Water pullava!

Well, if you’re anywhere in the Conwy area, you’ll know that we’ve had a bit of an issue with our water supply.

Wednesday evening a large main burst near the Llyn Cowlid water treatment facility, which has wiped out the water supplies to a lot of Conwy county. We got in on Thursday morning to find no supply to the shop. We struggled through for the day before finding out that it was not going to be a ‘quick fix’ and that from a legal standpoint we should have been closed. As such we stayed closed on Friday as well.

The water is now back on to the shop (other areas, including my home, not so much!), however it is brown and you wouldn’t really want to drink it yet. We can, however, flush the loos!

So that has been our big excitement this week and it will likely continue to be an issue tomorrow whilst we wait for everything to wash through properly.

As you can see from the map, there have been a lot of people affected, so we’re all hoping to be able to get back to normal again soon.

Knitted and crocheted garment design

I wanted to have a chat today about how to get started designing a knitted or crocheted garment. This is something I absolutely love doing – it is my main creative outlet and gives me a LOT of joy – but it is also a lot of work.

How do you start?

The first thing to do when you are designing any pattern is to check your gauge. This can mean a lot of trial and error using different hook or needle sizes and checking the feel of the fabric for each stitch you want to use.

Once you know how many stitches and rows you will have per inch, you can then work out how many stitches and rows you will need to create the size of fabric that you want. For example, if I have 22 sts per 4″ on my gauge square, this works out at 5.5 sts per inch. I know that for a particular sweater design to fit someone with a 36″ bust, i will need to have about 4 inches of positive ease (the extra space to make it fit and not be skin-tight), so 40″ of fabric.

5.5 (stitches per inch) x 40 (inches needed) = 220 sts.

I know that the neck of my sweater would need to be about 16″ around. Using the same method, this means that I would need to cast on 88 sts. (5.5 x 16 = 88)

Now I need to take into consideration the sleeves as well as it will be a yoked sweater, so the yoke would include the shoulders and down to the underarms. Each upper arm requires about 15″ more fabric, so 30″ in total. This would be another 165 sts (5.5 x 30 = 165). This means that at the end of the yoke I would need to have 220 (body) + 165 (arms) = 385 sts in total.

Now, the yoke length, the length from the neck to where you need to have finished the increases, is 20″. I go back to my gauge measurements and this time look at the number of rows. According to my gauge, I have 28 rows to 4″, so 7 rows per inch. This means that over 20 inches on my yoke, I will complete 140 rows. (7 x 20 = 140).

Once you know these numbers, you then know how many stitches you need to increase to get from the neck to the end of the yoke (385 – 88 = 297 sts) and how many rows you need to do it in (140). You can then decide how quickly to increase. I often find drawing a diagram and dividing my yoke into sections really helps with this, as you can see in the image above.

Even if you aren’t doing a shaped design, you will still need to know your gauge to know how big your project will be, and eventually how much yarn it will require as well.

Once you have worked out how your pattern will work, how many stitches you need, where you will put your increases, stitch patterns, colourwork etc, it is then time to start making the first sample.

Depending on the complexity of the design, you might need to make several samples, tweaking each time to make sure that you are happy with your finished object. Maybe that cable is facing the wrong way, maybe the fabric isn’t quite laying right, there are a multitude of reasons why you might need to restart. As you go along, you will make detailed notes of everything you do to ensure that you remember for when you come to writing up the pattern.

Once you are happy with your finished sample, you need to go back to your notes and get it all written up in a way that someone else would understand (my notes are often so rough they will only make sense to me!). Then it is time to talk to your friendly neighbourhood tech editor – these wonderful people make sure that everything you’ve written actually makes sense, has the right stitch counts throughout, is consistent so that you don’t confuse your customers by changing ( for * part way through, etc. If you are doing a sized pattern, such as a sweater, a lot of tech editors also offer a ‘grading’ service to help you work out how to make your one size sample work for each different size or age required. This is a long process and there is a lot of to-ing and fro-ing between the tech editor and the designer getting everything right.

There will be mistakes in your pattern which will need correcting, nomatter how careful you think you were when you wrote it up!

Depending on the complexity of your pattern, once you have had your pattern tech edited, you may then decide to put it out for testing. This is where you ask other kind knitters and crocheters to make up your project and check it all makes sense and works the way you expect it to. There may be a final chat with the tech editor after this if any problems are found!

Only at this point, which can take many months depending on the size and complexity of your design, are you at the point where you can now publish your pattern.

It is difficult to know how to price your patterns once you have done all of this work. You want them to be accessible, but also reflect the work involved. My patterns are mostly around £6.50 to buy, depending on the pattern, but I have priced my Coast and Castles blanket at £15. It’s very difficult to know how to price your designs simply from the hours of work you put into it yourself, and for those of us who do it properly – with tech editors, testers etc, it can also a costly and sometimes lengthy process due to this additional (vital!) support.

I hope you might be inspired to have a go yourself! If you are – please let me know!

Shop News

Well, there isn’t much today as we’ve been closed, however we have had another Lykke delivery in which included these lovely Pendels (which we’ve had on backorder for AGES!)

I think it’s safe to say that everyone here now wants one – Wendy has earmarked the sample one we have out (burnt Mango), and I’m a bit tempted with the plain mango, where as Adam and Ash have their eyes on the Rosewood!

We’ve also had some lovely deliveries from some of our local artisans. We’re working on getting photos of these and putting them on the website, but as they’re all completely unique, the best place to see them is to come into the shop.

Nikki News

Clue 9 of the Coast and Castles blanket is now out!

There are only 8 more squares to go, and I’m getting really excited! Here are the squares that you’ll be knitting in Clue 9:

I’m busy sewing in the ends and reblocking all the squares which have been hung around the counter. Some of them have become rather lopsided during their display time, so are in very strong need of a little tweaking!

Clue 10 will be released in February along with the details of how to complete your blanket!

I can’t wait to see them finished!

Speaking of finished things though…

Meet Woolhenmina!

I have had SO much fun making her, and she won’t be the last! I’ve now cast on the crochet version as well, so she’ll have a sister very soon!

We’ve been having a giggle coming up with names for the new flock… some of the best ones we’ve (mainly Andy) come up with so far are:

Nando Calrisihen, Perch-unia, Egglantine, Dolly Parthen, Jenny Hendrix, Miss F. Heather and Birdie Egglesthen.

Hendless fun!!

(yes, my family has pun wars!)

What have/will you you named your chicken?

Have a good week!!