Vintage Style

The recent Prairie collection for The Knitter Magazine Issue 144 features four elegant patterns inspired by wild flowers and vintage styles. I am absolutely delighted that my Bee Balm Sweater is included alongside beautiful designs by Kristin Blom, Maddie Harvey and Mary Henderson!

Bee Balm Sweater by Emma Vining
Image from the Knitter Magazine

Bee Balm was inspired by elements from a classic lace trimmed blouse. For the stitch pattern, I used long lines of eyelets with delicate cable details. Texture plays a big part in all my design work and this sweater begins with a reverse stocking stitch background, changing to a stocking stitch background for the upper section. Picot cast-on and cast-off edges complete the vintage effect. My Bee Balm sweater looks amazing in beautiful Walcot Yarns Opus yarn. The gorgeous colour is the rich, deep shade of plum.

Staircases

I love collecting all kinds of inspirational images to spark new knit design ideas and one of my favourite subjects is the staircase! This month Knitting magazine have published my Staircase Shawl in Issue 201. The inspiration for this design comes from the wonderful National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh.

Staircase Shawl by Emma Vining
Image from Knitting, GMC Publications

The particular inspirational staircase for my shawl is located in the upper levels of the building. I love everything about these stairs, from the curve of the steps, to the smooth and textured triangular features beside them, and also the monochrome colour way shown in my photo. The National Museum of Scotland is full of fantastic inspiration and there are amazing views of Edinburgh Castle from the top levels too!

Staircase in the National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh
Photo by Emma Vining

View from the top of the National Museum of Scotland
Photo by Emma Vining

Stunning architectural features inside the NMS
Photo by Emma Vining

My Staircase Shawl knitting pattern combines textured triangles, eyelets and short row shaping to make the series of steps. The short rows create a shawl with a gentle curve, just like the stairs in the museum. Using gradient shades of yarn sets off the stitch pattern perfectly and the John Arbon Knit by Numbers yarn range has so many different colour ways to choose from! These beautiful greys were the perfect match for my design ideas, but the shawl would look amazing in any of the colour gradients. To knit the shawl, you will need three 25g mini-skeins and one 100g full skein of 4ply KBN.

Staircase Shawl detail

Photo by Emma Vining

The Craftie Awards!

Exciting news! My blog has been nominated for a Craftie award!

Love Crafts have just announced the nominations for all the Craftie awards categories and I would be really grateful of your vote for my blog! You can use this link to access the voting page.

Here are all the categories. My blog has been notated for the Noteworthy Knitting Blog!

• ●  Creative Crochet Blog, 2019
• ●  Noteworthy Knitting Blog, 2019
• ●  Stylish Stitching Blog, 2019
• ●  Motivated Multi Craft Blog, 2019
• ●  Dedicated Indie Designer, 2019
• ●  Blog Personality of The Year, 2019

Voting opens from today, 1st November 2019, and closes on 18th November 2019. The shortlist will be announced on 26th November 2019 and the winners on 2nd December 2019.

As a way of celebrating my nomination I would like to share links to some of the blogs and websites that inspire me and that I hope you will enjoy too.

First up is the wonderful Knitting Now and Then blog, full of fascinating knitting information including detail about items from the Knitting & Crochet Guild Collection. Barbara, the blog author, is the publications curator for the Knitting & Crochet Guild and her blog shares her research into a wide range of the magazines, books, booklets and patterns held in the Guild collection.

Two years ago, I was delighted to be the winner of the Birlinn Yarn Company Knitting Design competition! I wrote about meeting owner Meg at her home on the Isle of Berneray in a previous post, here. Since then, we have kept in close contact and Meg and I have recently been working together on new knitting designs inspired by pottery fragments found on the beaches of Berneray. Through her blog, Meg shares news from her croft on the Isle of Berneray and updates about her gorgeous yarn. You can read Meg's blog here and see her range of knitting patterns using Birlinn yarns here.

One of my favourite ways to be inspired is by visiting museums and galleries. When the opportunity came up to volunteer at the V&A Museum in London, I jumped at the chance! Every time I walk in the door of the museum, I see the world of design in a different way. I love being part of the Visitor Experience team, helping visitors get the most out of their trip to the Museum. The museum curators and staff share their extensive knowledge through many different blogs and articles on the V&A website. A great place to start exploring is with this interesting post on the history of hand knitting, here, and a selection of knitted objects from the V&A collection, here.

These are just three of the many blogs and articles that I enjoy reading. Being a part of the Lovecraft Craftie awards is a great way to find out about other designers and crafters and I'm really looking forward to discovering more amazing blogs. Thanks so much for your support for my blog and please do vote if you can. Happy knitting and crafting!