Koigu Journal September 2014
Let's Koigu this!
This month we want to inspire you toward a next step in playing with colors.
The Koigu philosophy has always been to speak through color and design is the tool
Maie and Taiu have employed to translate, explore and embrace color.
So this month we want to Koigu a simple T-shirt pullover with seven KPPPMs in the
easiest kind of intarsia knitting- a regular group of stacked squares.
Of course, the first fun bit is choosing. Try not to be too regimented in your choices.
The pattern for the pullover included here uses brights and darks. They share a few
things: blue, some grey, a touch of pinky red.
But they're different enough to stand out as units when put into squares.
You'll see some alternate colorways included here.
The swatch is a group of pale-ish colors unified by their being "stippled" with color.
That is, they are made up of misty dots of color rather than larger, denser lengths of color.
The second colorway variation contains dyelots that share pinks and oranges.
Add a touch of yellow and the occasional deep hint to make this one sing.
Finally, there's something in between: loud pink, heathered lavender, strong
purple, a dark stipple and a hint of light blue-green.
Have a blast choosing, exchanging, adding your own color ideas!
Intarsia knitting involves separate lengths of each color and twisting them
when you finish one and start another.
The T-shirt pattern uses eight squares in each tier, so you'll be happier if you knit a
square of one colorway and then unravel that square, measure how much it took
and cut lengths of the other colors. Make sure you give yourself a few extra inches
of yarn so that you have enough to weave in the ends as you go. Now you can have
the amount you need for each unit and just pull the lengths through when you need them or wind your yarn into "butterflies" (there are wonderful online tutorials explaining both techniques).
Just remember to twist the new color around the old when you switch so you don't
get holes in between the squares! That's easily done if you always pick up the new
color from under the old one.
When using as many colors as this, some knitters find it helpful to put each individual ball in a plastic bag and mark the bags A through G. That way you won't accidentally grab the wrong color.
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