Sulo

Working with two strands of yarn, merino/silk (70/30) and mohair/silk (60/40) makes for one divine sweater. It's almost half silk!

What: Sulo / Own pattern

How: Circular needles 3.0 and 3.75 mm

From: Shibui Knits Staccato + Shibui Knits Silk Cloud, 225 + 65 g

I was super excited when Shibui Knits asked me if I'd like to design something in their yarns. I got to pick the yarn base and color - what could make a knitter happier? The selection was gorgeous and finally I decided that after my successful hat experiment in the fall, it would be time for a mohair/silk sweater. So I chose Staccato which is a merino/silk blend and Silk Cloud (mohair/silk blend).

Combining different yarns makes for interesting fabric but also really cool colors. I wanted both yarns to be neutral but different colors.

For Staccato, I chose a creamy off-white, and for Silk Cloud I picked a cold light grey color. Together they made this luxurious pearl grey cardigan that feels like melted butter and cotton candy.

I wanted to design a simple and elegant cardigan - a classic that would go together with any kind of clothes. And that's how Sulo came to be. It's named afted my grandfather, making it a pretty special little cardi.

Sulo is worked seamlessly top-down. It has a round yoke with few rows of simple lace. The cardigan is slightly cropped and has no waist shaping. I recommend to choose a size with approximately 4''/10 cm positive ease at bust height.

In addition to the yoke lace, the cuffs have sweet little cable patterns. It's most definitely my favorite thing about the cardigan. The rest of the cardigan is stockinette stitch with few rows of ribbing at the neckband, cuffs and hem. The button band is also worked in ribbing.

You can find the pattern on Ravelry and until April 6th it's -20 % with the code FLUFF.

Fairy lights

Don't you just love those little fairy lights people hang in their gardens? In the winter they make falling snow look like fairy dust.

What: Fairy lights hat / Own pattern

How: Circular needles 3.0 and 3.25 mm

From: Walcot Yarn Opus (3 colors), 48 g total

A year ago, at Edinburgh Yarn Fest I fell in love with Walcot Yarns Opus. It's one of the softest yarns ever, a luxurious combination of Falkland merino ja baby alpaca. I designed my Dre cardigan with it and was excited when they asked me to design an accessories set to be released for Edinburgh Yarn Fest this year.

I wanted to use their lovely color palette better so I went for stranded color work. I envisioned hanging fairy lights, painted with yarn - and so the fairy lights chart came to life.

The hat starts off with a neat long tail tubular cast on. After the ribbing there's few rows of three-color stranded knitting to work the fairy lights chart, and then most of the hat is fairy dust worked with two colors.

But the most beautiful part is at the top. Once the hat is tall enough, there's one more set of fairy lights - this time with just two colors, and the crown decreases are hidden among the color work. The decreases pull the the fairy lights together forming this beautiful flower.

What: Fairy lights mittens / Own pattern
How: Circular needles 3.0 mm
From: Walcot Yarns Opus (3 colors), 53 g total

The hat needed matching mittens so I had to design them too.

The mittens have folded cuffs with the fairy lights chart on top. As with the hat, most of the mittens are worked with the fairy dust pattern with two colors and ending with one more set of fairy lights forming the flowers on top.

The hat comes in three different sizes and the mittens are one-size. You can buy the patterns on Ravelry. The designs call for one skein of main color and mini-skeins of each of the contrast colors. I've used Light gray, Greenery and Golden rod. If you work the pattern in some other yarn you may need to adjust the needle size because Opus is a special yarn with its own kind of drape.

Triantan

Last year, I received an email asking me if I would have the time to design socks for the Finnish craft magazine, Suuri Käsityö. Obviously, I said yes.

What: Triantan / Own pattern

How: Circular needle 2.25 mm

From: Skein Queen Crush, 57 g

I needed a starting point so I asked if they had any color preferences. They told me they were hoping for grey, yellow or something down-to-earth type of color and I went stash diving.

I found a skein of Skein Queen Crush in the color Limpet which is one of my favorite yarn colors. I've also made my Crush sweater in Limpet. The color is beautiful pale grey with black and brown speckles. It's a lively color without being too variagated. You know, the kind of yarn that can do the talking by itself.

I wanted to design socks that would be mellow knitting but had some interest. So I needed a stitch pattern that would be easy to memorize. And this cable pattern forming triangles and diamonds is just the kind.

The clean lines of the cables inspired to me play with the pattern a bit. I decided to work the socks toe-up and let the cables slowly grow over the instep until they take over completely after the heel.

The socks are worked toe-up and the cable pattern grows diagonally over the instep. The heel is a traditional French heel - just worked from toe-up. The cuff ribbing follows along the lines of the cable pattern.

Triantan socks have just been published in the Finnish craft magazine, Suuri Käsityö. Later, in May, the pattern will also be available on Ravelry. In just a few days I will take the socks with me to Scotland and you can come check them out and buy yourself a printed pattern at Skein Queen's booth at the Edinburgh Yarn Fest.

Riihi shawl

Fall feels like it was a life time ago. Last fall I visited the biggest craft fair in Finland. The lovely folks at Pirtin kehräämö (a Finnish spin mill) booth asked me if I'd be interested in designing something for their yarns. I said I would think about it but inspiration struck almost immediately and the next day I went back to show them my little shawl sketch.

What: Riihi / Own pattern

How: Two sets of circular needles 3.75 mm

From: Pirtin kehräämö Kampalanka 90 TEX x 3, 200 g

Too bad they had already sold all of the beautiful light grey yarns I had my eye on. So I got the yarn in December when I visited the spin mill for a tour.

I designed a lovely and clean, crescent shaped shawl. It has garter stitch section in one color, and two-color brioche sections with short rows. The shawl has a contrast color zigzag edge with i-cord bind off.

It all started with the idea of  two-color brioche short rows. I wondered why no one was doing it so I gave it a go. I pretty soon found out why people weren't doing it: the stitches ended up in the wrong place on the needles to start the next row. I was about ready to give up when I came up with  a solution for this problem I had created: another set of needles.

So, in this shawl you get to try out working short rows in two-color brioche - and it takes two needles of the same size. The technique isn't difficult, it just takes two needles. I was nervous for the test knitting because it would reveal if others found the technique difficult. But I was very happy to find out all my test knitters felt the instructions were clear and easy, and they came up with beautiful shawls. I really enjoy learning new tricks you can do with yarn and needles if you're ready to take a look outside the box.

The yarn I used for this design is woollen spun. If you're not familiar with the concept, in woollen spun yarn the fibres are all combed the same direction before spinning the wool into yarn. It makes for a sleek, soft yarn that is more dense than worsted spun in which the fibres can point in all possible directions. This was my first time using Pirtin kerhäämö's woollen spun yarn and I liked it a lot. The shawl took 1.5 skeins of the grey main color and under 1 skein of the orange contrast color.

You can find the English version of the pattern in my Ravelry store. The pattern is -20 % with the code "WOOLLEN" during this week.