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Category Archive: behind the scene

Prairie Shawl

May 2nd, 2013

My Cotton & Cloud Fresh Inspirational Knits Vol.1 Spring/Summer 2013 collection is now available! It’s been thrilling and humbling at the same time to see four of my designs being within top 10 of the popular patterns when the collection was released. Thank you so much for your kind support!

One of my favourite designs from the collection is the Prairie Shawl made from just one skein of The Buffalo Wool Co. yarn called ‘Sexy’.

I first encountered bison yarn at the Knitting & Stitching Show here in London in 2009, at the busy Buffalo Wool Co.’s booth. I was amazed to discover how warm, yet wonderfully light, this unusual yarn is.

Buffalo_Wool_Co_Sexy_Natural_2

Buffalo Wool Co. in Sexy:
Lace weight: 50% bison-down, 50% bombyx silk
400+ yards/2 oz. skein

Buffalo_Wool_Co_Sexy_Natural_1

I wasn’t the only knitter who was intrigued by this latest addition to their amazing selection of yarns. It has a beautiful shimmer and is a real pleasure to knit! At the time, I was obsessed with designing half circular shawls and this new feather-light yarn inspired me to design the Prairie Shawl, based on the vast landscape where herds of bison still live.

As a huge fan of David Attenborough, I had seen the American bison in one of his series. I was delighted by the magnificent animals and the beauty of the prairie landscape with its distant mountains!

Since the yarn is an exotic, luxury material in Britain, I wanted the design to have a special story behind it. So not only is it enjoyable to knit, the finished shawl also forms a subtle, picture-pattern telling the timeless story of the prairie landscape.

Worked from the centre outwards, the first wave of pattern depicts the sky and clouds, followed by the zigzag section representing the impressive mountain ranges. Then there are columns of leaves symbolising the lush prairie grasslands that provide sustenance for these wonderful creatures!

I do hope you’ll like the Prairie Shawl and enjoy creating something a little ‘out of the ordinary’ from this amazingly soft and warm American buffalo yarn!

(Here’s a link to a similar BBC programme about U.S. bison).

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The Sea Urchin Shawl

February 21st, 2013

My latest design, the Sea Urchin Shawl, was inspired by the dainty, pink sea urchins I once saw in the Galapagos Islands. You can find the pattern in Knit Today (Issue 82) under Sea Urchin Shawl using Skein Queen Elixir. This Knit Today issue is still available in the shops or by subscription.

The design inspiration really comes from the happy memories I have of the time I spent in the wonderful Galapagos Islands, as a young environmental volunteer many years ago. Here’s a picture of me with a giant Galapagos tortoise!

One of the islands has a beautiful, white sandy beach on which thousands of sea urchin shells wash ashore and I was overwhelmed by the beauty of this unspoilt natural environment.

When Knit Today asked me to design a triangular shawl at the end of last year, specifying that it should be ‘extra-long’ in the width so it can be completely wrapped around the body, I started to think about my new design.

And later, when I saw Skein Queen’s Elixir yarn and its beautifully subdued colours, I remembered the delicate pink of the Galapagos sea-urchins and ping! I had my inspiration! Needless to say, I knitted my Sea Urchin Shawl design in the Elixir shade called Shell

Skein Queen Elixir Yarn

Skein Queen is an independent, U.K. hand-dyed yarn brand owned by the very talented, Debbie Orr. Elixir is a DK weight yarn, made from a mixture of 40% Superfine Alpaca, 40% Merino and 20% Silk, which is lovingly and expertly dyed by Debbie. One skein weighs 100 g and measures 230 m.

As you can imagine from the fibre content, Elixir yarn is light and soft and has a beautiful, natural shimmer. Every stitch I knitted looked like a little jewel passing through my fingers and the finished shawl drapes beautifully!

So I can highly recommend Skein Queen yarn dyed to perfection by Debbie. I’m telling all of my knitting friends to pop into her online shop to see lots more of her gorgeous, hand dyed yarns at www.skeinqueen.co.uk

Sea Urchin Shawl

Triangular shawls are often knitted from the centre outwards and you would usually increase an equal number of stitches on either side and at the centre.

However, in this design I added more stitches on either side of the triangle than the centre, to make the shawl longer in the ‘width to height’ proportion than is usual in other patterns.

The eyelet pattern of the stitches was inspired by the pretty rows of holes on dried sea urchins and the eyelets are sandwiched between rows of knit and purls, so it isn’t complicated. The edgings are neatly finished in crocheted chain stitch.

I hope you enjoy knitting and wearing my Sea Urchin Shawl design, and hope it will make you remember happy times you’ve spent by the seaside, too!

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Behind Mikan – Be Warm, Be Bright, Be Happy!

November 29th, 2012

Today, I would like to talk about the inspiration behind my exciting new Winter 2012/2013 Collection!

This collection is the very first one for Cotton & Cloud and I felt it was important to have a theme that is personal to me and reflects my life experiences. Therefore, my very first Winter Collection is a fusion of my fond memories of being a child in Japan and then my new life in the U.K.

So here it is and I hope you will enjoy making and wearing these designs, as much as I enjoyed creating them!

Mikan Snood & Hat

The attractive Mikan Snood & Hat are perfect winter-warmers and will definitely cheer you up during the cold, dark winter days. I have designed the Mikan Snood & Hat to be decorated with cute, chunky clumps of cable-like stitches making a chain of oval blobs, like tiny tangerines!

Mikan...

The inspiration for this design comes from my childhood in Japan and the delicious little tangerines I loved to eat in the wintertime.

Mikan is the Japanese word for tangerine or satsuma and these brightly-coloured fruits were my very favourite winter fruit in Japan. I used to eat them sitting at the Kotatsu table and sometimes while I knitted.

Citrus obsession!

When I later came to the U.K. to study, the fruits I could eat at boarding school were more often bananas and green apples. My beloved tangerines were replaced by clementines which, to me, are completely different and I missed eating the sweet and juicy tangerines at home with my family.

Now that I come to think about it, this must be one of the reasons why, as an adult, I am obsessed with eating citrus fruit – along with my obsession for pain au chocolat!

Video tutorial

However, let me get back to the Mikan Snood and Hood instructions!

The clusters of cable-like stitches are made by knitting 5 stitches together and then increase back to 5.
In over to prevent fabric being pulled too much (due to k5 tog), you should make yarn overs on the previous row that are subsequently dropped.

Here’s a quick tutorial I made for you.

Chunky & Cosy

The snood is reversible and I used Manos Wool Clasica, which is one of my favourite yarns. Manos Wool Clasica has varying yarn thickness, which makes the finished article more interesting and almost rustic.

Straight yarn would also work well, for example, something like Artesano Aran would turn out beautifully.

So what was your favourite winter food as a child – it’s so nice sometimes to remember those days with your family isn’t it?