ToDo/NewDo: Machine Knitting the Landscape Around You by Judith Pipher

A Machine-Knit Masterpiece: The Tom Thompson Pines!

Judith Pipher, Wasaga Beach, Ontario, Canada

This sweater is an original design by Judith. It is inspired by the Canadian artist Tom Thompson.

Judith describes her design..

My loves are Georgian Bay which is on the Great Lakes. 

The yarn colours are blends of Koigu yarn from Chatsworth Ontario. The plan was drawn on to my basic sweater pattern that was put on to paper, then coloured.  It was then knit on my 940 brother.  The back is stripes of the colour on the right side. The pictorial was done in intarsia,  the trees are hand embroidered. it was to have a front zip. That proved to be too heavy so I sewed it closed then made an I cord  to match  to hide the join.

side view

back view

A Little about Judith

Judith is a retired historical interpreter. She loves history and now volunteers to do textile management at different museums.  She does condition reports, exhibits and cares for them. Her first and best love? Fibre of all kinds.

Judith travel to learn, to meet like-minded people and to be inspired. She went back to college at the age of 64  to learn pattern making. She continued on to study tailoring with Le Grand Chic school In Italy through Georgian College Barrie. and she graduated at 70!  We were honored to have Judith study with Cochenille in both Italy and San Diego. she has also studied with Jon Moore in London,  Susan Khalje in NYC, and Kathryn Brenne in North Bay (ON, Canada)

 

ToDo/NewDo Project: Up-cycled Phone Bag Purse from a Retired Sweater

From Sweater to Phone Bag Purse

by Mary Ann Newton, Seattle Washington

Mary Ann Shares

Two years ago, I finished a cotton sweater that bagged and sagged, no matter what alterations I did to make it fit. This week, I took off the sleeves, sewed them together, joined at bottom, embroidered and embellished, lined, made a finger cord, and Voila! Now, what to do with the front and back of the sweater.

A little bit about Mary Ann
Mary Ann is a retired landscape designer living in the Seattle areas. She loves having the time to express herself in all kinds of fiber art.

Creativity vs. Corona Virus: Get Involved

As many of you know, I own and run Cochenille Design Studio, a company that develops software and design aids for the textile design world. I am a practitioner of many creative arts ranging from sewing, knitting, pattern making, cooking, mosaic, beading, photography, art, and many other things. Having grown up on a farm in rural Ontario, Canada with a mother and grandmothers who were creators gave a sound education in the home and creative arts. Having trained for and taught as a Professor of Fashion for most of my professional career also further nurtured things along.

Today in this world, we definitely live in uncertain times. For my business, we have had two trade shows canceled, which is no surprise given travel and other restrictions. We have also canceled our Italy retreats this June, and are still pending the decision for the France retreat (although I think that has now been taken out of our hands).

Here, at Cochenille, we’ve decided to try and make the best of our new daily life by using our at-home time to be creative. It is after all, National Crafts month.

So, we are asking our Cochenille audience and readers of this blog to join in and share with us on this creative challenge.

We are calling this challenge –ToDo/NewDo

• The To Do portion is to finish a project that is sitting in your ‘need to do’ pile. This could be a partially-complete project, alterations, or similar
• The New Do portion is to create a new project using any craft technique, from scratch.

Here is a link to a page on our website, where you can download this ToDo/NewDo list to use.

Join us in this creative solidarity. We hope to make it global. Send me (Susan) a photo of your project along with your info, and a brief description of the project.

I will share and post these for others to see. These do not need to be Garment Designer or Stitch Painter projects. Just jump in and finish up those UFO’s (unfinished objects), or start something new from scratch! In fact, your projects could be things like organizing your sewing room, yarn stash, or other.  Your project doesn't have to be fiber arts; it could be woodworking, home arts, a new recipe, etc. The idea is to use our time creatively and to share with each other.

We will be using this blog as the hosting site. This morning I posted a To Do.... now complete. Check it out.
So, I say Tag!! your turn

I will will post the images sent by those of you willing to be involved on this same blog. Please send them to susan@cochenille.com

Feel free to join the mail list of the blog so you can be notified when an entry is posted. Also feel free to invite friends to join in the ToDo/NewDo Challenge.

Be safe, and be well.

Our very best to all our audience.
Susan Lazear
Cochenille Design Studio

Knitting in Austria... Dessert

While visiting Vienna a few weeks ago, I happened upon the window of a knitting shop. It was so 'Vienna', pastries, that is.

Here are some images to share.

Close-up of Stitch Patterns

And a few close-ups of stitch patterns from Pitti Filati.












- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Italy

Pitti Filati Trends

Late last week, I spent two days at the Pitti Filati trend show in Florence, viewing the fashion and knitwear trends for Fall/Winter 2013/2014. Here are a few previews of garments and styles.
















- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Florence, Italy

Knit Bracelet

Here is a an image of a knitted bracelet, as seen in a shop window.

This one was made from Sterling Silver. There is also a ring (left).

Yarn in Verona! Jenny Klaer, Filati & Ricami

I have been to Verona many times, and have looked for yarn stores with no luck. You have to know who to ask, and so, you must ask a knitter. I was pleased to find out that my Italian friend Anna is a knitter, and so, she took me on tour of a few wonderful stores in Verona and area. We will begin with Jenny Klaier, Filati & Ricami. To the right here, you can see Jenny (left) and Lina (right).







First of all, meet Anna.. a fellow fiber enthusiast.


Jenny Klaer is the name of the store and of the owner. It is a lovely shop full of color, samples and of course, interesting yarns. Here are a couple shots of the interior of the store.



Jenny Klaer, Filati & Ricami
Via S. Egidio, 11, 37121 Verona (this is near Piazza Erbe)
Tel: 045 596761
Jennyklaer@yahoo.it

This is a great yarn, and you can see the project I am going to do. Jenny was very gracious and sketched the design and instructions for me. This is a simple shawl that begins with 151 stitches and involves decreases every other row. The first portion is knit with the edge of the yarn as your stitch. This creates a fringe of sorts. The latter body-portion is knit with the entire yarn forming the stitch.




Here is another yarn





Another yarn and scarf.

Knit and Crochet Moves to Interior Items

I love Italian fashion, and I love to see knits and crochet move to home interiors.

Look how crocheted granny squares form the headboard and base of this bed.














and look how stockinette/jersey knit becomes a throw.

Amazing Knitting Machine

A friend sent me the link to this blog... This is a pretty amazing knitting machine. It is an interactive sock project, where the knitting occurs when people blow through a straw.


http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/11/interactive_knitting_machine.html

or

Untitled Sock Project from Pol Pla on Vimeo.

The Big Sock... working towards a Guinness Book World Record

At Newton's Fall Machine Knitting seminar last weekend, I had the pleasure to participate in The Big Sock. This is an effort to knit the world's biggest sock, and set a new Guinness Book World record.

The sock is composed of 1500 stitches knitted with ten circular needles. This makes it 23 times larger than a typical sock (which starts with 64 stitches).
The project originated in Hastings England and is now traveling the U.S. This is the first time it is on the west coast, and is moving to Stitches in Hartford next week.

The current world record is a sock that measures 16 feet tall.

Knitters in the City (of San Francisco)

Last weekend I was having lunch at a little creperie in San Francisco. I happened to glance over at another table, and immediately had to smile, as lo and behold was a group of hand knitters, happily knitting away amidst chatter and laughs.

Given the nature of creative and yarn people, I knew the women wouldn’t mind a little intrusion, so I walked over to chat with them and find out more about the communal nature of group.

Meet ‘the Knit Wits’, (a newly dubbed name, by the way). This is a group of women who meet every Sunday at a little creperie restaurant near the yarn store called Atelier which is located on Divisadero in the city. The ladies have been meeting for two years. Their projects varied from scarves to hats to shrugs, and beyond. The knitting was well advanced in technique.

Here you can see a few of the projects members were working on.

Ginger Done!

My friend Ginger sent me an email and some photos, and I am sharing these here. Here is what Ginger had to say.

OK, a "done"! This scarf is a variation on a Japanese stitch pattern that I
learned when I was in Gayle Roehm's Challenging Japanese Stitch Patterns
class at Stitches East this year. The yarn is Noro's Silk Garden Lite. It
was fun to knit and actually went fairly quickly after a few pattern
repeats.

I'm famous (infamous?) for not finishing projects. I get so many ideas while
I'm working on one thing and as soon as I know that the current project will
work out all right, my mind is off and ready to begin the next new
exploration. You've inspired me to finish some of these abandoned projects
and I'm now going to alternate "dones" with new projects.

Ginger

Here is a detail...

Done #4: Sweater Jacket

This is a sweater jacket that I machine-knit a few years ago. The pattern is from a book I wrote, called Easy Seven Jackets. The purpose of the book is to teach people how to think outside of the box, using Garment Designer. Each jacket in the book teaches them a new way to think when using the software.

Apparently my gauge was ‘off’, or I simply goofed, but in the end the jacket was much larger than it should have been, and for that reason, it has sat shelved. I finally decided I needed t figure it out.


So… here is how the fixes evolved.
For the sleeves that were six inches too long? I made a fold-back cuff.
For the neckline that stretched? I used a chain crochet stitch to tighten it back up.
For the upper bodice that was too big? I simpy criss-crossed or overlapped the jacket top more.
For the jacket skirt (knit sideways) that was too narrow? Well, I decided to add contrasting wedges along the center front of the garment.

And…
For the two center fronts that were different lengths, because the cast-on was different than the cast-off? Well, I stretch one side like crazy when I added the wedges, so that all would look “intentional”.

In the end? A fun and creative jacket, which I can now wear.
Thanks to Lexi, one of my students, for modeling.

Done #3: The Finished/Unfinished Top

This is a project that had been in the works for quite some time. Several years ago, I wrote an article for Knit N' Style magazine, detailing how to create the garment you see below. Thanks to my student Stephanie for modeling.


Since the article only showed the front of the garment, I never actually knit the back piece. So... in my current "getting things done" mode, I decided to finish this project.

The design consists of a T-shirt type top, sewn out of illusion knit. Onto this base, I stitched a knit sweater piece that was knit too small (on purpose). I joke around, that this is what you do if you don't knit a proper gauge... you find a creative way to use the piece.

Garment Designer software was used to create both the sewn and knit patterns. If you want to see the entire process, including the inspiration garment from Denmark, go to my website and check it out.
http://www.cochenille.com/garmproj.html