Tag Archives: new favorites

New Favorites: from Plucky’s Spring Forward collection

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New Favorites: from Plucky's Spring Forward collection

It’s always a pleasure to see the Plucky Knitter sisters and crew at Stitches events, and last weekend I also got to see a lot of the samples from their new pattern collection, Spring Forward. Somehow their crazy-plucky color palette makes me wish I were a color person, and yet you know I’d likely knit all of these things, my favorites of the bunch, in a nice heather grey—

TOP LEFT: Beach Walk by Jill Zielinski, a simple shrug with a nice lace motif up the back

TOP RIGHT: Lake Effect by Amy Miller, a sweet granny-chic lace cardigan

BOTTOM LEFT: Screen Door, an allover textured-lace shawl, which I would like in this green, actually

BOTTOM RIGHT: Tide Chart by Amy Miller (pictured on Amy with her Porch Swing shawl), a good ultra-basic, top-down pullover (if you’re not ready to improvise your own)

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PREVIOUSLY in New Favorites: The hats of BT Men Vol 2

New Favorites: The hats of BT Men Vol 2

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New Favorites: The hats of BT Men Vol 2

Yesterday Brooklyn Tweed released BT Men Volume 2, and my favorite patterns are the two beautifully cabled, perfectly unisex hats. Crag by Jared Flood, up top, features the most gorgeous staggered, interlocking horseshoe cables. Snare by Norah Gaughan, bottom, has more of a twisty-twining cable pattern that also looks like a lot of fun to knit. And thankfully both are written for worsted-weight Shelter so they’ll be just what I like a hat to be: quickly, deeply satisfying.

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PREVIOUSLY in New Favorites: the Purl Bee three

New Favorites: the Purl Bee three

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New Favorites: the Purl Bee three

Just as people’s attention is starting to turn toward warmer-weather pursuits, and the pace of new knitting pattern releases slows to a painful crawl, the Purl Bee shows up with three killer scarf patterns — all of them featuring engaging little techniques to hold your interest:

TOP: Jasmine Scarf features an insanely pretty stitch pattern that looks like a ton of fun to knit — go watch the little how-to video on the pattern page (free pattern)

MIDDLE: Cobblestone Scarf is a simple stitch but knitted with three different yarns held together — always among my favorite tricks — to create intriguing and subtle texture and color complexities (free pattern)

BOTTOM: Reversible Rivulet Scarf combines twisted stitches and reversible cables (free pattern)

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UNRELATED NEWS OF BEAUTIFUL THINGS: We got in a nice little batch of several of the beloved vintage fiber mill spindles many of you have been asking about. There’s also a secret new addition in the dropdown (not pictured) — a light cherry red version of the green/blue one — but there are only a dozen of them so you might need to be fast! Plus Knitters Graph Paper Journal and both sizes of the Doane notebooks are back in stock. It’s an embarrassment of riches in the paper goods department right now!

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PREVIOUSLY in New Favorites: the perfect Summer aran

New Favorites: the perfect Summer aran

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New Favorites: the perfect Summer aran sweater

One night last week, we went out for ice cream at the local hotspot in my sister’s tiny coastal Florida town. Bob and I were enjoying the warmth, but the temperature must have dipped below 80 or something — the locals were all wearing jean jackets or sweaters, and you could tell they were savoring the chance. It brought to mind this Martin Storey sweater I ran across recently and can’t stop thinking about: Naxos. It’s perfectly unisex and would also work beautifully as a woolly winter sweater, but I love it in this ivory cotton, pictured in a dreamy boatscape. Because, you know, heaven forbid there should ever be a time or a place where some form of fisherman sweater isn’t part of the equation.

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PREVIOUSLY in New Favorites: Linda

New Favorites: Linda

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New Favorites: Linda

I’m truly savoring every cold minute we have left to us, living in dread of the swamp heat I know will be here soon, but also trying not to lose sight of the coming loveliness of Spring. I am eager to trade in my heavy wool pea coat for a cozy scarf or shawl, and there is one that shot straight to the top of my list last week: Linda by Deb Hoss, from Quince’s Scarves Etc. 4 collection. I love the proportions of this thing. And the dense side fringe? Even better than how great it looks is that it’s very cleverly achieved.

I have the exact right amount of yarn left over from my Bellows. Wouldn’t it make it easier on me, when I must give Bellows up for the season, to have this to take its place?

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PREVIOUSLY in New Favorites: Modified ganseys

New Favorites: Modified ganseys

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New Favorites: Modified gansey sweaters

I’m always hearing people talk about the gansey — relative of the cabled aran jumper in the classic fisherman-sweater family — and its characteristic underarm gusset. One of these days I’ll knit one and understand more specifically what the traditional construction is like. But it might have to get in line behind these recent interpretations, which are both calling out to me —

TOP: Eastbound Sweater by Courtney Kelley has an “exploded gusset” and slouchy shape, looks like the perfect spring/fall sweater to me

BOTTOM: Alvy by Jared Flood might be gussetless (not sure) but borrows the gansey look for a nicely androgynous sweater

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PREVIOUSLY in New Favorites: Foldover mitts

New Favorites: Foldover mitts

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New Favorites: Foldover fingerless mitts

We’re having another serious cold spell in Nashville and, as has been well documented, all of my gloves are fingerless. There are days driving to and from work in my drafty old Jeep where I think my fingertips might actually fall off. Encasing my fingers it out of the question, but I am dreaming of mitts with foldover tops, knitted densely in some extra-warm, extra-rustic wool. Of course, lots of mitts can be knitted longer at the top for folding over, but these are pretty much exactly what I crave—

TOP: Lambing Mitts by Veronika Jobe (free pattern)

BOTTOM: Spate by Jane Richmond

And of course, the repeatedly aforementioned Fure.

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UNRELATED: In case you missed it on Friday, the Fashionary sketchbook is back in stock! Also, please note that today is a postal holiday so webshop orders from the weekend and today will ship tomorrow!

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PREVIOUSLY  in New Favorites: Jocelyn Tunney’s triangles