On Becoming a...Yarn Company?

The Starpath Scarf, one of 
several Lotus yarn patterns!

Developing yarns to add to my DesigningVashti.com site is having a powerful affect on me as a crochet designer. This blog has been about the designing journey since 2005, so I thought I’d blog a series of journal-like posts about my yarn-designing adventure here.

Scroll to the end of this post for a clickable list of all posts in this series.

For the first time ever, I can design with a yarn that I already know I love, that I understand intimately, and over which I have complete control. I don't have to worry that someone will suddenly discontinue it. This has happened a lot. Doris and I have talked about this a lot.

Lotus Yarn in "White Blaze"

Freelance designers do not get paid for all the time it takes to get to know a yarn, yet this is one reason that creating design proposals, especially for yarn companies, is so time consuming. (For magazines, this task is delayed until you find out which yarn gets assigned to your design proposal.)

Big ol' cones of rosy Lotus colors

Over the past few months I’ve been developing a new yarn, and I mean new: not offered elsewhere. The first is called Lotus, and it's nearly ready for purchase! It's a z-twisted sport weight blend of cotton and rayon. The yarn labels are currently being printed, and the last of the first fourteen colors is being dyed right now now available!  

My Tunisian Wicker Stitch in "Satin Grey" Lotus

DesigningVashti Lotus Yarn in "Crystal Blue"

I’m going directly to yarn mills with some ideas for yarns that are not already available. I’ve been an avid yarn user (consumer, swatcher, stasher) for years. It's fascinating how fibers, plying, twist, dyeing, etc. add to my love of crochet and pattern designing! I pay attention to differences between yarns, and so by now it's easy for me to envision my own ideal yarns.

Yarn mill folks seem to appreciate that I study yarns and have some ideas to try. This is a great relief to me! I was afraid I’d get blank looks, or “Well, that’ll cost you!” responses. Instead, they seem more relieved and curious.

Brushed Shells in color "Peachy Sheen"

I’m getting ahead of myself, though. 

Today, what brings me to my blog is that I’m in a design slump! Not a crochet slump, just a design slump (it happens every time I return from teaching a lot of classes at a national conference.) 

Being surrounded by my Lotus yarn in rainbow colors makes this slump a fun experience.

(By the way, I never know how the colors are going to show up on different computer screens, so I try different kinds of lighting and add various photos everywhere.)

This year, shipments of my new yarn were arriving from the mill while I was preparing to teach. Now that I'm home from teaching, I feel like a mother with her newborn baby. I spend every day trying out new stitch patterns with different colors of Lotus. I take photos of Lotus at different angles and times of day. I've dug out early designs for which I used favorite stitch patterns. I'm going through my old books and trying stitches that have always intrigued me. 

It turns out that designing a YARN and making it a reality is like having a baby, in several ways: the months of anticipation, choosing a name, and the "labor." I even had to prepare a new room for its arrival. 

Zenobia Palm Stitch in color "Pearly Pearl"

I love that my early years as a freelance designer have taught me that the best thing I could be doing right now is swatching up different crochet stitches with Lotus! 

Crocheting with a yarn is like getting to know a new person. Each has a distinct temperament, unique strengths & weaknesses, and preferences. The better one knows a yarn, the better a design will work for it. 

As a crochet designer with my own yarn company, I don’t have to go on blind dates with yarns I may never design with again. Lotus is family!

-:-------:-

Other posts in this series (in chronological order):

• "Creating Color Cards for a New Yarn."
• "How Lotus Got Its Name"
• "Birth of a Yarn Company, About Five Months In"
• "How (Not) to Sell Yarn at a Crochet Conference"
• "My Lotus Yarn in Magazines: What It's Like!"
• "DesigningVashti Lotus Yarns at the 12 Year Mark"
• "DesigningVashti Lotus Yarn: in the Magazines (a Gallery)"
• "Crochet Yarn Put Up, Part I of II"

About That Rivuline Shawl Tunisian Crochet Stitch Pattern

Rivuline Shawl by Vashti Braha.
I used an H-8 (5 mm) Tunisian crochet hook
with Manos del Uruguay Serena
(sport weight alpaca-cotton blend).

I can finally SPILL the DEETS on the RIVULINE! They concern two main things: a progressively trippy stitch pattern, and the nearly ONE HUNDRED photos I took of it. (The first photo at left is from the book. You should see how different it looks in some of my pre-publication photos below. Also a few of my GAZILLION swatch variations.) 

I received a copy this week of Dora Ohrenstein's latest book, The New Tunisian Crochet: Contemporary Designs from Time-Honored Traditions. The Rivuline Shawl is a new crochet pattern that I designed for the book.

To me now -- 2 years later! -- the Rivuline Shawl is a tactile record of my mind slowly being blown. That's why I have to show you my own secret pics. 

It turns out that Rivuline came packed with eurekas for my pre-Tunisian-freeforming brain. That swaggy border is 100% Tunisian crochet too. Until Rivuline, I didn't know Tunisian crochet could do that!

I like the stitch texture and color tone quality
of this photo. You can see the birth of Petals
in this early Rivuline swatch!

It started with a stitch pattern idea that grabbed a hold of me back when Dora visited me in December, 2010. Dora's visit turned out to be a big ol' Tunisian crochet PARTY. 

She brought wondrous goodies: a Japanese collection of Tunisian crochet stitch patterns with the best collection of stitch symbols and diagrams I've ever seen; and a big stack of Duplet magazine back issues (half of which have cool Tunisian stuff in them).

Petals Cowl/Ring Scarf:
Cashmere and silk 'offset Rivuline' and a beaded seam.

Witness the "Tunisian and Regular Crochet Visit a Hall of Mirrors!" newsletter issue that welled up a few months later. 

A Rivuline stitch variation
and alternate yarn test.

That newsletter topic is really about Rivuline, but I couldn't say so. Instead I show Petals, its offset beaded cowl version. A few months later, Rivuline caused one of my all-time favorite designs to happen: the Tunisian Filet Aero.

Part of the reason I took so many photos is that I had trouble objectively evaluating them. 
Looking back, I now know why: the stitch experiment was a groundbreaking experience for me of Tunisian crochet. (At the same time, I was finding out how different fibers in pink tones are affected by any little change in light source and angle.) 

Swatching for early Rivulines in cotton, milk fiber,
silk, mohair, merino,  Icelandic lace wt wool...

Notice how the textures of the stitch pattern looks so different in the photos. So does the yarn color. (I remember this driving me crazy! And the emails to Dora: "Does _ or _ come across in this photo? How about this one?") 

For many more photos, also see the Petals photo album.

I eventually got a hold of a copy of the Japanese book Dora showed me. That inspired issue #10, "Tunisian Crochet: Breaking Out of Ruts" of my Crochet Inspirations Newsletter.

Book cover of 
The New Tunisian Crochet

By the way, Rivuline may look like traditional rectangular stole construction, design-wise. In reality, the border is a gradual variation of its stitch pattern. This way, a crocheter who's new to this way doing Tunisian crochet has a chance to get used to it before the variations of it begin. 

Another invisible design feature is that the foundation chain is disguised as a Tunisian Purl Stitch row. This was another discovery for me, which I then used for the seam of the Petals loop scarf/cowl, with beads for fun.

More About Crochet Kimono and Ruana Shapes

Kimono and ruana cartoons from my sketchbooks

I have additional images left over from sending out a Crochet Inspirations newsletter a few days ago (issue #41: Beachy Kimono and Ruana Shapes). 

Also, some diagrams in the newsletter were too small for some people's browsers, so I've reproduced higher-res images of them here. Just click on one to see it fully enlarged.

The ease and versatility of kimono and ruana shapes for crochet (as described in the newsletter) is such a rich topic that even the overflow from a newsletter issue is too much for a blog post!

Alzannah is a ruana.

The way these shapes shift as they drape around the remarkably complex 3D angles of the upper human body is almost alchemical. It took me years of designing, and seeing the same design on different people and in different kinds of yarns, to appreciate how just a slight change in the shape of the neck opening, for example, can create a different garment, or the look of a different decade.

In the cartoons below, compare the seemingly minor variations in front and neck opening shapes. These are only a fraction of the very meaningful variations possible with this shape.

Add to this that there are several other versatile simple shapes that also underlie many seemingly complex garments. I'm just mentioning this because today's blog topic is a mere taste of the cool stuff to consider when designing crochet clothing.

Here are images in the newsletter that some people had a hard time seeing clearly enough. I hope these help:

See issue #41 for explanations of these two sets of 'cartoons'. Remember that you can click on a photo to make it full size in all its cartoony glory.

You know what's funny to me? A few newsletter readers here and there have told me that I give away too much information in them. Sometimes I think it's from concern for my business and intellectual property, and I appreciate that, but I always see it as a good thing. GREAT, even. Can you imagine how awful the opposite would be?! (I can, because a few 'newsletters' I get are really just fancy advertising spam. They give nothing.)

Minuet Vest actually starts out as a ruana.

I can only ever fit into a newsletter issue, or a blog post, a smidgeon of all that I actually have on a topic. So to me, I barely give away anything--it just won't all fit! (It means I need to start writing books.)

Schematics are powerful tools if you know how to use them. It has taken me years--years!--to see everything there is to see in a schematic. For those readers who can get the most from one of the above cartoons, go for it! I'm not giving too much away; you've earned it, and your final design will be different from the ones I "see" when I look at these sketches.

Not only that, the schematics above are missing measurements. That's when the real work of using a schematic begins, anyway. For crocheters who are new to the powers of a schematic, I offer tips in the newsletter for starting out on your own journey of gaining wisdom about them. For example, use the schematics in the patterns you already own, and experiment with them for your own personal use. Try putting your foundation row along a different edge of the shape and see what you think. If you have store bought kimonos or ruanas, measure them and analyze what you like about them. You will gain so much from this!

(I know it's faint, sorry.
It's even less clear if I darken it.)

OK, that said, take a look at this hastily scribbled ruana schematic: it includes measurements! I drew it on scrap paper years ago when my dear friend was visiting. I remember loving the cut velvet wrap she wore. I knew that if I didn't also measure it, I might miss what gave it the compelling flair that it had.

Now here's an actionable, valuable schematic because it has measurements. Am I giving away too much? I don't think so...heck, it doesn't even inspire me anymore! 

Try as I might, I no longer recall what the actual garment looked like. I should have taken a photo or sketched its shape on Kalli while she wore it--whatever it was that made me go to the hurried trouble to measure and sketch it at all.

See, over the years I've also learned what to include in a sketch to give its inspiration staying power.

But if this cartoon inspires you, great. I'm glad you got something out of visiting my blog today! If you crochet one, I'd love to see a picture.

Crochet Designing and TNNA 2011

If I'm a sailboat on a sea of creativity, the waters have been choppy lately! The schedule of my son's summer camp is like a big speedboat that leaves a big wake for my sailboat. He loves the camp and I'm getting the hang of those waves. There's also the TNNA conference I've just attended: it's an unexpected air current that keeps catching my sails! (OK, I'll stop the analogy here.)

'Twas great to see Linda Permann, Doris Chan, and
Ellen Gormley crocheting simultaneously!
(Click here to see one with me in it.)

I've attended and blogged about The National Needlearts Association trade shows ("TNNA shows") every June since 2006. The attendees are primarily needle arts and yarn shop owners, and the exhibitors are businesses that offer yarns, tools, books, etc. for these shops. As a crochet designer I experience the yarn side of the show much more than the needlepoint-cross stitch-embroidery side. 


This year, warm appreciation and abundant new opportunities flowed toward designers! It was wonderful. Almost every business responded with a sparkling 'Yes!' when I asked if they work with indie {crochet} designers, which wasn't so much the case in previous years. I think that as social media and other online resources develop, helping each other succeed just keeps getting easier.

Fun picture of Marly and me taken at the
Ravelry Ice Cream Social, TNNA 2010.
Click here for Marly's original photo
(less grainy resolution than mine)

At a designer dinner I received a remarkable goody bag of everything from a stylish Namaste messenger bag to a coveted skein of pure buffalo yarn. Like I told Marly (see photo at left) who organized the dinner, it's had a great effect on my creativity. 


I'm already using and loving:

• Bijou Basin's yak-bamboo yarn! 
• Skacel's new Addi Click Hook tip 
• The sumptuous Heel (mine is cucumber scented and even my son uses it)
• The elegantly cool yarn snips by The Crochet Dude®. 

Looking forward to using: 

• Wacky Woollies playing cards :-) 
• Eucalan (handy wipes too)
• Boye's exotic rosewood crochet hooks (will work great for 3rd-loop and slip stitch crochet)
• An audiobook from Random House that I've prepared for by starting a new sweater; and of course:
• The Knit Kit! 

In addition to the buffalo yarn, I'm looking forward to swatching up: 

• Yarns from the new Debbie Macomber Blossom Street Collection
• Vickie Howell's Sheep(ish) and Joy! from Caron
• Red Heart Boutique yarns
• Kraemer's Perfection

I have more experiences with new tools and yarns to report when time permits. Until then, I have issue #22 of my Crochet Inspirations newsletter to prepare this week (it won't have anything to do with TNNA, unlike issue #20), and my first-ever crochet videos to upload! 
 
Plus, the usual stream of crochet patterns to complete and publish. 
 
I've been adding charts to some published patterns and I announce stuff like that in my newsletters so please subscribe here.

Slip Stitch Crochet Lace Possibilities

Woke up this morning and saw this:

It could only mean that fairyfolk got into my yarn stash while I slept. 


I don't know if they forgot to take this swatch with them, or what. Maybe they're hinting at something. I'm not even sure what the fairies mean it to be, but get this: 


These are slip stitches. I can see why the wee folk favor slip stitch lace--slip stitches being all about small and all. 


I'm seeing a wide shallow triangular wrap. I hope I can figure out how they made slip stitches look like that.


Full moons embolden fairies, and we just had that super-full moon the other day. If I've noticed that moonlight makes my yarn stash glow, surely fairies have too. Seems to make linen yarn magnetic for them too. Luckily they left my beaded silk and glittery mohair alone! (Wouldn't be easy to rip out fairy crochet swatches with those yarns.)

A Year Full of Crocheted Accessories! Have a Favorite?

Satin Pillows Necklace

Sterling Boutique Handbag

Tunisian Islander

Onefellswoop FlexMitts

Until I learned this month that I'm a finalist for the Crochet Liberation Front's Best Crochet Designer for Accessories award, I didn't realize how many accessories I designed in 2010! 


I've been staying out of trouble, writing up new crochet patterns, learning how my new website works, and how to make downloadable PDF's look the way I want them to--stuff like that.


I'm still a bit stunned: I'm very honored to be nominated and to share the honor with the other designers in this category.  Makes me wonder if I should write a book of accessories to crochet LOL. I guess these patterns can pile up if one keeps designing them, huh. 

Pallas Scarf

Weightless Tunisian

I don't think of them as "accessories" though. Maybe that's why I didn't realize how many I designed in a year. The crochet jewelry designs, especially necklaces & lariats, feel like they're from a different part of my brain than, say, Tunisian shawls and wraps. 


Remember that cowl fever I caught? Cowls, mobiae, and scarves are their own thing too. So are handbags, and fingerless gloves. 

Lovepod Boa

Stitchmerge How-to

(And then that Lovepod Boa, see at left--I don't know which part of the brain that one came from. Is it jewelry worn as a scarf, or vice versa?)

The Crochet Liberation Front created the Flamies Awards about three years ago, and the winners are announced on a special episode of Mary Beth Temple's Getting Loopy podcast. ("Flamies" refers to flaming hooks of justice!)

Chainmaille Cowl-Scarves

Frostyflakes Superpattern

Voting for the Annual Flamies Awards begins this week: March 15. I'm very excited because in only three years it has become the "academy awards" for crocheters. 

Aran Rozsanas Superpattern

1380 Cashmere Picots

Do you have a favorite DesigningVashti crochet accessories pattern?

Happy Crochet Valentines Day!

I crocheted a last-minute Valentine card for my dearest sweetie. He's been my Valentine for 18 years of marriage (plus more years a-courting).

Each page of this Valentine Wishbook is a wish for my Valentine for 2011. (I've always wanted to crochet a book.)

I used Tunisian Simple Stitch for the center background because it's a great surface for adding er, um, embroidery. (Elsewhere I've confessed a weakness for using dimensional fabric paint as a stand-in for embroidery floss. Also, my menfolk like its vivid colors and raised textures.)

The ivory page with the glittery red heart on it is smaller because it's the prototype of the other pages. I didn't have time to make a larger ivory page! The paint requires a long drying time.

Once upon a time I was a young professional calligrapher for a small town. One year I created some special-edition deluxe hand-crafted Valentines. We're talking silk brocade, hand-tinted cameos, real lace trims. They were so labor-intensive that I couldn't sell them! I've carried them with me ever since, and there'd be a photo of them right here and now [insert photo of them here] if I could find where I stored them. One of them was a small hand-lettered book with parchment pages inside.

Plan A for my life's sweetheart in 2011 was to crochet socks. The socks are still happening, just not with a tight deadline. (Anyone who has knit or crocheted socks is probably smiling knowingly right now.)

A crochet Valentine's Day card worked out nicely today as a Plan B. I blogged a 2008 attempt for "Mr. DesigningVashti" and it's been on display in our house ever since.

Christmas Crochet Vest with Silk and Beads

I've been crocheting straight through the holidays! This fancy vest is the laciest of my December projects. At right is a temporary experiment in wearing it backwards, as a tunic. I really like the neckline of it.

I see "Alezannah" when I look at this lacy beaded red silk, maybe because both of my grandmothers have been on my mind a lot this month. The mysterious* name Alezannah is a women's name used over many generations on my mother's side of the family. Sometimes it was spelled Alzanah or Alzannah. A lovely riff on the name is my maternal grandmother's: her name LeeAnna was intended to be an updated version.

Here's LeeAnna holding me when I was almost six months old.

My sister and I called her Mamie and my grandfather Papa. I loved using these names, which are somewhat mysterious** also. I would like to be called Mamie too if I become a grandmother.

My husband went to a local yarn shop and picked out some fabulous yarns and this is one of them! He couldn't wait until Christmas to give me Tilli Tomas Beaded Plie. I knew I wanted to wear it around my shoulders somehow to a holiday party, so I Vashti'd up a stitch pattern that I've always wanted to use with the right yarn.
At left is a cellphone photo taken at the party two nights ago. That's my friend Colette, who coincidentally planned to wear the same yarn to the same party. (She used the Frostyflakes pattern.)

I tried on Alezannah every which way before I created the sleeves. So, in this photo at right (another grainy cellphone shot) I tried it as an asymmetrical wrap. I get great design ideas this way, for example the v-neck top in the first photo. Same thing happened with the Waterlily Layer when I discovered it can be worn upside down and backwards!

*The Alezannahs in my family tree were of English and German descent, as far as I know. The name fascinates me and I've never found it in name books. It seems like an unusually exotic name for generations of rural midwestern ladies. If you know anything about this name, please let me know!

**I'm told these are French names for grandparents; not typical for Ohio LOL. Perhaps the French ancestry on my maternal father's side is more than a sliver? I haven't met anyone else who uses these names for their grandparents (not that the subject comes up with everyone I meet).

The Frostyflakes Scarf/Wrap All-Gauge 'Superpattern'

Name on birth certificate: Frostyflakes Scarf/Wrap

100% mulberry silk, DK wt

Birthdate: July 9, 2010. The heat of summer, when anything can happen.

Takes after: Filet crochet and Spiderweb stitch sisters; the eccentric corner-starting, sideways-crochetin' side of the family.

Caron Simply Soft yarn & silver bells

Malabrigo Lace wt (merino)

Quick Scarf of alpaca & silk

Beaded Cashmere

Well now, Frostyflakes is a zesty little firecracker. Her name is a bit unusual (she's not particularly frosty, nor flaky) but that's because she was born with Uranian aspects to her rising sign. She snorts and hums "Don't Fence Me In" loudly if she hears any talk of swatching, stitch gauges, or yarn requirements.

She's been known to say (holler, actually), "Silk and alpaca blend? Let me at it. I DON'T CARE how many yards are in a skein, dang it I don't need to know. Just give me a crochet hook a little bigger than what the label calls for and I'll have a beaut for ya before sundown. Git now."

Scarf-sized: 150 yds sport wt

Watch your yarn stash around her because she'll take anything and whip it up into a gift scarf or wrap (might want to supervise her around bead stashes too). Her style is, get a running start, jump on the horse and ride at full speed (double crochet stitches and chains). She does however indulge in some fancypants tastes when it comes to the horses she'll ride (i.e., yarn).

Frostyflakes was conceived when a particular yarn put a twinkle in her ma's eye. The exact moment was Saturday afternoon in the market of the 2010 CGOA national Chain Link conference, held in Manchester NH. A particularly sunny Melissa Leapman was in the Leilani Arts booth. She held up a glowing skein of pure mulberry silk yarn and said, "Have you seen this? It's wonderful." I said, "I wonder how many I would need to make something?" She showed me her crocheted shawl and said, "This only took ONE skein. That's really all you need." (See first photo.)

Three Beaded Amigos (red=lace wt & seed beads; white=heavy lace wt & glass beads; blue=light worsted wt & silver bells)

The yarn whispered sweet nothings in my ear, like "if you start in one corner and increase steadily until I'm half used up, then you'll know how big your wrap will be and then you can work your will on every last inch of me." And, "I'm so drapey and delicious that simple double crochet stitches will look great. Group them into some dramatic solid sections, surround them with starry open spaces, and our love will live on forever."

The Scrapbook of Frostyflakes
(Like a doting Mom, I'll update this section whenever newsy items occur.)

• To learn more about the Frostyflakes cornerstart crochet pattern, or to purchase and instantly download it, go to my pattern website here. To do the same in my Ravelry Store, go here. (If you go to my website, you can see lots more patterns--by me, and by Doris Chan, before they appear in Ravelry.)

• Frostyflakes has a social life over in Ravelry. Even if you don't visit her page to purchase the pattern, look at the tabs across the top and you can see the Frostyflakes projects other Ravelers make, when she pops up as a topic in forums, Ravelers' comments, and yarn ideas.

• Frostyflakes has her own Flickr set here. Actually she has two. One is public, and one can be accessed only by using a special pass found in her pattern!