Letters
Intarsia: Hello, Competence!
Dear Kay,
Comparing this project to climbing Mount Everest may be overstating it. A bit. I know—this is a piece of knitting, not a 29,000-foot-high mountain.
But I am definitely feeling the thin air receding as I slide down the back slope of this project. The symmetry of this triangle-shaped shawl means that there really is a halfway point of consequence. And getting home is so much faster than the climb up.
Once I hit Row 300 of Bristol Ivy’s Brambling Shawl, something encouraging happened. I got it. I mean: it wasn’t ever hard, but my scrawls on the pattern became fewer. The rhythm of the edge shaping made sense. Even the blocks of color, diminishing and increasing in size in varying proportion, fell into an order I could understand.
The hardest part for me has been following the pattern, which has a lot of repeats of batches of rows that include repeats within the repeats. Ack! My brain is so hurty! I haven’t ever worked this without the pattern at hand—and I continue to check off rows as I go—but the second half became rhythmic enough that I could listen to the entire podcast of S Town and simultaneously a) swap out colors and b) think a lot about John B. McLemore, the main character. (Anybody want to discuss it in the Lounge? I’ll set up a topic. Here you go: “S Town: The New Podcast from the Makers of Serial.”) (Kind of gutted by the whole story.)
Example of a Thing Becoming Intuitive
I kept wondering how the colors would trail off the edge when the time came. Sort of like that dread you have when you’re pregnant: what if my kid doesn’t ever figure out how to swim? Well, friends, when you get to the edge, and the color runs out, the pattern tells you what to do. The three-stitch garter stitch edge continues, yet the color does not. My relief at this actually happening was akin to that moment when the swimming teacher lets go and, holy kamoley, the boy floats.
Another Thing
The simplicity of the intarsia color change means we could, potentially, if we felt like it, make rugs or tapestries or even other knitted things. It’s so flat and single layered. I have no desire to knit up a panda-face pullover, but these swoopy colorblocks are a beautiful new sort of knitting.
if you’re just dialing in and wonder what all the intarsia is about, this project is from A Year of Techniques, Jen and Jim Arnall-Culliford’s clever program of lessons and patterns and yarns, oh my. We’ll be playing around all year long (this is Project 2 of 12), so come on in—you’ll float, I swear you will. All the details are here.
The conversation in the Year of Techniques Ravelry group and the MDK Lounge has been incredibly helpful. Thanks to everybody who has been so generous about sharing The Way Of Intarsia!
Love,
Ann
Ack! Ack!! You’re finished, and my yarn is still sealed in its bag, waiting for me to finish my last helical stripe mitt! Ack!
Love those colors!!
So beautiful! I’ve been too consumed with Goings On to add new skills to my life or so I thought. This is tempting me.
(Did a marathon S-Town listen enroute to Chicago last week. Hoping the topic gets discussed).
I just set up a conversation in the Lounge–would love to hear your thoughts.
http://forums.masondixonknitting.com/t/s-town-the-new-podcast-from-the-makers-of-serial/1246/1
Mine is moving right along! I’d like to say I’ll get it done this month, but I don’t know…I’ve been working on my Storm Mountain sweater, which I can knit while reading.
It’s beautiful! I love these colors and the lightness of Brambling. It’s perfect for California where I have returned home after years of being in Colorado. Loved the warm woolies, but not so good here on a regular basis!
After long avoidance of intarsia, I’m diving in.
PS: Thanks for the photo showing it in full length and glory.
I’m still amused to find that you are (were, now) a novice at intarsia. For some reason, maybe because you’re such a Rowan fan, I’d assumed that you had started knitting in the ’80s aka the Age of Intarsia. That’s when I really got into the art, and intarsia sweaters were half of my early output (the other half were cabled sweaters and vests). Come to think of it, my first project ever was an intarsia scarf. No wonder I burned out on the technique – but Bristol Ivy is making it appeal to me again . . .
Beautiful! And QUICK! Really, watching this project grow has enlightened me about intarsia. Right now I’m just puttering happily along on a sock, but intarsia is on my list.
(And personally, I wish all the people who have left tons of total crap on the flanks of Everest had just taken up knitting instead of “conquering” a mountain.)
(Should I have prefaced that with a Curmudgeon Alert?)
Yes, and tons of actual crap on the flanks of Everest. If pooping someplace outdoors means you’ve “conquered” it, I am sovereign of quite a few primitive campgrounds and dive sites.
I guess my dogs can claim a number of blocks of NYC (although I cleaned up after them, I promise!)
How did that happen, Ann?! A few days back I was almost as far as you and now you’re done?! Way to go, congratulations (though I am also quite enjoying having more knitting left with that lush yarn)
Oh no! Ran over to the shop to get the yarn and the Silver combo is out of stock, Will you be restocking (fingers crossed)?
It’s on the way! Please check back early next week. Thanks for your patience!
Agh! I am down with the twist but am struggling w the pattern. I’m in section 4 where it stops labeling the shawl body increase. And I’m lost. I am half way done and haven’t increased color C at all in this section. What did i miss?
I am just getting close to where I will start the decrease section. Nice to hear that it goes faster at the end. I loved your comments and they reflect my thoughts, exactly. After looking at your shawl, I changed the order of the last two colors. Can’t wait till finished. I learned to knit with argyle socks so intarsia is not a particular new technique. However, the instructions are. I wonder how they design for this. Ginormous graph paper?
Due to technical difficulties ( don’t ask!) haven’t signed up yet but will once the Stars finally line up. Just wanted to pass on a great big thank you for the link to Jen A-C’s Intarsia video. My biggest hurdle for both intarsia and stripes has been remembering which yarn goes over or under the other one. Of course this video provides the mnemonic – O for both OLD and OVER. Why didn’t I think of that? Thank you both so much!