Sunday, August 14, 2016

Freia Hand Paint Scarf - a Real Challenge!

Scarf,  fingering weight merino wool, with nylon, garter stitch, size 3 wood cable needle 24 in.



I love the hand painted yarn cakes! They are wound so that the color changes in exactly the opposite order if the yarn is pulled from the middle of each cake. This particular yarn is designed to change colors in very long and subtle lengths.  If one used a single yarn at a time it would make very broad stripes. I am using both skeins as I knit and pulling from the middle of each cake and alternating the yarns each row. I decided to use a plain stitch pattern so that the colors would be the stars of the show.

The light weight yarn and the small needles means very fine gauge knitting, but I think the fine gauge works best with these colors. The most contrast in the colors of the two yarns are at the ends.



At this stage the colors are into the purple and magenta part. Hand painted yarn is one way to closely control how the colors change from one to the other.









This is the middle, where the two yarns are the same magenta color.  After this the colors along the length of the fabric will begin to look symmetrical in order out to the finishing end.

At about three quarters of the way through the colors of the two yarns are different again so they are purple and magenta again.


The tiny needles make sure that the lightweight yarn still makes a warm and firm fabric that won't let the cold breezes of fall and winter blow right through. The wool makes a nice drape but it's not loosey goosey. It takes a very long time to make any amount of fabric. I've had to put this aside several times because I just don't feel like I'm getting anywhere with it, but I've always come back because I can't wait to see the beautiful color combination play out at the end!!!





Ta da

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