Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Designed for summer...

...or better yet designed for Florida.  Here is my call to all knitwear designers.  Design more knitwear for summer (and Florida livin').  Now, having requested this I'm also going to attempt to design some knitwear.  While knitting the Vesper pullover I came to realize some summer knitting basics.  What does a summer knit need in it's design?  In my opinion it's a few things.  First a breathable fabric.  Second the resulting garment needs to be lightweight.   and Third the garment needs to be easy to wear.  I've also come to realize that this will mean, again in my opinion, no yarn larger than sport or DK weight.  I know, this means no quick knits. 

So my first assignment (to myself) will be to study Elizabeth Zimmermann's knit designs and principles.  I'm doing this because I believe that EZ is the shiz-knit of knitting.  Only one problem most things she knit were suited for winter and northern climates.  I'm hoping that in studying her designs I'll be able to create lightweight translations.  I also hope that this will help in the future designs that I've thought up over the years but didn't really know how to create a pattern.  Such us a peasant shirt that I've been mulling around in my head. 

I'll keep you updated on how things are coming along. 

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Good luck with that. I am going to sit by and watch. I am totally incapable of designing anything but I will be happy to help with test knitting. ;)

Pengiknits said...

Yeah. I think I am with Jessica on that one. Although I will also volunteer my number skillz.

Anna said...

While I don't live in FL, I'm all for knitting with small yarn. And the cardigans/whatever take longer, but the result is nice.