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In short

January 8, 2013 in Classes, Events by thisisknit | No comments

Knitting can be a little square. Working rows and rows one above the other tends to give you a two-dimensional fabric, and sometimes it would be nice to have a bit of a curve. That’s where short rows come in.

Short rowing is what makes the lovely curve on Carol Feller’s Maenad shawl in the picture above. It means that your knitting can be curved or three dimensional, and it’s a technique that’s useful in so many places.

The reason we’re thinking about short rows is that Carol is coming to give us a workshop on them on February 2nd, and we can’t wait. She’s bringing a brand new mini cardigan pattern for the class, so here’s a chance to learn a cool skill with a new pattern from an internationally renowned designer. As well as Maenad, you can see the magic she works with short rows in Ravi – such clever and interesting shaping.

So where else does short rowing come in useful? In short row heel and toe socks, for one, or when you want to add bust shaping to a jumper, or raise the neckline of a cardigan a touch at the nape of the neck…. Once you start putting them in, you’ll be using them everywhere.

Here’s a couple of examples: the terrifically popular Color Affection shawl uses them to give beautiful swoops of colour and texture – we’ve been making quite a few of these recently (we’ll talk about them in an upcoming post) but here’s a quick preview of Lisa’s. The rows meet each other at unexpected and delightful angles, as you can see:

And where you want to get a smoother fitting cardigan or shrug, reach for the short rows. Lisa did in her Winterberry Shrug, where the lower back curves around the ribcage in the most flattering way:

You’ll find the booking page for Carol’s class at this link. It could be the best thing you do for your knitting this year.

Finishing touches

January 5, 2013 in Customer Gallery, Events, Musings by thisisknit | No comments

There’s something rather nice about the very final stages of a project – the last few ends to weave in, the buttons to sew on, a waft of the steam iron, and then it’s done, ready to take its place beside the other finished objects. Years are like that: the planning, the execution, the modification on the fly, and then the accomplishment after.

So before we get started on a fresh and shiny 2013, let’s have a look at what we’ve just finished. You might, as with the best projects, want to sit down with a cup of something while we look back.

The big news early in the year was the launch of the new online shop. This involved a lot of lists and a lot of pictures of yarn and a lot of computer code, and the result was a huge improvement on what it replaced. So we have happy memories of shooting beautiful yarn (that’s definitely Noro in the foreground, and isn’t that Studio Donegal Soft Merino ready for its close up?).

Judging from what you’ve been saying, you like it too (and we still want your feedback if we can make it better for you).

But really soon, it was spring, and our thoughts turned to garments that would be useful right through the summer. The Spring Knit Along kicked off in February, with a choice of two cardigans – it was enormous fun, with new skills learned and new yarn tried out and a wonderful supportive Ravelry thread. The result, in Lisa’s case, was this: a Fan Jacket that’s pretty and vibrant:

So keep an eye out for our next KAL – and spring can’t be far away now.

Over the course of the year we had the privilege of welcoming a lot of illustrious visitors to teach at This Is Knit, some old friends and some new. Carol Feller gave an excellent workshop on seamless garment construction, and one result of that was several of Carol’s pattern centenary cardigan, Ravi.

Kate Davies came back to This Is Knit in April and gave us the world premiere of her Steek Sandwich workshop. There was a lot of trepidation, and then a lot of triumph, as the steeks were cut and the stitches behaved:

We love Kate. We hope she comes back soon.

We were also very proud to host Aoibhe Ní to give a number of her clever Tunisian Lace crochet workshops – it’s been an amazing year for her, and we can’t wait to see what she does next.

Woolly Wormhead came to give a fabulous class on making the perfect hat in August, and goodness, there were so many to be inspired by: an entire table covered with clever, flattering headwear:

In September, we took over the theatre upstairs in the Powerscourt Centre for the annual Yarn Tasting. It was a lovely night, and Ysolda Teague and Carol Feller were our special guests for the evening.

There were exciting garments to try on…

…there were piles and piles of samples to rummage gleefully through…

and there was tempting new yarn to go home with. What more could you want as the evenings drew in?

Carol’s coming back in February to give us some more workshops, this time on short rows and on cables and charts – you’ll find details here.

In fact, that’s something else that was new in 2012: we started using a new booking system, the one that we blogged about back in April. It makes finding out what’s coming up and then seizing your place very convenient. A word of advice, though: events can book out very fast indeed when they’re announced (Woolly Wormhead and Ysolda’s workshops were full in a day or so), so the sooner you hear about them the better. The best way to keep up to date is to follow us on twitter – we’re @Thisisknit, and we announce sales, events and all sorts of things there, so keep an eye on our feed.

Indeed, if you were following us back in October, you’ll have found us live tweeting from the Blog Awards – we’re very happy to have been finalists, and we’d like to say a big thank you to everyone who nominated us, as well as a big Congratulations! to the winners. It was a fabulous night, and thank you to everyone who worked so hard to organise it.

Right in the middle of the year, we had the worldwide spectacle of the Ravellenic Games, with Team This Is Knit marching proudly into the stadium behind a small but appealing alpaca. Impressive feats of skill and daring were on display, new techniques mastered, new patterns deciphered, and in one case, a cardigan finished and then entirely frogged during the Olympic Closing Ceremony (it didn’t fit, and both the knitter and the yarn are much happier with something else). To everyone who took part, or cheered, or provided tea, salutation, and to our tireless Team Captains Jacqui and Nadia, thank you!

We’ve said many times that our favourite thing ever is when the yarn comes back into the shop, all made up into your finished object, so we can admire both it and your skill. This was a particularly good year for us, then.

Back in May, Clare, who’s clareblove on Ravelry, brought in her outrageously lovely steeked Latvian Garden Baby Blanket. Knitted in the round and then cut open before being backed with cotton fabric, this is a knitting tour de force.

It’s still on display in the shop, and not a day goes by without someone exclaiming over it in wonder. It’s all of that and more. Come see it.

Sometimes we get to see beautiful things that aren’t knitted, too. Late in the year, we made two new friends, Catherine and Annabel, who are visiting Dublin from Mauritius. It turns out that although knitting isn’t that big there (one can easily imagine why not!), other crafts certainly are. One day, Catherine brought in some of her ribbon embroidery to show us, and we gasped:

That’s the house where Catherine grew up. Such three-dimensional beauty, with the flowers spilling out of the frame, and every one of those flowers a little yellow ribbon French knot. And there’s more.

This one’s still in the embroidery frame, and it’s a riot of exuberant flowers in all the colours. We were simply charmed by it – thank you, Katherine, for showing us your lovely, inspiring work.

For all-round knitted delight, though, one event stood out this year. In April, Jenny, one of our customers, married Rossa. The wedding was one of the most beautiful and original we’ve ever encountered – a lavender theme, hand-made stationary, a wee knitted bride and groom on the top of the cake, and the loveliest Echo Beach shawl, all alight with Swarowski crystals.

The wedding photographer was Julie Matkin of halfadreamaway.com, and a very good friend of ours. All of these wedding pictures are her work (used with permission, of course), and if you want to see more, then go over there and look through the gallery, or click through to onefabday, which this week featured Jenny and Rossa’s day as one of their highlights of the year.

A lavender theme, you see! There’s more, much more, on the crafting of this delightful and touching wedding on Jenny’s own blog Crafty Tails. Go have a look – you’ll be glad you did. Jenny and Rossa, our very best wishes for a long and happy life together!

Finally, there was yarn! Boxes and boxes of it arriving through the door and leaving in smart paper bags – new brands, new ranges, new colours to show you. This year we added Coolree Yarns to the mix, hand-dyed in County Wexford by the very talented Alex McLeod:

And if you want to see it knitted up, here’s a shawl of Jacqui’s (looking back over these pages, she made a staggering number of shawls this year, including the Cladonia right at the top of this post) – doesn’t the colour work beautifully with the stitch pattern?

Also new this year were Jamieson and Smith Shetland wool in jumperweight and laceweight (we’re avidly awaiting Kate Davies’ new book), lovely soft Aran merino by Rico, MillaMia sportweight in those lovely bright shades and soft and colourful yarns from Katia. So much to crochet and knit, so much to plan….

Well, we’ve come to the end of the year – that’s the last end woven in, the last blocking wire removed. Time to fold up that project and cast on a new one. Knitting? Crochet? Spinning? Earthy cabled Aran or delicate lace (from the Irish Indie Dyers’ Lace Club, perhaps)? Oh, why choose – let’s do all of it!

Happy new year!

Love lace!

November 27, 2012 in Events, TIK News by thisisknit | 2 comments

You’ll probably have noticed that at This Is Knit, we love lace rather a lot. So we’re tremendously excited to be organising the first ever Irish Indie Dyers Yarn Club!

The Club will run from January to March 2013, and each month, the members will receive a completely exclusive colourway of a stunning lace yarn from a different Irish indie dyer.

We’re very proud that the participating dyers are Coolree Yarns, the Dublin Dye Company and Hedgehog Fibres. The exact yarns and colours are a secret (shhh!), but these craftspeople produce stunning yarn like the alpaca lace used in the Cold Mountain stole at the top of this post, or like this delicious cashmere laceweight from Hedgehog Fibres…

…and just look at the colour intensity that Coolree Yarns achieves….

This club will have elegance and luxury in spades: from sparkles and silk to cashmere and alpaca, we’ll have beautiful bases in delicious shades, dyed with care and skill expressly for the Club.

The Club is limited to just twenty memberships, so if you fancy a treat for yourself or if you’re looking for a very special gift for a knitter or crocheter, why not visit the This Is Knit booking page from Saturday next, December 1st. We have specific packages inclusive of postage to anywhere in the world, so be sure to select the option for your region (and if you like, you can choose to pick up your lovely lacy surprise in person at the shop each month!).

Bowled over!

October 26, 2012 in Events, Stock Updates, TIK News by thisisknit | No comments

This morning, we took excited delivery of some very special new things: lovely yarn bowls, exclusively hand-thrown for us by a very talented craftsman. They come in two colours of glaze, the gentle blue in the picture and a pale green, and they’re all individual, as you’d expect in something handmade.

They all have a handy notch in the side to guide your yarn and stop it careening all over the floor. Of course, you could also use them to hold any number of other things (though not, we would suggest, soup). They’d make an ideal gift for any crocheter or knitter, and the perfect souvenir of a visit to Dublin.

Since this is a Bank Holiday weekend, the shop will be closed on Sunday 28th and Monday 29th Octobber. But in the coming week, we’ve got some special offers for you between the 1st and the 4th of November. First of all, if you spend €60 either instore or online on Paloma, Winter Garden, Rialto Chunky, Orielle, Blue Faced Leicester Aran or Amitola, we will give you the pattern book for the yarn for free. And second, if you spend €30 between the same dates, you’ll be entered for a draw to win one of the lovely Soak gift boxes, containing a bottle of Soak yarn wash, another of delicious hand cream, 200 yards of Lorna’s Laces hand-dyed yarn, an gorgeous mitts pattern and nail varnish that matches the colour of the yarn.

This year, we’re not exhibiting at the Knitting and Stitching Show at the RDS, but you don’t have to miss out on This Is Knit if you’re travelling to Dublin. The shop in the Powerscourt Centre will be open until 8.00pm on Thursday November 1st – you’ll find details on how to find us at this link, and you know, we’d really love to see you.

What a night!

September 18, 2012 in Events, Powerscourt Townhouse by thisisknit | 1 comment

Yarn Tasting 2012 can really be summed up by that picture: lovely new yarn and fibre, and it’s hers, all hers!

We were so excited as 7.30pm approached on Friday – we had so much to share with you and so much to talk about. We gathered in the Powerscourt Townhouse Theatre for the first part of the evening (the same space we’ve used before, though it’s now a rather spiffing performance space used by Jig), and it was on with the show.

We had not one, but two eminent guests – Carol Feller and Ysolda Teague. Carol was at last year’s Yarn Tasting, so she talked about what she’s been up to in the last year. It won’t surprise you to hear that she’s been busy – she launched a new collaborative project with Hedgehog Fibres on Friday (we’ve got kits for the hat pattern all made up for you), and she’s now got a craftsy class for this gorgeous cabled cardigan:

There were also lots of Ravi cardigans in the audience – you’ll remember that Carol had a KnitALong to celebrate her 100th pattern and that we had a chance to see it during her workshop back in May. Lisa was wearing hers, and we kept seeing them walking by:

Our next guest was Ysolda Teague. She’s a true knitting superstar, having built an international reputation with her charming, innovative and colourful patterns. Her talk to us was fascinating: it detailed how she had come to be a knitter in the first place (because of a doll unfortunately named Annabel), and how she’d embarked on a career as a designer.

The only really committed knitter in her family was her grandfather, who learned to knit while serving with the RAF during the Second World War. The picture above shows the two of them, both wearing garments he’d made. He was with us in spirit, I think.

If you’re on twitter, then you may have noticed #yarntasting trending in Dublin on Friday night – we were all encouraged to tweet with that hashtag, and hence there was this sort of thing happening all over the place (and if you’re not following us yet, we’re @ThisIsKnit – it’s a great way of getting our news very fast indeed).

As the samples of yarn were handed out, each member of the audience got a sheet of paper with ready-attached strands, so it was easy to record first impressions as we knit with them.

As the weights of yarn were distributed and eagerly pounced on, we got to see sample garments made up from each. For example, Sublime Baby Cashmere Merino Silk is what was used for this garment. If there’s a sweeter poncho available, we’d be very surprised.

As you arrived, you received a This Is Knit goody bag, with a copy of the Debbie Bliss magazine and a raffle ticket. Then, right through the evening, tickets were drawn for really excellent prizes, ranging from special skeins of Malabrigo to jumper quantities of Studio Donegal Merino 2-ply. (If you won one, we’d really love to see what you make with your well-gotten gains!)

Then we went downstairs for the second part of the evening: hanging out in the shop, knitting at the tables outside, trying on Carol and Ysolda’s lovely garments on the balcony, with refreshments served by Rónan and Liam, our delightful barmen.

In the shop, there were a lot of happy people with wide smiles and arms full of new yarn. It’s going to be a very warm and colourful winter.

On the balcony, there were heaps and heaps of the garments we’ve admired online and in books – lovely sweaters like Ysolda’s Chickadee…

…and literally piles of mittens and hats and shawls…

And quietly overseeing it all, James McCullagh’s breathtaking staircase ceiling in the original Powercourt townhouse. It’s one of the world’s great Georgian buildings, and we get to have our friends over to visit.

We’d like to say a very big Thank You! to the Pepper Pot, to Jig, and to the staff and particularly the security personnel of the Powerscourt Centre. It was a wonderful evening, and you all made it easy.

A closer look

September 14, 2012 in Events, Pattern Faves by thisisknit | 1 comment

Back in July, we mentioned that we were looking forward an awful lot to Louisa Harding’s new Orielle, a luxurious alpaca yarn with the subtlest touch of gold sparkle.

It’s now in the shop, and it’s even lovelier than we imagined. You can see the colour range in the picture above. And because we’ve got a lot of sample garments to show at the Yarn Tasting tonight, we’ve had a chance to see how it looks in a finished garment.

This is our current favourite from the Orielle pattern book. It’s called Zarina. You can make it simply as a rectangular lace scarf, but you can also join it into this elegant little cape – just perfect for layering over an evening frock during the coming party season.

And if you haven’t marked HandmAid Craft Day in your diary yet, it’s on Saturday of next week in the Damer Hall on St Stephens Green. There’s classes, there’s yarn, there’s crafted gifts to buy, there’s tea and cake, and it’s all in aid of the DSPCA. Last year’s Craft Day was a lot of fun and an enormous success, and this year’s bound to live up to the challenge!

Now, if you’ll excuse us, there’s still a bit to do for this evening….

Tired but happy!

August 28, 2012 in Events by thisisknit | No comments

Well, the dust has settled, and we’re steadily recovering from the Ravellenic Games. Team This Is Knit did us all proud – sixteen triumphant medallists, many with more than one medal.

We’d like to extend very special thanks to our two captains, Jacqui and Nadia, who organised the entire team (and we’re never easy to organise!), provided assistance, encouragement and yarn, and did the whole with laughter and good humour.

Congratulations once more to olearycarol and surfguna, who won our special Ravellenics goody bags! What will that prize yarn turn into? We’d love to know!

And finally, Don José is so very proud of you all, finishers and non-finishers.

And don’t forget: this astounding summer of sporting magic isn’t over. The 2012 Paralympic Games start tomorrow, with coverage on Channel 4. It’s not time to get up from the sofa just yet!

Things to come

August 21, 2012 in Events by thisisknit | 1 comment

It’s very nearly one of our favourite times of the year: Yarn Tasting time! It’s happening on the 14th of September (a Friday), and the behind-the-scenes preparations are revving up.

If you haven’t experienced a Yarn Tasting before (we’ve had three so far), it’s an evening of yarny frolics when we get to play with the new yarn and fibre that are coming in for the autumn and winter, as well as some old favourites. We have lots of prizes and refreshments and a great deal of fun.

And we have a very special guest. The lovely Ysolda Teague is joining us this year. She’ll be talking to us about her designs and there’ll be samples to try on and exclaim over. (Her workshop the next day is fully booked, though. We’re really not surprised.)

If you want to have a look back at previous Yarn Tastings, you’ll find Julie’s pictures of 2009 and 2010 on her blog, and our report of last year’s is at this link.

Tempted? We thought so. You can click over to book yourself (or a friend) a place right here. We’d love to see you.

In the thick of it

August 3, 2012 in Events, TIK Knits by thisisknit | No comments

Things have been hectic since the start of the Ravellenic Games. There’s all sorts of projects going on, and all sorts of new things being learned. The first medal earned by a Team This Is Knit athlete went to clareblove in the Frogging Trampoline – oh, the relief when the unloved garment gets a chance to be something new and lovely! We can’t wait to see what it’s reborn as!

Speaking of medals, here’s how you earn yours. When you’re finished your event project, go to the main Ravellenics Games forum, and find the thread corresponding to the event. In each, you’ll find instructions on what you need to do – “PLEASE POST THE FOLLOWING” will tell you the information you need to post in the thread, and then there’s a quick FINISH LINE form to fill in. Both stages need to be completed, but it’ll only take a minute or so.

But that’s not all: we’ve also planned some very special This Is Knit medals too, exclusively for our own athletes. These will be awarded after the games end. It’ll be a bit like driving down O’Connell Street through cheering crowds in an open-topped bus!

But that’s still not all: after the games end, we’ll be proudly awarding prizes! There’ll be more of that in a later post, but for now, we’d better get back to the hat, and the cardigan, and the shawl, and the socks….

Don José, our tutelary alpaca, is on guard in the shop, watching over our Ravellenic Flame, which burns undimmed amidst the yarn.

He’s terribly proud of you all. So are the rest of us.

On your marks!

July 26, 2012 in Events, TIK Knits by thisisknit | No comments

We’re approaching peak fitness for the Ravellenic Games, and the fun begins tomorrow evening.

If you’d like to join us in the shop, then the doors of the South William Street entrance to the Powercourt Centre will be open until 6.30 – the security men know we’re expecting you and will let you in.

If you want to show your proud Team This Is Knit allegiance, then you can save the image above and upload it to Ravelry as your avatar. There’s a very good walkthough of how to change avatars at this link.

As your projects get completed, remember to take pictures! We’re planning a big display of photos of team achievements, so if you send us your pictures, we’ll be delighted to add them to the display.

Get set….

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