Knit Progress: holiday hats

I took a few skeins of yarn with me on our Thankgiving trip and was able to complete a few hats. I did the Meringue hat pattern in Malabrigo silky merino and it makes a nice soft lighter weight version of this hat. I ended up adding a few rows in the ribbed section to make the band wider and added a few rows to the body before the decrease rows to make this hat a bit fuller.

I was also able to visit a new yarn store called The Slip Knot in Newton Square, PA and picked up a few more skeins of Cascade Yarns Eco Alpaca and a nice tweed of another brand that was on sale. Its a great little shop with a nice selection of weights and brands with a big table in the back for knitting. I’ll try to go back next time I’m in town.

I made the black and white striped hat with the Eco Alpaca for myself. Its already been keeping my head warm. I’ve also just finished up another of these hats using the leftover black and smoke yarn I had from a hat and a pair of gloves and made another  striped hat  for Christmas.

Next up I am making a pair of gloves to match an existing hat and then I’ll have two more custom dog sweaters to complete in the next week or two. Check back to see how those turn out!

Let me know if you’re still trying to finish up some presents for the holidays in the next few  weeks. Its nice to know I’m not the only one!

Knit Progress: grab bag of stuff

I’ve been working on a number of projects the past few weeks, most of them being custom order items or Christmas presents on my own holiday list! Here is a grouping of a bunch of those projects. A friend of mine asked me to make these simple I-cord necklaces as a gift and I liked them so much, I made some for myself to use as minimal scarves this winter. I had some small balls of Madelinetosh Tosh Merino left over from other projects and they were perfect for this type of project where you need just a bit of yarn. Here’s a quick video to show you how to do it. I used US8 dpns and worked over 4 stitches. I also have quick instructions in this craftsy project.

I’ll be starting on a hat and another set of gloves or two for some Christmas presents of my own. I’ve been working with Malabrigo Silky Merino again and remembered why I love it – so soft with a beautiful sheen!

Happy Thanksgiving this week!

Things We Like: Peter Saville, Joy Division, Substance

We are quite fond of the work of British graphic designer Peter Saville. If we were forced to admit it, we might actually say that it’s easily some of the best graphic design work ever produced. At its best, his work is conceptually driven, visually restrained, often dry and mostly deadpan.

Saville gained notoriety within the niche of music graphics, designing iconic cover art for Tony Wilson’s legendary Factory label like Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures and New Order’s Blue Monday. For us, though, it’s his promotional artwork for Joy Division’s Substance collection and Atmosphere single of 1988 that rise to the top of the list.

The posters are so simple, so restrained, yet so full of contrasts. Saville pits the humanist qualities of Garamond against Wim Crouwel’s mechanical, retro-futurist New Alphabet font of 1967. He adds to them some abstract, macro-lensed photography, a judicious hit of color, sets it all within a vast field of white, aligns on a central axis, and presumably packs it in for the day. They’re so simple, so straight forward that one could easily just shrug their shoulders and sigh, “so what?”.

But it’s precisely that lack of “stuff” that makes these works so perfect. The massive white space heightens the tension between parts by creating a quiet, vacuum-sealed environment where one has no choice but to study the few elements that do inhabit the space and investigate their nuances. Everything placed there has a purpose and the composition is devoid of all extraneous parts and gestures.

In any creative endeavor there is that impulse to jump in and start making; a subconscious urge and assumption that says in order to make an impression, you must make a mark. Any mark. Yet with Saville’s work, the reverse is true. His work dictates that objects loaded with meaning, carefully selected, thoughtfully edited and composed with clear intent will leave a greater impression than any overwrought, self-indulgent gesture ever could.

Prints: Monoprints

Here are two new monoprints that emerged from the studio just recently. They were unveiled  at the Cherokee Heights Arts Festival yesterday only to be purchased a few hours later by a local collector.

I’m happy to see that they’ve found an appreciative home.

Print: Untitled (Triple Stripe)

As Knits and Prints gears up for the Cherokee Heights Arts Festival this weekend (Saturday, November 10 in Marietta, Georgia), I’ll be posting new work as the week progresses. I completed this new print (edition: 5) right before Halloween. The colors seem to suggest that I’ve bypassed trick or treat season and focused squarely on December’s festivities. Some sort of subliminal message? I’m not certain that that’s the case. But I suppose that that makes for a good story, so if you’d like to read into the work feel free. To me it’s just simple, clean, perfect.

Come visit us at the Cherokee Heights Arts Festival. We’ll have a ton of new work to share and would love to see you.

Knit Progress: Dog sweaters galore!

I’ve had a number of custom dog sweater requests come in, so that is what I have been working on. Its so interesting to see how the measurements vary by breed. The above are the last three projects that I’ve completed. I’m currently working on an argyle pattern for a mini schnauzer – it should be really cute too. The Gray one with the sleeves was for a pug – so cute!