Genius Tips
Yarn Detective: Creative Linen for the Schvitzing Season
In North America it’s summer. And in a lot of North America, it’s really hot, and sometimes humid, or what I like to call schvitzing season.
I get so sweaty, but I still want to knit and wear pretty knitted things.
A great yarn for the heat and humidity is Rowan Creative Linen, a blend of 50% cotton and 50% linen, which is featured in Nell’s beloved Shakerag Skirt (pictured above). I’ve recently talked about cotton, but adding linen to cotton is genius.
Linen has many similar characteristics as cotton. It’s a plant fiber, it’s cool, it’s absorbent, and it’s not elastic.
Where cotton is a short fiber, linen fibers (from the flax plant) are very long and sturdy. If you’ve knit with 100% linen fiber you know that it feels stiffer than cotton at first. If you wear 100% linen clothing you know linen gets softer over time while remaining durable.
I would like to add a note of gratitude to the woman who decided that linen clothes don’t need to be ironed. All hail rumpled linen!
Linen adds more durability and drape to cotton. I find it more absorbent, and I like how it adds a crispness to stitches.
I find linen cooler than cotton, too. Maybe it’s the absorbency or the drape that allows garments to flutter in the heat?
The yarns in these photos are before and after blocking. From left to right: 100% cotton yarn, Creative Linen, and 100% linen yarn.
The linen swatch looks sculptural before it’s finished and the cotton yarn looks soft and squishy. The Creative Linen falls right in between.
After a warm soak and a light pinning, the swatches and stitches have all smoothed out—the linen dramatically so.
Here are the finished swatches close up, left to right: 100% cotton, Creative Linen, Creative Linen, 100% linen.
You can see the stitch definition and the strength. The cotton has good stitch definition and looks soft, the linen looks crisp in all senses of the word, sharp outlines of the stitches, and firm to the touch (but remember it gets softer over time). It looks like anything knit from this would last you decades of summer wear.
The Creative Linen has the best qualities of both. It looks softer than the 100% linen, with better stitch definition than the 100% cotton
What about drape? Here are our swatches hanging out, left to right Creative Linen, 100% cotton, Creative Linen, and 100% linen. Cotton doesn’t have much and linen has it all, and gets swingier as time goes by. The Creative Linen leans more to the cotton side for drape, but it may get a little more languid over time.
Creative Linen is made up of ten plies of fine, fine singles. This allows room for the yarn to flex and makes the yarn lighter. If Creative Linen were a single or 2-ply yarn, it would be much heavier and stiffer to knit with.
(Because I know you’ll ask, the ball in the photo was wound on a Roly-Poly, an electric ball winder from Daedalus Spinning Wheels; it winds yarn into the same style and shape balls as a nostepinne.)
Creative Linen knits mostly like cotton. It is soft, very smooth, but not as cushy. I like how it looks and feels, the 50/50 blend is a real sweet spot.
I found it firmer, and a little sneaky. I had to watch my knitting habits, so I didn’t yank the yarn or grasp my needles tighter, because it likes to slide a little more than cotton. You might consider wooden or bamboo needles for this yarn.
Thes stitch definition is so good, and smooth, with the tiniest bit of texture. Sometimes I find cotton yarns too soft looking, and they tend to develop halo over time and wear, which Creative Linen won’t do because of the linen.
This is lace barely blocked. I patted it down, and pinned the corners. Look how it holds the yarn overs. If I had pinned this aggressively for a shawl or popover project, those YOs would stay open. I like how structural and organic the lace looks; the double decrease looks like the spine in a leaf.
This is definitely a yarn that I would not knit without swatching and finishing, both for gauge and to make sure you like the look.
For all plant fiber yarns, I like to weave my ends in on the sides or split the plies and weave them in. The lack of spring can make woven ends pop out and leave an unsightly bulge.
Cotton and cotton-linen blends are not my first-choice yarns for big texture knitting, like cables. The lack of elasticity causes the crossed stitches be a little uneven and a little funky, and not in the Earth Wind and Fire way.
To prevent weight from being an issue. I would look for a stitch pattern that also incorporates lace or use the texture as an inset.
I usually dress mostly in linen when it’s hot, and Creative Linen is a great way to add a little more linen into my knitting.
This is a great article… thank you! This skill, choosing the right pattern to complement the yarn structure, is one I’ve not mastered!
Creative Linen is my go to yarn for summer knitting. I love the muted colors. I’ve made 3 Shakerag skirts and Shakerag top using it.
This article taught me so much about this yarn. Thank you.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experience, dear Jillian! Creative Linen is a terrific yarn – it wears and washes so well, and the palette is lovely, as Lucy mentioned.
I especially love the recommendation to split the plies when weaving in the ends to reduce bulk… I wear a Creative Linen Shakerag skirt several times a week from hiking and biking to visiting a museum.
I am working on my skirt I started at Shakerag in June. The pattern is addictive and the yarn is fabulous. I’m already thinking about what color the next one should be.Thanks for the inspiration.
Thank you so much for this incredibly informative article about how linen impacts cotton. I live in a hot climate and sleeping on 100% linen sheets is the only way to go. Love your writing. Keep it coming!
I enjoyed reading this, as linen is always appealing to me. Your samples/swatches are gorgeous and inspirational. Thank you.
I have just switched for my first shakerag skirt. Just need to find the time behind my other multiple WIP’s to get it started. I have a terrible case of castonitis that I am trying to control.
I don’t know if it’s original to you, but I LOVE the coinage “castonitis”!!
This was great, thank you Jillian! I love linen, alone or blended with other fibers, its an enhancement to yarn in my opinion. I’m knitting now with a cotton/linen/bamboo blend yarn that’s lovely too. And my Shakerag skirt in Rowan Creative linen is so comfy and gets lots of compliments, thank you Nell! That Roly Poly electric ball winder is very cool but costs about 600 times the cost of the hand winder I own, oh well…
I have found Creative Linen is great for larger cables. I agree the small cables shown in the article are a little funny, but for something more substantial give it a try! I used CL in my Calligraphy Cardigan and it turned out great.
I LOVE your columns! I learn so much about different yarns. I appreciate the way you compare/contrast different yarns and write honestly about the pro’s and con’s. I am currently knitting a 100% linen scarf. It is slippery and a little stiff, but I love the look of linen.
Thanks for the info, Jillian. I’m on my second Shakerag skirt at the moment. I do love Rowan’s Creative Linen.
What a perfect article — everything I wanted to know and photos! YAY
I picked up some Creative Linen from MDK a few months ago for my second Shakerag Skirt. It’s patiently waiting for me to finish the other stuff in queue ahead of it & wind it into a ball.
This article is perfect in its timing & topic: I knit my first version in some linen I’d had in stash for ages, so I’m eager to see how the Creative Linen blend works up in comparison.
I like the skirt- but I really like the eyelet version on the MDK intro to the pattern- is that included in the pattern or is it a different skirt? I have wanted to knit a skirt and this might be it- albeit longer for my ‘aging’ legs!
Nell has added a couple of new edges to the pattern. They should show up in Ravelry.
It’s the same skirt. There are some earlier posts on the blog about the mods to make the eyelets.
Having moved to southern Florida from western New York last year, I’m always looking for cooler yarn and fabrics. Sitting with wool on my lap in 95° heat is not very pleasant! I think the combo of cotton and linen would be perfect. I see more summery tops and tanks in my knitting future.
I’m crocheting clothes out of CotLin yarn for Summer. It feels great to wear. Now I’m working on my Winter selection with wool blends. I’ll be finished with my new crochet socks this week.
Having moved to southern Florida from western New York last year, I’m always looking for cooler yarn and fabrics. Sitting with wool on my lap in 95° heat is not very pleasant! I think the combo of cotton and linen would be perfect. I see more summery tops and tanks in my knitting future.
Amen to wrinkled linen!!! This allows us to enjoy wearing linen so much more especially during these sultry July days.
I love linen! I’ve never seen it mixed with cotton so thank you for an introduction to this yarn!
Been knitting for 55 years and learned two new things just from reading this short article. Wow thanks so much
I love CotLin yarn. I just finished a laced top and love the feel wearing it. Thanks for the added information.