Dionne Shawl

Image copyright Jeanette Sloan 2012

It may seem a strange thing to admit but as a designer I’ve never been the most prolific, banging one design out after another. Don’t get me wrong, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that way of working and I admire those that can do it. But ever since my student days I’ve taken the time to love and develop an idea through  the swatching, graphing and pattern writing process to the final creation. That’s just the way that I’ve found I’m best able to work and it means that when I like a design, I REALLY love it. And this is the case with my latest shawl design….

Image copyright Jeanette Sloan 2012

Dionne is a bottom up triangular shaped shawl knitted in my wonderfully soft Baby Alpaca / Silk 4ply yarn. It begins with just a few stitches and widens as vertical lines of a teardrop shaped lace motif travel down its length.

Image copyright Jeanette Sloan 2012

I wanted the shawl to have a ‘finished’ rather than a raw edge but didn’t want to have to pick up and knit to achieve this so instead I’ve used double eyelets at each edge and knitted into the 1st and last stitches on the WS rows to prevent the fabric from curling.

Image copyright Jeanette Sloan 2012

The shawl takes 200g (4 x 50g) of my Baby Alpaca / Silk 4ply which is a lovely blend with just the right balance of lustre /softness from the silk and warmth from the alpaca content. (It’s 30% silk, 70% Baby Alpaca). I know from experience how it slips along quite beautifully when knitting  although I have to say a HUGE thank you to my great friend Mary who knitted this Dionne for me.  The pattern is available as a PDF download and given how awful the British ‘Summer’ weather is you could say it was the perfect thing to be knitting at the moment.

For more information on pattern and yarn have  look at the website here

J x

Purl about town

Me and Debbie, the lovely owner of Purl Brighton

Although we made the move from Edinburgh to Brighton last November with the upheaval of major building work and a new job to settle into, there wasn’t much opportunity to explore Brighton’s many delights. I have put  this right in the last couple of weeks, firstly by eating my way around the Foodies Festival and then yesterday visiting the lovely Debbie at her gorgeous yarn shop Purl (Brighton).  I’d heard a lot of good things about the shop from my good friend Georgie Troon who works there on Saturdays and it reminded me a lot of when I ran HKhandknit in Edinburgh. There’s a lovely welcome when you walk through the door and you can browse through the yarns and large selection of books in a beautifully relaxed atmosphere. In fact the welcome was SO warm that I lost about 2 hours of yesterday afternoon in the shop and plan to be back there very soon…keep your eyes peeled for updates. In the meantime if you’re in the Seven Dials area of Brighton pop in and see Debbie and treat yourself. The sale starts this Saturday so there’s no excuse no to….

J x