Meanwhile in Maine | Knit Eco Chic

The Easy One

Lindsay Lewchuk September 15, 2022 Announcements, Into the Unknown (2022 theme), Meanwhile in Maine, Pattern Related 2 Comments

A Meanwhile in Maine update Remember back at the beginning of this year when I started to struggle with the Meanwhile in Maine design and decided to put it aside and work on an “easy sweater”? I’m happy to say that pattern release is right around the corner. However, it proved anything but easy! My sample was finished and shot in April with a promised summer 2022 release agreement with the yarn company, Malabrigo. But then my typical pollen fog never lifted. It’s strange how God uses events in our lives for change and this sweater was one such atypical tool! After writing, rewriting, and finally drawing out each and every size in excel, I “thought” I’d cracked it. The …

Tweaking the Design

Lindsay Lewchuk February 24, 2022 Announcements, Into the Unknown (2022 theme), Meanwhile in Maine, Pattern Related Leave a Comment

It’s been a while, but I’ve been working… or should I say, “tweaking”. The little grey cells are still not assimilating the sizes into a single pattern format, so I’ve 1) cast on a new “easy” sweater to try to trick it into processing and 2) spent some more time making the design absolutely perfect.

Into the Unknown

Lindsay Lewchuk January 20, 2022 Announcements, Into the Unknown (2022 theme), Meanwhile in Maine, Pattern Related, Slip and Rise Pattern Club 4 Comments

We got chatting about Maine and the move and other big 2022 events… Puddles 10-year gotcha anniversary ☹, and cough, turning 40, cough. She threw out “into the unknown”. And ya know what, it was perfect! Not a daunting kind of ‘unknown,’ but a year of adventure in stitches which didn’t restrict the creative juices to one particular cast on / bind off method. “Into the Unknown” was born with joy and friendship, new possibilities, and future new locales!

Laddering stitches with Puddles and "close knit friends" t-shirt

Two Kinds of Ladders

Lindsay Lewchuk December 30, 2021 Announcements, Hems and Ends, Meanwhile in Maine, Pattern Related, Puddles Leave a Comment

Sometimes things sound better than they look. I didn’t start the patterning until after the short rows were over to keep the pattern writing concise – 3 simple stockinette short rows and then a nice long pattern set up across the back.

Upper Back

Lindsay Lewchuk October 28, 2021 Announcements, Hems and Ends, Meanwhile in Maine, Pattern Related 2 Comments

After a few false starts… The sweater is underway! The back to the ‘join in rnd’ part is complete, which gave me an opportunity to test the full length of the chart once through.

Foundations

Lindsay Lewchuk October 1, 2021 A System of Grading, Announcements, Meanwhile in Maine, Pattern Related Leave a Comment

As the workers create the foundations of our home, I get to the foundations of the sweater to wear there! The foundation for my designs is excel. I start with a template I created in Jill Wolcot’s “A System of Grading” course and go from there.

Proportional Design

Lindsay Lewchuk September 17, 2021 Hems and Ends, Meanwhile in Maine, Pattern Related Leave a Comment

To the bat cave, batman! The next step is to take the data mined from swatching and plug it into excel and illustrator. One of the design elements that is very important to the brand of “Knit Eco Chic” is proportional design elements. So, I sketch out the Medium first (since that’s my base size) and then the small and large. I use a 10% scale and then do a locked ratio size increase to blow it up (or rather, I just zoom in, but that’s not so easy for you all to do reading this). For this design it’s the back center panel that is the main design element. Analyzing the sketch – 2 things pop out. I’ll have …

Meanwhile in Maine…

Lindsay Lewchuk August 19, 2021 eco world, Hems and Ends, Meanwhile in Maine, Pattern Related 4 Comments

A site photo from the ground clearing company was sent to me this week and I was so excited to see where my future first nest is going! It made me reflect upon the joy of the process and not just the end result so I decided to try something a little different with my next design. Puddles and I invite you to join along in the process of designing a sweater worthy of Maine’s forecasted winters!