Letters
Intarsia: 7 Decent Tips
Dear Kay,
A Year of Techniques is becoming my favorite excuse. “Sorry can’t fix dinner—I’m learning.” “Wish I could help, but I’m enriching my soul.” “I’m elevating.” “I am leaning in to intarsia.”
Oh, whatever—once you see Jen Arnall-Culliford’s seven-minute A Year of Techniques intarsia tutorial, you realize that intarsia is itself the tiniest of maneuvers. You change yarn colors in the middle of a row simply by throwing the old color over the new color, then knit with the new color. It’s a bit of weaving, that’s all.
An addicting bit of weaving.
I don’t mean to brag (totally bragging), but I’m on Row 274 of Bristol Ivy’s Brambling Shawl. That puts me almost halfway done, working three colors of this Fyberspates Cumulus at once, just about to add the fourth color.
I’m finding tricks and tips to share.
In the MDK Shop
Tips for a Better Brambling Shawl
Tip No. 1: Tug the new color. Beautiful intarsia happens when the magical join line is as smooth as possible, with stitches the same size along each side of the color change. I find that gently snugging up the new color stitch makes it a tidy, even size. It’s a tiny tug, not a big tug. But it’s definitely a tug. My early rows have balloony stitches along the color switch line, because I Failed To Tug.
Tip No. 2: Turn your work with care. Fear of Tangling is an issue with intarsia, and you have to accept at some point that your yarns will entwine to some degree. Here’s a great tip from dbukko on Ravelry that will minimize this:
After a knit row, turn your work to the right to start the next row.
After a purl row, turn your work to the left to start the next row.
Tip No. 3: Pointy needles. A dull tip makes the M1 stitches a pain.
I’m using size 8 needles rather than the size 6 specified. Looking for the airiness.
Tip No. 4: Knit the yarn, not the flurf. Fyberspates Cumulus is dreamy because of its halo. But sometimes the eager knitter will knit the halo and not the yarn itself.
Knitting the halo means you basically didn’t knit the stitch.
Tip No. 5: Hold your work up to the light. This is how you find the wayward dropped stitch, which with this velcroish yarn will sit patiently for a very long time without unraveling.
This dropped stitch may never have unraveled—but we don’t know this, do we?
Tip No. 6: Read and map out each section before knitting. This Brambling Shawl pattern does cool things, shifting blocks of colors while simultaneously building a triangle shape. No one row has a ton of action, but there’s often a color shift, an increase, or a decrease that requires attention. This has been the most challenging part of this pattern—making sure I’m doing the repeated sections the proper number of times. I’ve been marking up my pattern to keep track of all this, and it frankly looks demented. I’m not showing you a picture of my pattern. Nobody needs to see what happens when somebody is simultaneously binge-watching River (so dark! so good!) and annotating an intarsia pattern. I’m craving a cheat sheet that will streamline all this row-counting. Stay tuned for Mrs. Shayne’s Brambling Cheat Sheet.
Tip No. 7: What to Fix. This is a highly sensitive and personal issue. Some knitters aim for perfection in their knitting, ripping out a hundred rows to install a missing yarnover. Some let imperfections stay as a testament to the wabi-sabi, human-made gorgeousness of life. Some are compulsive. Some are lazy—see how fast it all breaks down into judgment? I’m not a perfectionist. My feeling is that a lot of stuff just doesn’t really matter all that much. If I miss a k2tog, I’ll often let it go. But the one mistake I have gone back to fix twice now is where I failed to twist yarns when changing colors. It’s just so noticeable, along a beautiful line of contrasting color intarsia, to see that gap. No judgment—I mean, if you like big whacking pathetic swiss cheese holes in the middle of your intarsia, right on.
Love,
Ann
Beautiful Intarsia,excellent tips and omg, River.
Hi Ann, great letter, love reading about a newcomer to intarsia unravelling its mysteries.
One thing I have learned after many, many years of intarsiaing is that if you do miss drilling down to fix one of those “big whacking pathetic swiss cheese holes in the middle of your intarsia” a little judicious stitching on the wrong side works wonders at the finishing stage.
Any chance your next intarsia project will be a Kaffe design????
Love your tidbits. I’m also a fan of intarsia. this blanket is one of my favorite projects.
http://www.ravelry.com/projects/wesben/abc-baby-blanket
Wow! This is some seriously lovely intarsia, and in cotton yarns to boot! Bravo.
River, yes! Intarsia, maybe.
Will you be getting in more of the yarn for the procrastinators among us?
Hi Ann! We have one of the colorways, Revere, available now. We’re working on getting more in the Sterling colorway.
Signed,
Fellow Procrastinator
Thank you – I await the Sterling. Love today’s pictures, just lovely.
Well, you win, you’re farther along than I am. I AM maneuvering 3 colors though, successfully, although my stitch count is off (somehow I have more than I should) but I’m ok with that. This project is a TV project, not a reading project, so I am alternating it with a Storm Mountain sweater that has been ripped back to the cast on and is now moving apace. That is a reading project, now that I have the gauge right (yes, I DID do a swatch.) Somehow it’ll all get done.
Brigid, does this mean that you read while you knit? I mean, something other than the pattern? How do you do that?
Maybe she means reading in the audiobook sense of the word? That’s the way I “read” while knitting but if she’s reading reading, well, that’s just mind boggling.
While knitting or not, run don’t walk to get a copy of “Swear on This Life” by Renee Carlino. I read it in 24 hours while juggling knives. Fabulous.
Textbooks work too. Knitting while reading got my mom through studying for her PhD defense and got me through studying for my ASCP certification exam.
Since I speed-read, I find reading while knitting a tad annoying, since I have to turn the pages so frequently, but my Kindle I can “turn the page” with my off-hand pinky, so it’s less annoying.
Reading while knitting requires a tablet or kindle type device to read from with a case that helps it stand, or a lovely well-worn library book that holds open at pages, or a reading stand. I prefer my tablet as with a flick of my little finger, I turn the page.
Brigid also knits things while mulching the tomatoes, rotating the tires on her car, and replacing the roof on her house. BRIGID YOU AMAZE ME.
Thank you for the tips!! Alas, though – y’all distracted me utterly with the striped sweater, so I appear to have ordered the yarn to make One of My Very Own (or something much like it), instead of the yarn to make this shawl. Oops.
i just happened to think of another tip that people might find helpful. i take a LOT of wip photos and post them to my project page. I do this because i see things in a photo that i would miss in real life. i.e mistakes, noticeable ones, jump right out at you. and then you will need to decide…can i live with it or no. for me, it’s “no” 🙂
Wonderful tips for this project! I appreciate the mention, but I would suggest knitters interested in ways to keep yarn from tangling check out the Arnall-Cullford Knitwear Ravelry group – specifically the posts from noirem — she’s a pro in so many ways!
Beautiful shawl and great tips. Your mention of River has left me with an ear-worm! I keep recommending that show.
I am making an intarsia afghan using five different yarns across each row. To make this without driving myself nuts with the tangling, I found a box that was exactly wide enough to hold my five balls of yarn in a row. I cut a series of five notches on each long side of the box and pulled one color of yarn through each. The box sits on a TV tray in front of my knitting chair. When I turn my work, I turn the box. Works like a charm!
https://kmkat.wordpress.com/2015/08/12/wip-wednesday-the-knitting/
Thanks for the extra tips! I’m enjoying this pattern immensely. My first time doing intarsia. I had to start 3 times because I’m using yarn from my stash and need to make adjustments. It’s looking great so far, but I’m not nearly as close to halfway as you since I’ve been knitting Hyacinthus as well.
Digging deeper into my fibres these days. Even combing back thru this tutorial just to find solace & inspiration as I’ll be hybernating soon. Just acknowledging this yearly habit & claiming it as my own & embracing how it has served me well over time. Loving how learning might also be nurturing a synapse or three whilts encouraging some new pathways in the Ole grey matter…
Great tips! Can I ask how you fix the “big whacking pathetic swiss cheese holes” due to having failed to twist the yarns at a colour change?