Goodness, it’s been a while. This spring has been a full one, with no sign of slowing down for the summer. The drawback is that a lot of the busyness has been working on projects that I can’t talk about online yet, so my posts are starting to read like a catalogue of pattern releases. I hate when that happens—I recently set up a mailing list for pattern release announcements to try to move this space towards less sell-y content—which is probably why it’s taken me so long to post about Line and Shadow. However, the sample is going to TNNA with me to be displayed in the Shibui Knits booth (the sample, that is—I’m not nearly as good at staying still. It’ll be in booth 389.) I’m pretty chuffed about that, plus it’s well past time, so here goes.

Line and Shadow came about when I started playing with the idea of using the way knit columns move across a bias-knit piece by working stripes up to one column of stitches, instead of all the way across. The changing length of the stripes (from wide to narrow at the beginning, and narrow to wide at the end) creates two triangular sections of stripes with a solid parallelogram in the middle. I added columns of slipped stitches in the centre section; these columns move with the knitting, at right angles to the stripes.

I’m becoming enamoured with the idea of using contrasting textures in the way that we often contrast colours in knitting, so at the last TNNA, when I was thinking about yarn for this design, I got in touch with Shibui Knits. Their Silk Cloud, a laceweight yarn of kid mohair with a silk thread at its core, makes a light, airy fabric that floats between the solid stripes of Cima (a superbaby alpaca/merino laceweight, held double here). The alpaca gives Cima a little bit of halo, too, while the yarn’s twist provides enough stitch definition to show off the slip stitch columns. The resulting fabric is light and warm, with excellent drape, and is soft like a kitten’s belly.

The pattern for Line and Shadow is available as a PDF download on Ravelry for $6 USD. (Click the link for information on gauge, yarn requirements, and so on, and to buy the pattern.) The gorgeous photos are by Gale Zucker, with Josephine Ankarah modeling once again, because I will never get enough of seeing her in my designs.

Now to spend the rest of the day packing and choosing WIPs for this weekend’s TNNA show. I’ll need one or two personal projects, things that can actually be posted online, so hopefully I’ll have lots to tell you about when I get back.

Photos ©Gale Zucker 2016