Recycling

I read the below article recently (original article published here) and started thinking about how similar fishing nets and yarn are. Imagine if we took all the leftover yarn we had from all of our projects and did something amazing like this? I love seeing people turn a negative like illegal fishing and harming our oceans and sea life and turning it into a positive and useful thing that we all wear - sneakers. “The problems we face are many, but so are the solutions." Well said indeed.

Discarded Plastic Fishing Nets Retrieved from the Ocean Used in New Shoe Prototype by Kate Sierzputowski

Adidas is now designing shoes from our oceans’ detritus, recently producing the world’s first prototype with parts constructed from ocean plastic and illegal deep-sea gillnets. The athletic apparel manufacture partnered with Parley for the Oceans as collaborators, a group of creators, thinkers, and leaders who design projects that aim to end the destruction of our oceans.

The community explains, “Our oceans are about to collapse and there is not much time to turn it around. Nobody can solve this alone. Everyone has to be a part of the solution. And collaboration is the magic formula.”

An ally of Parley, the Sea Shepard Conservation Society, collected the materials for the shoe while tracking an outlawed poaching vessel off the coast of West Africa. The concept for the shoe was then created in just six days, the prototype showcased at the UnxParley launch event in New York on June 29.

Parley explains that this concept is only the beginning, but is an example of how impactful creative collaboration is. “The problems we face are many, but so are the solutions. Stay tuned to learn more about how Parley will end ocean plastic pollution.” Although the partners have explained that this specific concept might never be commercially available, Adidas plans to introduce recycled plastic into their manufacturing process by early next year.

Bad Kitty

I like looking back over my current design year and remembering yarns I enjoyed working with, projects that had that magical balance from concept to weaving in ends, color combinations that popped and if it turned into a class, was a great project to teach and the students did wonderfully. One of my favorite designs this current design year was the Simon Says Cowl, and I knew I wanted to use that yarn again for another color work cowl.

I'd like to introduce the Bad Kitty cowl, a Fair Isle knit cowl with Latvian braids and a Delft pottery-vibe. According to Holland.com, "Delft Blue is the world-famous earthenware that has been produced in the city of Delft since the 17th century. Between 1600 and 1800, this earthenware was popular among rich families who would show off their Delft Blue collections to one another. Although the Delftware potters preferred to call their earthenware “porcelain”, it was only a cheaper version of the real Chinese porcelain. Delft Blue was not made from the typical porcelain clay, but from clay that was coated with a tin glaze after it was fired. In spite of this, Delft Blue achieved unrivalled popularity, and at its peak, there were 33 factories in Delft. Of all of these factories, the only one remaining today is Royal Delft."

I was hanging out with a friend recently, binge-watching Outlander with her as she was cat-sitting for her parents. It's been a while since my cat Igby passed away, and I haven't had to fight the (always losing) battle between woman, cat and yarn for years. After leaving her house and spending the next few days picking cat hair out of my yarn, the idea for the Bad Kitty cowl was hatched.

Knit in the round in the lovely Mrs. Crosby's Carpet Bag yarn on US 6 needles, this cowl uses 1 hank of each color. I also really love the idea of switching colors in each striped section and having a rainbow of bad kitties circling around, plotting their revenge on your yarn! Carpet Bag has great drape when knitted up and the sheen (from the 20% silk) and slight halo (from the 80% superwash merino) make it super soft and cozy. A lot of knitters are sensitive to yarn around their neck or on their forehead and this yarn hit an ideal balance for me.

Pairing Fair Isle and Latvian Braids running in opposite directions creates a dynamic combination between texture and design. Throw in some corrugated ribbing for balance and weight and you have everything I love about cowls in one project. The added length ensures enough knit fabric to tuck under your coat and keep out the chill, but you can make it even longer or shorter if you wish.

Keep the bad kitties who go after your yarn at bay! Download the Bad Kitty cowl here.

Intertwined

My parents recently sold the house I grew up in, which was an oddly emotional experience for me, especially considering I haven't lived there since I left at 18 to go to RISD. Leaving behind a tiny New England town in southeastern Massachusetts, they moved into an apartment in Boston.

I got a call recently from my mom, telling me about a huge net installation she saw while exploring her new bit of town, then she sent me this link (original article here) to share with you, dear readers.  It looks like a beautiful piece of knitting stretched across buildings and sky and I love that the artist states that it's a way to “visually knit together the fabric of the city with art." If you find yourself in Boston, it would definitely be worth checking out. Gorgeous!

Thanks, mom!

A Monumental Sculpture of Colorful Twine Netting Suspended Above Boston by Kate Sierzputowski on July 31, 2015

One hundred miles of twine compose this public sculpture of suspended netting above Boston, a structure that spans the void of an elevated highway that once split downtown Boston from its waterfront. The artist, Janet Echelman, designed the artwork titled As If It Were Already Here to reflect the history of the installation’s location. Echelman also intended the piece to be a visual metaphor—a way to “visually knit together the fabric of the city with art,” she explains.

The installation is 600 feet at its widest, including over 500,000 knots for structural support. Each time one section of the sculpture sways or vibrates in the wind the other parts follow suit, undulating as a single form 600 feet in the sky. As the day progresses the 1,000-pound structure’s webbed surface begins to glow, becoming a beacon in the sky rather than blending into the blue above it. In addition to moving with the wind, the structure also glows in response to sensors that register tension and project light onto the sculpture.

As If It Were Already Here is just one of Echelman’s enormous sculptures, she’s also installed pieces in Montreal, Seattle, and elsewhere. Echelman received the Guggenheim Fellowship, the Harvard University Loeb Fellowship, a Fulbright Lectureship, and was named an Architectural Digest Innovator for “changing the very essence of urban spaces.” You can see Echelman speak about her other environmentally-responsive sculptures in her TED talk here.

Fade Into You

I went up to Maryland and visited the lovely ladies at Dragonfly Fibers and came home with an armful of yarn as well as one of their beautiful gradient sock yarn kits. Gradient kits hold so much possibility... The gentle ebb and flow of color, the ombre effect the yarn creates when knitted up, the excitement of being done with one color then reaching for the next to continue the bleed into the new. I'm a fan.

When I sat down to figure out just what I wanted to do with the array of blues called "Cheshire Cat," I was stumped. Fair Isle always calls to me like a Siren song, but Fair Isle with colors that are too similar create a muddled or muddy effect (if you missed my post on color theory and how best to choose yarns for color work knitting, read it here.) After casting on and ripping out a few times, I knew I wanted to do Fair Isle and I knew I wanted one of my favorite color combinations, blue and red. The wonderful women at Dragonfly sent me down another gradient box in "Peony" and inspiration was ignited.

I enjoy the show Nashville. It's got good music, great actors and it's good to knit to. One of my favorite songs on that show is Fade Into You, a love song. If you haven't heard it, take a listen below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VhaD6WplfU

Inspired by the line, "If I was the red and you were the blue, I could just fade into you," the Fade Into You cowl was born. Knit from the bottom up in the round in one piece on US 3s, the magic in this cowl really happens when you start switching the colors. The reds and the blues start at opposite ends of their respective spectrums, then flow back out. Ombre Fair Isle? Sign. Me. Up.

Made with 2 Dragonfly Fibers gradient kits, the color possibilities for this cowl are endless. What about just using one kit and pairing it with black or white? What about using 2 kits that together create a stunning array of color for your neck? What about just using bits and bobs of fingering weight yarn from your stash? I talked about this on my color theory post - MAKE IT YOUR OWN!

Download the Fade Into You cowl pattern here.