

  • kitkin

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    I thought you might like to see the shorter version of the Catkin sweater that Mel has just knitted — Kitkin! Like the original Catkin, Kitkin is knitted in baa ram ewe’s Titus, in a lovely charcoal grey shade. To make this cropped version, Mel simply cast on the number of bust stitches for the…

  • images of knitting #1

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    I have a small (but ever growing) collection of prints and postcard in which knitters, and the activity of knitting, are represented. Some of these are really very interesting, and I thought I’d occasionally share them with you here. This card, which was posted with an Austrian stamp in 1916, depicts a ‘continental’ knitter working…

  • Amazing Boreal cardigans

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    One of the most rewarding aspects of this very rewarding job is seeing folk happily wearing the stuff that you’ve designed. I particularly enjoy seeing knitters’ inventive modifications of my work, and recently came across three versions of my Boreal sweater that are so wonderful that I just had to show you. Here are friends…

  • generosity

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    I have had more than one occasion to thank my lucky stars for knitters and blog readers over the past year. It still amazes me how incredibly generous and supportive you are with your thoughts, your comments and your correspondence. Sometimes something you say or do really moves me, and reminds me just how lucky…

  • retrovintage

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    Needled reviews: Lise-Lotte Lystrup, Vintage Knitwear for Modern Knitters (Thames & Hudson, 2008) Kari Cornell and Jean Lampe, Retro Knits: Cool Vintage Patterns for Men, Women and Children from the 1900s through the 1970s (Voyageur Press, 2008) Most knitters will have noticed the recent ubiquity of all things “vintage” in the world of wool. There…